Hotcha's Calypso Now Label

July 4, 2011

Herschell Gordon Lewis, accountant of splatter and gore

Filed under: Uncategorized — Hotcha @ 11:35 am

The baddest, the bloodiest splatter’n’gore movies are often made by unglamorous accountant types, me seems. What does an accountant type look like, you probably immediately ask yourself, dear cliché-hating reader. Thanks for asking, proves we both are intelligent people. Accountant types look like splatter’n’gore filmmakers.

Herschell Gordon Lewis

Like Herschell Gordon Lewis. He’s the creator of the gore film, it is said. I just hope he does not read this here, because this could be the case, he being at the NIFFF in Neuchâtel at the moment, an 80 year old monsieur, which has been parked by his still actif wife in the festival center while she does the weekly shopping, that’s what he looks like. I just passed by him, he was sitting there, waiting to be picked up again, I could have easily slit his throat or chewed off one of his fingers, nobody would have seen it, nobody would have noticed a thing, he was there all alone. I could have acted like Fuad Ramses, the bloody caterer from Blood Feast, the first Splatter’n’Gore movie, made in 1963 by Lewis. Ramses goes much further than slitting throats or chewing fingers, though, he does not hesitate to cut out the tongue of a blonde bombshell, of course she’s still alive while he’s at it

Later that day Lewis will present his movie to a young crowd of a enthusiastic public, where he tells them that he made this film for commercial reasons. Well, that’s a reason I do like, chapeau. Searching for a kind of a movie that has never been made before, that will make it into the cinemas and will motivate people to shove out their dollar. And to make the movie the cheapest way possible. Not the worst set of ideas to create a great and lasting artwork. So he invented gore. And he was a successful accountant, too. Wrote the music himself, for instance, because he obviously hates to pay people to do things he can do himself, maybe even better. He also did this for his second movie, 2000 Maniacs, where he even wrote the catchy and cheasy hillbilly title track. It’s catchy, proof: He sings it that day with his public, “Hee-Haaa” – a great entertainer, the man, who without problem can pretend he does this here for the first time, because we are such a wonderful public. Of course he must have done that a dozen times….

2000 Maniacs is his favorite HGL movie, according to his words. Why are so few people here? For Blood Feast he had a full house. But as he says himself, 2000 Maniacs is not easy to understand for a european public, treating a very US theme, the civil war of the 19th century. The dialogs are sometimes hard to understand, the recording quality is just too poor. But for me, of course, this is a sign of quality, because the first take is always the best, just leave it at that, the next ones can only get cleaner, that’s all.

Blood Feast

So let’s get back to Blood Feast. The first splatter’n’gore movie. The first in a billion dollar business. And a very good movie, absolutely. Those trashy colors, plenty of green orange red, the wooden dialogues, this fantastic non-acting which is so difficult to obtain, the special effects that come directly from the second hand shop. Just look at the egypt goddess, a shop window dummy with painted-on gold, 2 meters of velvet, all in all about 80 $ worth of material.

You can appreciate this movie from so many different angles. First of all, it’s pure esthetic pleasure: the camera, the cheesy fake egyptian death march music, it’s a rock video, many bands would be proud to have such a thing on Youtube. Never forget, Lewis is not a musician, he just hates to spend money and wants to cut costs wherever he can!

Then you have those fantastic dialogues: the desperate housewive, who wants to have a very special party for her daugter, who is a totally underexposed blonde – she uses the same spray-on tan as Shawne Fielding, by the way… At the end, she even lays herself under the demonic egyptian’s knife, to not spoil his fun! But first on my list are the two FBI agents in their brownish office, plastic tree in the corner, chewing on a pipe, not ashamed to show that they do not have a clue – and when they find the one piece this mosaic is made of, they can go on and on about how clever and intelligent they sherlockholmed this case.

Hello David Lynch

You can become addicted to this kind of storytelling. There’s a whole crowd of filmmakers who created a complete work on Lewis’ invention. Hello David Lynch! I do not know all of HGL’s movies yet, but I presume, it’s like with all trash: First try is the best. I could be wrong, and anyway, it doesn’t matter. What I can say, is that I’ve underestimated Lewis’ work until now, which is completely my fault, I could have watched them all on the net for free. Let me recommend you to buy them all, you’ll get a better screen resolution and a better sound where the music is concerned (I do not talk about the dialogs…). And show them at your next party, with a beamer, on a big stereo.

The Vicious Brothers

When I’ve started this post here, I planned to write about the Vicious Brothers and their movie Grave Encounters. It’s a surprising ghost story treating a very swiss theme, I do not know if this was planned as such. Maybe I’ll write about it tomorrow. Do not miss this movie, it will be screened one more time at the NIFFF in Neuchâtel, July 5 2011, 17:00 at the Apollo One.

June 12, 2011

Nick Porsche: New tape “Hit-Breaker”

Filed under: Catalogue — Hotcha @ 5:03 pm

Need I say more about Nick Porsche? I already wrote a review of his gig at Labieu, and we’ve finally got the live recordings together. The cassette will be released in about a week, time we need for mastering and copying the tapes and have the cover printed. Here’s a rough mix of “Doreen” from my Audacity file for pre-listening.

Nick Porsche: Doreen

Just press play
[audio:doreen.mp3]

Do not miss to order here from Calypso Now (or buy directly from him at gigs!). His first cassette “Deutsche Hitparade Vega 2000” is still available, and it’s very recommended too. This was his first release with tracks from his Apple notebook archives, quite different from his live sound, so you really should get it. He also has a finished album in the can waiting for CD release, which of course can not be handled by Calypso Now, we really do hold on to analog cassettes… So watch this space for more news about the man!

June 4, 2011

Grindstone Redux

Filed under: Bands — Tags: — Hotcha @ 3:43 am

Grindstone Redux (2009)Just came across a documentary film you can watch for free, Grindstone Redux by Andy Szava-Kovats, the guy behind Data-Bank-A. The movie assembles interviews by american cassette culture activists of the 80’s and gives an impression of the creative power this network set free on a worldwide basis.

I noted with interest the bizarre interiors some of those people live in – I mean, who would hang a prominent Maxell cassettes logo on his wall?

May 27, 2011

They call him Hit Machine

Filed under: Bands — Tags: — Hotcha @ 8:12 pm

No joke – local songwriter and performer Nick Porsche, former member of Puts Marie, still under his thirties and with more than 10 years of professional musicianship under his belt: When I recorded his last gig here in town, I had a guy saying this to me: “That’s a real hit machine you got here…”

yeah!

But I haven’t got him, unfortunately, I’m not in a position to push such a promising hit machine how it has to be done. So all I can do is put out yet another cassette of him, it will be the second in six months, and just hope he gets the recognition he deserves. It’s not that I think this would be a favor, he doesn’t need this from me, and the gig I’ve witnessed on the night of the Eurovision Song Contest in the cellar of squatted Labieu was just plain crazy. Imagine a guy sitting on a stool behind a drum kit of bass and snare drum, both hit with a foot pedal, sometimes switching to the hi-hat, playing an old no-name trashy electric guitar, singing over a second guitar amp, a bit nervous maybe at the start, but really getting off from the third song, delivering hit after hit after hit, all self-penned of course. It helps that the ladies are going crazy. And everybody knows that this is the only true sign of star material…

I didn’t have my cam with me, it’s a real pity. But I recorded the whole gig and listened to it at least 10 times since: One of the very few gigs I ever saw that had no filler at all, and that during 60 minutes.

We will put out a cassette of the gig, and in the meantime try to catch Nick Porsche if he ever hits your town. He’s uploaded some songs from this concert, but beware: MP3 just doesn’t have the power of an analog audio cassette. So watch this space for the release. And watch his MySpace for gigs announcements!

January 15, 2011

Late Night Links

Filed under: Uncategorized — Hotcha @ 1:09 am

Listen to this here, a history of spanish avantgarde underground: http://www.ubu.com/sound/spanish_avant.html.

If you rather feel like watching, then here’s a fantastic movie I found: http://retrovision.tv/freevideo/bigamist-the-1953.

First of all, it features the great Ida Lupino. I always liked here a lot, but I did not know that she also directed movies. Here she does. You find other movies of her on the same site, Retrovision. Just hit the Ida Lupino tag.

Voici un lien vers sa biographie sur Wikipedia (francais). Elle était tout simplement adorable!

January 12, 2011

Bovine Music Show Archives

Filed under: Free MP3 Download — Hotcha @ 6:15 pm

Looking for Steven Tetzloff on the net, I found this here:



They had a show where Steven’s music was played. Go here for that one!

If you know of the whereabouts of Steven Tetzloff, please get in touch – I want to rerelease his music very badly!

January 4, 2011

Sich in Hoehlen schlagen

Filed under: Catalogue,deutsche Postings,Our shop — Hotcha @ 7:42 am

Seit ich mein Kassettenlabel Calypso Now im November 2009 wieder reaktiviert habe, ist einiges passiert. Das schaut ihr euch am besten in meinem Shop oder auf dem ‘gedruckten’ Flyer an.


Die Westschweizer Journalisten haben das Projekt schon mehrfach aufgegriffen, meist radiophonisch, hier nun auch gedruckt in der ‘Vitamine Orange’ Tribune Le Matin. Gefaellt mir gut, der Artikel.

Wuerde es gerne uebersetzen, aber dafuer gibt’s ja die Google Sprachtools. Das toent dann etwa so:

Calypso Jetzt hat das Label schlug sich mit Aufnahmen in Hoehlen, oft mit einer Revox-Recorder. Des productions limitees a 150 exemplaires, des cassettes vendues entre 5 et 9 francs: Hotcha s’est contente du minimum, comme en temoigne son logement fait de bric et de broc. Produktion limitiert auf 150 Exemplare von Kassetten zwischen 5 und 9 Franken Hotcha lediglich die Mindestanforderungen, wie sie ihre Gehaeuse Kleinigkeiten gemacht belegt verkauft.

.

January 3, 2011

Sister Ray live tape

Filed under: Bands,Free MP3 Download — Tags: — Hotcha @ 10:05 am

Sister Ray were a band from Ohio, who in the late eighties had some unexpected succes among european labels – well, to speak the very truth, they were just on one european label, Semaphore from Holland, but they released four records of those psychedelic punks. Psychedelic? Will they kill me when they read this? Their trademark were not the long stereo noodles psychedelic usually stands for, they were on the contrary very sharp and blasted out tune after tune without really having a break between them. I saw them live @Hirscheneck in Basel back then, and they simply ruled. You’ll get a good impression on the live tape I put on here. But they were psychedelic all right, I mean, they always played Pink Floyd’s Take Thy Stethoscope And Walk. And they had a farfisa organ. At least then. They dropped it later, I believe. Read all about here: http://www.nkvdrecords.com/sisteray.htm

I’m a bit pissed, because I added this tape to discogs 6 months ago, and nobody seems to care. How I know? Because nobody did hit the ‘I want this’-button. Which is rather unusual for such a tape. It was self-released by the band, and there were only 100 copies made. I bought it at their gig, and I also bought a solo tape of their guitar wizard Mark Hanley. Will post it one day here, I think.

Sister Ray Official Live Cassette 1986

Just press play
[audio:sister ray live tape side 1.mp3,sister ray live tape side 2.mp3]

To download right-click

December 24, 2010

Weihnachtsgeschenk

Filed under: Catalogue,deutsche Postings,Free MP3 Download,Our shop — Tags: — Hotcha @ 7:25 pm

Alle Unternehmen und Institutionen sind an Weihnachten ganz weihnaechtlich gestimmt, um endlich so richtig schwarze Zahlen zu schreiben. Da will ich nicht abseits stehen. Hier also mein Weihnachtsgeschenk, verknuepft mit der obligaten Werbebotschaft. Was wollt ihr zuerst? Geschenk oder Botschaft? ueberlegt’s euch mal…

 

OK, wie ihr wollt: Beides gleichzeitig, so sei es!

Nun habe ich ja mein Kassettenlabel aus den Fruehachtzigern wieder belebt, ganz einfach darum, weil es total Spass macht. Kauft ueberhaupt wer die Kassetten?

Falsche Frage!

Die Frage ist, produzieren Musiker heute ueberhaupt noch Kassetten. Und die Antwort gibt’s hier: Ich will nun kurz von meiner neuen Kassettenserie reden, die, welche keinen Namen hat, aber ein ganz tolles Aussehen! Etwa so:



Und das alles in Hochglanz in einem chemischen Verfahren eingeritzt oder so, ich mache das nicht selber, zahle aber ein Vermoegen dafuer, also muss es gut sein. Schoen ist es ja allemal.

Und wie das klingt, wollt Ihr wissen? Da kann ich nur mit Pull My Daisy aufwarten, meiner frueheren Band, die anderen Sachen will ich verkaufen (auch PMD kann man kaufen, Cover siehe oben). Ihr hoert hier ein Demo, muss aus 1988 sein, ich habe noch in einer Kiste eine gute Handvoll davon gefunden, das hatte damals kein spezielles Cover. Habe es ein bisschen ueberarbeitet (mit Audacity, ich geb’s zu…) und neu auf die alten Kassetten kopiert, das alte Cover noch auf die Kassette geklebt, und dieses neue als Hommage auch an einen meiner praegenden Einfluesse, Ted Robert eben, voller Liebe hingetrasht.

Pull My Daisy Demo 1988, wiederveroeffentlicht als “Oscar de France decerne a TED ROBERT”

[audio:pmd_demo_side1_betterversion.mp3,pmd_demo_side2_betterversion.mp3]
Einfach den Abspielknopf druecken

To download right-click

So, und nun weiter im Verkaufgespraech: Die Sachen gibt’s bereits oder bald in meinem neuen Webshop http://www.calypsonow.ch/shop/catalog. Zudem habe ich mich auch erweichen lassen durch das staendige Klagen “Ach, haette ich nur gewusst, dass es so geile Kassetten gibt, ich haette mein Kassettengeraet nicht entsorgt” und habe ein paar Kisten Geraete eingekauft. Da ich einen Ruf zu verlieren habe, kann ich die jetzt nicht einfach hier raufschmeissen, sondern muss die schon noch so gut wie moeglich testen. Da bin ich dran, ein paar habe ich aber schon freigeben koennen. Ihr findet die auch in meinem Webshop. Bitte beachtet vor allem das Angebot gleich hier unten:

Es wird dann noch andere geben, hier ein paar Kandidaten im Test:

Soviel fuer heute. Besucht den Shop – es sind alles nur begrenzt erhaeltliche Angebote!

December 19, 2010

Tav Falco’s Panther Burns

Filed under: Bands — Tags: — Hotcha @ 1:38 pm

Saw their show last night here in Biel; incredible, just incredible. Quite loud for my damaged hearing, twangy guitars with mucho treble, but a great program of what I might call ‘Boudoir Blues’ – tango, mambo, garage stomp, eastern raga punk. It’s not that nobody else does that, but first of all Tav is the godfather of all those bands like my fave The Dead Brothers, but he is also very much rooted in the old Memphis songwriting tradition of Stax and Sun Records, a survivor, if there ever was one. Impressive. I also loved the grandseigneuresque performance of the man, ruling over a band of mostly european youngsters, with a superb guitar player, he with the look of a bank teller trying to be cool, and a Cleopatra-like drummer from Rome, who really knows where the hitting has to be hard.

For me this was the occasion to pay royalties for a tape I released 22 years ago – do not ask for a copy, it’s deleted, of course.
Buy Tav’s new product. Listen to it here on Myspace. And go catch him live if you can.

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