Carwashtagnacht - Distance -1996- (Cassette, Self-Released), Hungary

Carwashtagnacht was a Hungarian industrial metal band from the small city of Békéscaba in the south-east of Hungary formed by Kiss Balázs (guitar), Knyihár Pál (bass guitar) and Sörös Gergö (vocals and programming). They played a Godflesh inspired style in which long-lasting repetitive metal riffs were combined with drum machine patterns with in this case gloomy distorted vocals in Hungarian and English. A band like Godflesh has had a lot of influence in Eastern Europe after the change of the political system in the 90's. Because of the lack of musical extremes in dominant music culture in socialist countries like Hungary before the 90's, many people were inspired by metal and punk bands.

Those type of foreign alternative bands were also some of the first to tour the smaller cities in Eastern Europe. At first many of these unclassifiable alternative experimental metal bands came from Italy for example, but eventually even bands from Latin America came to play. Eastern Europe became a new fertile domain after it had previously been closed for tours of such bands. This development also had its influence on locals that in turn started bands with a similar sound. I think it's also a reason why metal and alternative rock styles are still big in Eastern Europe. But aside from that: the 90's was just an insane decade for the development of any genre really. More than end results and completion, potential ruled the musical output.

In the late 90's Carwashtagnacht published a CD on the legendary Trottel Records in Hungary that together with the label Bahia was responsible for the output of alternative and experimental bands in Hungary. The label revolved around the alter-rock band Trottel that started out in the early 80's as a punk band and later evolved into an ethno-experimental-space-band.

This particular cassette of Carwashtagnacht seems to be some sort of demo tape that was self-released a long time before their official album. The musical style is somewhat different to what usually finds itself to the blog, but it's important to keep extending genres and to shed light on the Hungarian underground of the 90's that is totally overlooked and that I happen to have an access to. The term rare doesn't even qualify anymore for a cassette like this. Specially since the band comes from the countryside and not from the capital Budapest.

More obscure Hungarian tapes will be gradually uploaded to the blog.

Get it HERE

Sukursaal - Union -198X- (Tape, Pion Tapes), Netherlands

Even though 'low-key' this was already digitized I figured to rip this anyway to shed some more light on this band since the music is really good, sometimes even better stuff than some of the wave reissues that came out throughout the years.  

Sukursaal were a Dutch wave band (Nederwave) consisting of Marc de Reus, Maarten de Reus, Marijke Bruggink and other collaborators. They made this one cassette that came out on the Pion Tapes label from Delft (a small picturesque city in between The Hague and Rotterdam where for example famous Dutch painter Johnannes Vermeer was born). Pion Tapes also released the new wave band La Peste that was posted on No Longer Forgotten Music ages ago.

Sukursaal played interesting poppy new wave music that displayed a classic Dutch wave sound, synthetic minimal synth tracks, but also used funky basslines and a jazzy impro sound. The Dutchness is emphasized in tracks like 'Dikes (Protect Me)' where the lyrics are: "Dikes protect me from being washed under", yep most of Holland is still under sea level and we really need those dikes.

The music reminds me a lot of the Rotterdam band Dojoji, of electro-jazz outfit Niew Hip Stilen, but also of Malice In Wonderland (just a lot less batcave style of new wave). The tracks are quite distinct from each other and also quite clean because of the studio recording production. The highlights are the tracks with female vocals and the electronic ones.

Many many more Dutch tapes from the home-taping era still to come to the blog this year!

Get it HERE

Bizim Oyun Havalari ‎- Burcu Burcu Türkiye'm -198X- (Tape, Erdal Plak), Turkey

So I had this tape laying around for decades at home, but never properly gave it a listen until recently. I thought the music was typical Turkish folklore music, produced as some sort of souvenir, but it actually turned out to be one of the nicest psychedelic Turkish tapes I have yet heard.

Turkish folklore music is usually acoustic and obviously covering traditionals, often also quite hard to distinguish from each other. This tape too is a lengthy mix-up of all kind of similar traditional Turkish songs and melodies, but the key lies in the fact that the whole thing is electrified with the electro-saz (electric bağlama) as well as with keyboards that were manufactured in the 80's. The music is easily to be put in line with the sounds of older Turkish and Anatolian psychedelic music like Selda, Erkin Koray or Edip Akbayram in which the use of electric instruments took over from the acoustic predecessors. A bit like what Miles Davis did in Jazz at a certain moment.

The music on Burcu Burcu Türkiye'm could very well be the summer soundtrack of you moving forward in an ever-lasting trans-orient-express while its engine driver and yourself are spacing out on a fair amount of hashish and opium discussing Rumi's poetry. You're flying through the Turkish countryside after a magical woman has just red your future in the coffee ground while you're solving the mysteries of the Nazar. It could be this.

But aside from that, the music is also creating a similar atmosphere as contemporary artists like the Syrian musician Omar Souleyman or the Sahrawi psych-force Group Doueh from the Western Sahara. Obviously these are different geographical regions, but they are somewhat musically connected in their use of the endless repetitive psychedelic oriental sounds inducing their trance.

The tape is unindexed which seemed a better choice. Specially the B-Side is a psychedelic treat! Enjoy the trip!

Get it HERE