It’s 1982 or maybe early 1983. Synth pop seems to be all the rage: Yaz (or Yazoo in the UK), Tears for Fears, and at the Top 40 level, Culture Club. From the west coast of the US, centered around Los Angeles, gather a group of musicians that looked back at psychedelic rock of the 60s with a fond nod and revisionist heart. They got called The Paisley Underground: The Three O’Clock, The Rain Parade, and the Bangs who softened their sound a little as the Bangles. You can lump Green on Red and twenty or thirty other bands into that category as well.
It seemed like a breath of fresh air, this backward glace and new found appreciation for what a couple of guitars, a drum set, a bass, and low key synths could do. Synths were still used, but they were used to imitate mellotrons instead or moogs on steroids. I like featuring these bands on Deeper. These releases are hard to come by, for some of these bands. As luck would have it they were reaching their peak just as the CD was gaining wide acceptance, so twenty years ago the catalog was easier to come buy. And, thankfully, most of the CDs I bought back then still scan.
Below, I feature some YouTubes of this time – most are videos never shown on MTV – or show rarely, so they were new discoveries (mostly) for me. Enjoy.
Also see: this article and this “Star Trek” linkage
and sadly: http://www.mazzystar.nu/web/members/bandmember4.asp
Also: Alan McGee remembers them, too
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