WREK's Underground Recordings is one of the handful of radio shows that I keep up with every week. They air old recordings of live band performances in WREK's studio. Some of the stuff they have from the 80's and 90's is incredible! Check out the website linked above for a schedule of past and upcoming episodes.
This past Tuesday (Feb 10th) they aired a Nov 1993 performance by Smoke, which was fronted by the now-departed Benjamin. This was actually the second appearance of Smoke on UR; they aired a May 1994 performance about six months ago. This one is a full hour of Benjamin and Bill Taft et al. I'm not sure if Coleman Lewis and Tim Campion had joined at this point. This was right around the time that they came out with their first single, on Colossal Records. One of my brushes with greatness is that I got a credit on the back of that seven inch, as one of the 3-4 guys that helped Arthur Davis fund the pressing of that single.
Listen now via mp3 streaming:
http://www.wrek.org/stream/meta/week/wrek_live-128kb/The_Underground_Recordings.m3u
Download the mp3 files now (27 MB each):
http://www.wrek.org/streamripper/wrek_live-128kb/Tue1800.mp3
http://www.wrek.org/streamripper/wrek_live-128kb/Tue1830.mp3
It gets better! Last week's show (Feb 3rd) featured Buzz Hungry from Oct 1995, David Barbe's band after he parted ways with Bob Mould and Sugar. You'll hear clear echos of Barbe's earlier band Mercyland, as they tear through a set in the old coliseum studio. Like nearly all Live @ WREK shows for a long run from the mid-80's to the late 90s, this was engineered by Joe Whitaker, WREK's chief engineer and world class crank. Joe used to tell me that really good bands made mixing sound easy, and Buzz Hungry proves it here. Barbe is now a co-owner and engineer at Athens GA's Chase Park Transduction studio, birthplace of many great recordings.
Alas, the show gets cut off after about 45 minutes by Georgia Tech sports coverage, whoo. Oh well, we got most of it.
Listen now via mp3 streaming:
http://www.wrek.org/stream/meta/week/wrek_live-128kb/The_Underground_RecordingsO.m3u
Download the mp3 files now (27 MB each):
http://www.wrek.org/streamripper/wrek_live-128kb/Tue1800_old.mp3
http://www.wrek.org/streamripper/wrek_live-128kb/Tue1830_old.mp3
WARNING: the mp3 audio links above will only work until Tuesday Feb 17th 6pm! After that, the Buzz Hungry recording is gone, but you can still get to the Smoke recording by using the Buzz Hungry links. A little confusing but that's how it works. After another week (Feb 24th) the Smoke recording will be gone too.
One final note: a few weeks ago, UR aired a 1995 performance by a band called Tennessee Williamson. Fantastic! They were a lean three piece that reminded me of the Minutemen and the Meat Puppets. Does anyone know anything about them? I have the recording if anyone wants to hear it.
Good stuff, Chris. Thanks for the background info. I generally try to find information on the bands as I'm digitizing them, but can be difficult to piece valuable information together -- given the obscurity and datedness of the bands.
Posted by: Alex Mackintosh | February 13, 2009 at 10:08 AM