Ismeritek Barta Bence haveromat? Tudjátok az a nyurga, szikár, loboncoshajú képzőművész, zenész, zenekiadó, zenebuzi, művészetmanager (ezdeszarul hangzik, bocs, de hát így hívják azt, aki galériát csinál, nem?), a leköszönő 2010-es évek egyik hivatásos és tisztességes pesti partyanimálja, valamint annak a Lili Aggnak a pasija, aki egyszer egy szintén RNR666-os interjúban, valami csodálatosan elegáns geci humorral (joggal) döngölte bele a kérdezőt a földbe, amikor “Bence csajaként” lett aposztrofálva. Szóval, ez a beszélgetés már megszülethetett volna kb 8-10 éve, így amikor ténylegesen nekiláttunk, még nem tudtam, hogy lesz-e bármi aktualitása a készülő interjúnak, aztán lett: feloszlott ugyanis Bence legutóbbi bandája a Not Enough Violence. Ettől függetlenül átpofáztuk művészet, művészetelmélet, zene és bona fejetetejéreállását vele:

– Én téged RNR666 bulikból ismerlek, ott vagy velünk-köztünk az ősidőktől fogva! Melyik volt a kedvenc RNR666 bulid, kedvenc RNR666 buli színpadán látott külföldi zenekarod és ha megkérdeznénk téged, hogy kiket hívjunk meg külföldről a jövőben, akkor kit ajánlanál?

– Pont nemrég az USé kibaszott nagy volt. De egy konkrét zenekart nem tudnék kiválasztani, annyi volt. Emlékezetes buliból is volt pár, például amikor  a Summer Schatzies alkalmi csörgőseként rázogattam teljesen fogalmatlanul, még véletlen sem ritmusra, utólag is bocs srácok! Uána egyébként hatalmas volt a J.C. Satán. Ja, meg életem első RNR666 bulija, ahol a Strange Hands és a Regal játszott, és egy idő után teljes őrületbe csapott át az egész, én meg a Trafik szellőzőcsövén lógva találtam magam, amire hivatkozva a hangosítómindenes le is fújta az egészet. Akiket mindenképp ajánlanék, az a francia Animal En Acier, lány-fiú duó, dobbal, zajokkal, szintivel, torzított mikrofonnal, zörgő, csattogó, csilingelő csekmetekkel. Marseilleben láttuk őket Lilivel és teljesen letaglózott. Itt egy videó pont arról a koncertről (türelmetleneknek szólok: 6 perc körül indul az őrület). Utána dumálgattunk is velük, hogy tökjó lenne, ha egyszer hozzánk is elnéznének, de aztán a mailünkre már nem válaszoltak, nektek hátha. De az örökké kínzó kérdés az, hogy miért nem volt még Lightning Bolt Pesten??!

– A n o a h s t a s és a Not Enough Violence mellett még a Szentcsalád egyik régi, nagyzenekarrá alakult formájában is basszusoztal egy félórát, de érdekelne, hogy ezeken kívül milyen formációkban, milyen posztokon fordultál meg az évek alatt?

– Hát ezeken kívül nem nagyon volt semmi, vagyis volt többféle zajpunk kezdemény, de nem nagyon sikerült másokkal zöldágra vergődni. Részben ezért is csináltam meg a  n o a h s t a s -t egyedül. Még raktam is bele hangmintát korábbi próbákból, bár azért az elég messze került a zajpunktól. Inkább csak zaj. A Not Enough Violence már duó, de az meg pont most oszlott fel. Ja, meg az egyszeri és megismételhetetlen, tökéletes nevű Haynau SS.

– Ez a két általam az imént idézett cucc az ugye erősen elektronikus alapu, de nekem te mindig is “gitárfej” voltál, szóval, akkor a benyomásaim rosszak, vagy egyszerűen ezisazis? Esetleg, ilyen az egész  bartabenceség nagy egybefüggő flowja?

– Mindig érdekelt az elektronikus zene is, már gimisként is próbáltam számítógéppel zenéket eszkábálni, azt hagyjuk, hogy milyen eredménnyel… Recsegő gitár, kalapáló dob, húsbavágóan pulzáló szinti és idegtépően zúgó elromlott hűtő is képes megfogni, erős hatásokat kiváltani. Ezek valójában csak eszközök, sokkal jobban érdekel, hogy egy zene (vagy igazából bármi) mit fejez ki, minthogy pontosan mivel készül. Azt hiszem, hogy azokat a zenéket amikért rajongani tudok, sokkal erősebben kötik egymáshoz az attitűdbeli hasonlóságok, mint a közös hangszer és stíluselem használat. Én is bármit felhasználok, ami a kezembe kerül. A  n o a h s t a s  anyagokon elég sok basszusgitár is van, csak alaposan széttorzítva, modulálva.

– Hozzáértőktől tudom, hogy a Not Enough Violence zenéje és a képzőművészeted is a dekonstrukció csodás gesztusára tekint, mint teremtő elvre. A nem hozzáértő persze erre mondhatja, hogy hogyan alkotható bármi rombolásból, az pedig, aki csak egy kicsit ért hozzá, azt mondhatja, hogy minden leképezés, ha úgy tetszik, minden szintézis, a valóság egyfajta tudatos és irányitott megvaltoztatasa, ha úgy tetszik (le)rombolása. Hol az igazság?

– Az, hogy rombolásból ne lehetne alkotni baromság. A fuzzpedál (de bármilyen más torzító  is) konkrétan roncsolja a tiszta hangot, de egy szobrász is pusztítja a kő vagy fa tömböt, amiből végül kifaragja a kifaragandót. A szubjektív felfogásomban egymásra rakódó rétegekből áll a valóság, és a dekonstrukcióval, egyes rétegek eltávolításával lehet kiemelni vagy legalábbis sejtetni a mélyebben húzódó, kevésbé egyértelmű, de zsigeri elemeket. Ebben a felfogásban az elvétel is hozzáadás, például egy sima felületű festett falemez roncsolásával valójában érdes, szabdalt felületeket adok hozzá, további kifejező eszközökkel gazdagítom a műalkotást, ha úgy tetszik. A dekonstrukciót pedig mindig rekonstrukció követi, a lehántott, kiemelt, roncsolt elemek új szervezőelvek mentén történő összeállítása.

– Számtalanszor pakoltunk együtt zenét, különböző táncmulatságokon és amikor a te szetted jött én mindig tudtam, hogy telebaszott, vastag nagy fuzzokkal körített punk ordítások fognak következni, a gépemen maradt mappáidat amúgy mai napig hallgatom esős napokon. Na de érdekelne, hogy szerinted fut még ez a fuzz-szekér, vagy ma már csak romantikus retrózás ez az egész fuzz-dili? Zeneértő és ismerő arc vagy, ezért meg merem kérdezni tőled: ki lesz a 20-as évek elején az, aki a 10-es évek elején volt Ty Segall, vagy épp Jay Reatard?

– Kezdjük ott, hogy Reatardhoz képest Ty Segall egy unalmas nyugger, de amúgy fogalmam sincs, hogy lesz-e mégegyszer ennyire hiperaktív és tehetséges ember ebben a műfajban. Bízzunk benne. Amúgy van továbbra is sok fasza zenekar, akik nem szégyellik össze-vissza torzítani a gitárjaikat, lesznek is mindig, csak legyen, aki feltúrja őket, dehát ezt pont nektek nem kell mondani. De az a nosztalgiavonat, amit ma a legtöbben fuzz alatt értenek egyre inkább hidegen hagy.

– Van még olyan, hogy CYST Records? Készültök kijönni valamivel, vagy az EXILES felfalta a fiatal kisérletielektronika szcénáját? 🙂

Nahát! Az eredetileg a Quartban 2013-ban megjelent NATURAL CHILD interjú magyarul még nem volt olvasható az RNRen. Na de most már igen:

A NATURAL CHILD utóbbi idők legjobb rock’n’roll zenekara. 2009-ben Nashvilleben alakult egyszerű garázs rock trióként, amin már első, 1971 című nagylemezükkel túlléptek. Zenéjükben rock, blues és punk elemek keverednek. Az évek folyamán punkos lendületüket megőrizve egyre inkább a rockzene gyökerei felé fordultak, erőteljesebb lett a blues, keményebb a rock, s muzsikájukban a country is megjelent.

Interjú a NATURAL CHILD gitárosával

– Nashville a country zene fővárosa. Mennyire határozza ez meg a hétköznapokat?

Seth: Nashvilleben minden countryból van. Vagy az abból befolyt pénzből. Sok helyen, főleg a hivatalokban, a „Peace in the Valley” (nagyon híres country szám) a „kapcsolásig kérem szíves türelmét” dal. A country az életemet is meghatározta, ugyanis nagyfaterom kiváló country zenész volt. Red Foleyval meg Hank Williamsszel játszott együtt. Sok ismert ember megfordult a nála rendezett híres reggelig tartó zenés ivászatokon. Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, egyszer-kétszer Elvis is eljött. Erről apám tudna sokat mesélni. Egy ilyen buli reggelén szívtam először, lehettem vagy 9-10 éves. Anyám átszalasztott valamiért, még mindenki aludt, csak Willie Nelson (többszörös Grammy-díjas country legenda) üldögélt a kertben, és megkínált a cigarettájából. Kérdeztem, mi ez. Annyit mondott: isten ajándéka a szenvedő emberiségnek.

– Első, 2011-ben megjelent nagylemezetek címe 1971. Miért pont 1971?

– A rock’n’roll legjobb éve volt. Például akkor alakult az őspunk New York Dolls. Akkor jelent meg Hendrix és Janis Joplin utolsó stúdió albuma, meg a Doors utolsó lemeze Jim Morissonnal. Aztán volt Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin meg Rolling Stones lemez. Olyan híres számok köthetők ehhez az évhez, mint az Imagine John Lennontól, a Smoke on the Water a Deep Purpletől, a Stairway to Heaven a Led Zeppelintől, a Brown Sugar a Rolling Stonestól, vagy az L.A. Woman a Doorstól. Sorolhatnám napestig.

– A blues fokozatosan került előtérbe zenétekben. Tulajdonképpen milyen zenekarként, milyen céllal alakultatok meg 2009-ben?

– Azért alakultunk, mert már egyetlen igazi rock and roll banda sem létezett. A műfajt az elmúlás fenyegette, mi pedig elhatároztuk, hogy megmentjük. Szóval mi vagyunk az utolsó rock’n’roll együttes a világon.

– Én persze tudom, hogy ti vagytok a legjobb rock’n’roll zenekar a világon, de rapper szokás a nyilvánvaló kisebbrendűségi érzésből fakadó önfelmagasztalás.

– Hé! Mi vagyunk Keith Richards (a Rolling Stones gitárosa) lányának kedvenc zenekara! Járt is nálunk egyszer a csaj. Kiderült, hogy a basszusgitárosokat szereti. Neki mindegy, csak basszusgitáros legyen, és az se számít, ha csaj.

– Esetleg az apjával találkoztatok?

– Csak telefonon beszéltem vele. Pont akkor hívta a lányát, amikor Wesszel gyakoroltak, így én vettem fel. Akkor mondta, hogy mi vagyunk a világ második legjobb rock’n’roll zenekara.

– Nagy meglepetésre egy pedál slide gitáros meg egy orgonista csatlakozásával nemrég öt tagúra bővült a csapat. Ti nem voltatok meglepődve?

– De, nagyon is. Nekem két hétbe telt, míg észrevettem, hogy öten vagyunk, de Wes még mindig nem tudja.

– Miért volt szükség plusz tagokra?

– Luke és Benny kábé egy éve csatlakoztak hozzánk. Hangzásunkat teszik teljesebbé, és lehetőséget adnak arra, hogy új irányokba is elkalandozzunk.

– Meglehetősen sokat változtatok 2009 óta, nem csak zeneileg, de külsőleg is. Mintha a megjelenésetek együtt változna a zenétekkel. És most egy-egy country szám is megjelent a repertoárban. Merre tart a Natural Child a zene és a divat terén?

– Zeneileg mindenféle műfaji keretek áthágása a cél. Divat szempontjából csak a három őstag tekintetében merek nyilatkozni. Én a kamionos country rocker stílust képviselem, a dobosunk Zach, a középnyugati benzinkutas divatot követi, Wes pedig egy cseh rajzfilmfigurára, egy Rumcájsz nevű torzonborz cseh erdei rablóra kattant rá.

– ??? Hogy került Rumcájsz Nashvillebe?

– Wes családja cseh származású. Nem szakadtak el a cseh kultúrától, tartják a kapcsolatot az óhazával. Wes persze főleg a cseh sörökkel, meg a rajzfilmekkel. Természetesen kiválóan beszél csehül.

– Eszem megáll.

– Van is egy cseh country szám, ami mindig előkerül nálunk házibulikon. Olyankor mindenki fetreng a röhögéstől. Főleg mikor egy bendzsó is előkerül és Wes is elődja.

– Huh. Hát én erre már csak annyit tudok mondani, hogy “Nudíte se? Kupte si medvídka mývala!”

– ???

– Unatkozik? Vásároljon mosómedvét!

*

English version

“Marvin would kick your ass for nothing. A true genius, Marvin was a pure original” said Iggy Pop about the extraordinary musician Marvin Pontiac. And if Iggy is so into him than I introduce that true genius to you.

THE STRANGE STORY OF MARVIN PONTIAC

He was born in 1932, the son of an African father from Mali and a white Jewish mother from New Rochelle, New York. The father’s original last name was Toure but he changed it to Pontiac when the family moved to Detroit, believing it to be a conventional American name.

Marvin’s father left the family when Marvin was two years old. When his mother was mental institutionalized in 1936, the father returned and took the young boy to Bamako, Mali where Marvin was raised until he was fifteen. The music that he heard there would influence him forever.

At fifteen Marvin moved by himself to Chicago where he became versed in playing blues harmonica. At the age of seventeen, Marvin was accused by the great Little Walter of copying his harmonica style. This accusation led to a fistfight outside of a small club on Maxwell Street. Losing a fight to the much smaller Little Walter was so humiliating to the young Marvin that he left Chicago and moved to Lubbock, Texas where he became a plumber’s assistant.

Not much is known about him for the next three years. There are unsubstantiated rumors that Marvin may have been involved in a bank robbery in 1950. In 1952, he had a minor hit for Acorn Records with the then controversial song “I’m a Doggy.”

Oddly enough, unbeknownst to Marvin and his label, he simultaneously had an enormous bootleg success in Nigeria with the beautiful song Pancakes.

His disdain and mistrust of the music business is well documented and he soon fell out with Acorn’s owner, Norman Hector. Although approached by other labels, Marvin refused to record for anyone unless the owner of the label came to his home in Slidell, Louisiana and mowed his lawn.

Reportedly Marvin’s music was the only music that Jackson Pollack would ever listen to while he painted, this respect was not reciprocated. In 1970 Marvin believed that he was abducted by aliens. He felt his mother had had a similar unsettling experience, which had led to her breakdown. He stopped playing music and dedicated all of his time and energy to amicably contacting these creatures who had previously probed his body so brutally.

Furthermore Marvin held the tribal belief that having a photograph taken of yourself could steal your soul, thus these candid shots are the only ones known to exist.

When he was arrested for riding a bicycle naked down the side streets of Slidell, it provided a sad but clear view of Marvin’s coming years. In 1971 he moved back to Detroit where he drifted forever and permanently into insanity.

He was killed by a bus accidentally in 1977.

His only album “GREATEST HITS” was released posthumously in 1999. And this unstable genius recorded his African rhythm and blues songs with such great musicians as Marc Ribot, John Medeski, Billy Martin, Eszter Bálint and many others.

GREATEST HITS first time on vinyl on NORTHERN SPY RECORDS

LISTEN TO IT ON SPOTIFY!

By the way. You can find some inconsistencies in this story. For example Eszter Bálint was 11 years old when Marvin Pontiac died, so it seems impossible that she could work with him. Well, the truth is that the character of Marvin Pontiac was invented by John Lurie because “for a long time, I was threatening to do a vocal record. But the idea of me putting out a record where I sang seemed ostentatious or pretentious. Like the music of Telly Savalas . . . I don’t sing very well, I was shy about it. As a character, it made it easier.”

Not long ago Lurie found some materials of Marvin Pontiac which were recorded when he was in a mental hospital. Those were released as The Asylum Tapes in 2017.

Ha emlékszel azokra az időkre amikor erre a nyíregyházi falra az volt felfújva, hogy ELVONTAK, az alábbi trafik előtt pedig te is cigiztél, ahol mint ahogy látszik, hogy még 2012-ben is ácsorog pár furcsahajú, hülyekabátos:

…akkor biztosan ismerős lesz Eunoctin által a napokban a felpakolt NYOLC RÉSZES GYÜJTEMÉNY eredeti felvételeinek némelyike. Mondjuk, ha egy tornatermi, vagy ebédlői koncerten se voltál, ha fogalmad sincs, hogy milyen volt a kizárólag a koliszobákban éjszaka, a hangosbemondó hanszóróiból sugárzott kalózrádió, akkor se csüggedj, mert most meghallgathatod hogyan hangzott a 90-es években a nyíregyi művészetis lofi-bedroom-trash-blues-punk-grunge  amit akkoriban még kurvára nem így neveztek, hanem már nem emlékszemhogy.

/Ceausescu 100/

románia ősi földje
cirógatja csontodat
te voltál a fénylő árnyék
gondoskodó gondolat

harcoltál a béke frontján
irányt szabott jogarad
gigantikus szellemed szórt
világító sugarat

szépségednek antik leple
lángelmédnek fátyola
túdós nejjel oldaladon
szőttél merész álmokat

szebb világot építeni
múlt sebétől fájó kínt
balzsamoddal, gyógykenőccsel
megszüntetni csak te bírsz

árulóknak rossz golyói
feltépték a szívedet
pulpitusról kedves lényed
nékünk már nem integet

fiatal vagy már örökre
kit az idő elkerült
mégis hiányodat sírjuk
mind mi árvák legbelül

könnyünk nyeljük míg a portréd
falról reánk mosolyog
rideg, fájó űr mit hagytál
s elszorul ma sok torok

kegyetlen és sivár otthon
lett a világ nélküled
gyászba öltözött karácsony
lelkünk komor épület

eszméidnek oszlopai
tetteidnek zászlaja
mi leszünk s az ifjúságunk
konzerválva általa

hűségünket felajánljuk
néked ím e szent napon
mártír apánk nézz ránk föntről
ÖRÖK ISTEN, ETALON!

2018 Január 26. Bukarest

Do you know Luca? The colourful Italian musician from The Ultra Twist, Trio Banana, Trans Upper Egypt, Duodenum, Centauri, and RAWWAR? Who also is a visual artist who made clips for Ty Segall, Thee Oh Sees, Country Teasers and a lot of others. And has collages too:

PALI: Hey Luca! Long time ago that I did an interview with you (in the Ultra Twist times). Since you’ve moved to Rome from Siena, The Ultra Twist split etc. Anyway where are you living and what do you do there?

LUCA: Hi, Bro’! After Rome I moved to Milano where I lived four years. There, I did new band with old friends who lived in Milano too. The name of the band is Centauri, we make weird country/folk/psychedelic non-sense stuff.

I tried to continue to play with bands in Rome: Trans Upper Egypt, Trio Banana and Duodenum, but it was too difficult, so I quit TUE, ‘cause I didn’t enjoy more. Trio Banana is on-standby, we never really quit but we can’t play together now. But Duodenum is a very hard band to play often.

Number 71 Monobanda, the man who plays with me, got many bands too, and he lives between Napoli and Rome. Very hard to meet each other in a year, but we are like brothers, so for us play is something more than make gigs and shows. Duodenum will never quit.

In Milano I have started my solo project Tab_ularasa 2-3 years ago. I did many records and tape and maybe too many gigs around Italy. That’s my main project now, and I’m working on a new record. It will be very experimental and different from records done before. Hope to finish soon and to put out it after summer.

Tab_ularasa make punk/folk for children and crazy people. I play alone only with guitar and sing very weird songs in Italian. In the end of 2016 I have gone back to my countryside in Tuscany and I will stay here this year.

PALI: You have got a new band RAWWAR after Trio Banana split.

LUCA: Like I said before, Trio Banana never really split and maybe we will play in the future, but not now. But Trio Banana’s drummer Gabriele Doctor Dead and I never stop to play. When I come back to Rome we play in a rehearsal room. At the start we didn’t want to make a new band to make gigs but only keep to play together, have fun, write new songs and make records.

PALI: You and Dr Dead from Trio Banana, but who is your second guitar player, please introduce him!

LUCA: After few practices we did 9 songs and a cover (Don’t Make Me Kill Again from Urinals) then we decided to make records. I spoke about that with Michele Zufux from Ferrara, one of my best old friend from Ultra Twist time. He was in a fucking great band called Larsen. They’re almost unknown, but for me Larsen is one of the best Italian bands ever. Now he plays in For Food and Dead Horses also from Ferrara, different style of music but really great stuff. We spoke in chat about that, I sent him our songs, he liked them so much that I asked to join us with his guitar to record. We were in Ferrara on a weekend last October. We never play together before, and we recorded three songs of the 1st RAWWAR tape. It was a magic day, we did everything live with only two microphones like a live gig, so we were lucky too.

Some week later Alessandro, a new friend from Teramo, did a very great master and we put out the tape on Bubca Records last March. We wanted to make a 7” but was not money, and maybe there would have been even no sense, ‘cause we don’t play so much live. We live far each other and even here in Italy the situation is quite sad for a band who play garage/punk… There is a kind of little “mafia” to book gigs, and obviously we’re not inside that stuff. The bigger festivals prefer to give a lot of money to American mythological dead bands from the 90s instead to make a cool garage/punk underground festival with new bands. They live in the past. Here in Italy the majority of “underground” people live in the past. This is not punk/rock for me. I always hope to discover, listen and see new bands. Otherwise I’m just so happy to make this tape, to play music with my friends and that’s all. If people will ask us to play it would be better, but if not, nessun problema, we will keep playing in some garages that we enjoy much than play in a shitty venue or festival.

PALI: Not long ago RAWWAR put out its debut tape on your own Bubca Records. Those three songs remind me something like Cheater Slicks between Country Teasers and a bit like early Demon’s Claws. It’s rawer and more direct and less psychedelic than TRIO BANANA was. What do you think?

LUCA: From the start Gabriele and I wanted to make something more weird and repetitive like the old blues/punk stuff. The bands that you mentioned are some of my favorites, but we have tried to find our way to play RAW the primordial blues like did Cheater Slicks, Country Teasers and Demon’s Claws. We like so much Can’s first album, Velvet Underground’s weird stuff, Gun Club. We love too Neu, Oneida’s first records and so many other stuff, but when you make music you have to try to find your own way.

PALI: Please talk about the process of recording. I think you like to do everything as basic as you can.

LUCA: Sure! We recorded in this way ‘cause we did not even time to make it in a different way. I didn’t recorded RAWWAR, Mauro from For Food & Dead Horses helped us and Michele did the rest. We used a cheap multitrack recorder with two mics and we set the level of sounds just before start. I have learned lo-fi tricks from Falconx, the guru who has made my theremin and recorded many garage records in the 80s. If you want warmer sounds and really feel the people’s energy who play then the best way to record everything live, even the voice too. Sure it’s more difficult, ‘cause you have to know and try where put the mics, how sounds moving at the place where you record, and mostly you have to be lucky because when you play at high volume you can generate shitty feedbacks and distortions. Here in Italy we said “La Fortuna aiuta gli audaci”, I think in English they say: “Fortune favours the bold”, and maybe there is a Hungarian version too. (Of course: “Bátraké a szerencse.”) This time we were very lucky… hope next time too.

PALI: And your copy technic is unique I think hahaha! Do you buy some shitty tapes on a flea market and copy your music on it? How do you do this?

LUCA: Almost from the start, Bubca Records make tapes using second hand/recycled tapes. Now vinyl seems new fashion. There are some shitty dynamics to make it but if you don’t book a Euro tour it does not make a sense at all to print it. Making tapes it’s a kind of new little fashion, but it seems like to live in the past. CD is dead, the new world goes in a different way. Maybe we should discover new way to pass underground music. The task of the avant-garde in art has always been be ahead, but now young people make new stuff and invent things from very young age for multinational factories. The few people who make true DIY garage/punk stuff are like dinosaurs. We are dinosaurs, we’re going to extinct soon. I don’t care about that, I’m keeping to make my stuff but I hate nerd punks who think that the old way to make records is the True & Sacred. They are the Worst! For me, make records with second hand tapes is a kind of ironic action, and I don’t want to pollute the world with new plastic too, the worlds is already polluted enough. I find tapes in some flea markets and when I duplicate stuff I do not delete the end of the original music, so if you don’t like RAWWAR you can listen Laura Pausini, Tiziano Ferro, Adriano Celentano or classic music. Cheers!

PALI: You do all of artwork as well. Do you have got own copy machine?

LUCA: Yeah, I make artwork, collage or draw for my records. If I make a record for other bands I always ask them about the artwork, if they do not want to make it, then I do it. Almost all old Bubca Records stuff is a B/W xerox copy, but we did some colour cover too. Our first coloured cover was made for the first Trio Banana EP “Baby Save My Soul”. If a collage or a draw is colored we keep it coloured. I don’t have own copy machine, I just go to a cheap copy shop. To get a copy machine and buy ink is more expensive.

PALI: You booked last year a mini tour for The Rebel. How was that? What kind of guy Ben Wallers? I think he is one of the weirdest guys nowadays in the R’n’R underground. Is it right?

LUCA: Make a tour with Ben was one of the best things done last years. Ben is not so weird as he seems, he’s very kind, smart and cool guy. Making music is the most important thing in his life, like for me, so we have become true friends. I hope to make new tour with him sooner or later.

PALI: Please talk about the last few Bubca Records release!

LUCA: We’re not so active now as we were before, but I’m trying to keep Bubca alive. Before RAWWAR, the last record was Pist Idiots, an amazing new young band from Australia. I love them!

PALI: What are you main active project now?

LUCA: Main project is my solo project Tab_ularasa, but I hope to play more often with RAWWAR, Centauri and Duodenum. I enjoy more playing in a band that alone.

PALI: Please recommend us few cool Italian bands what are active now and you really like!

LUCA: My favorite Italian band is For Food from Ferrara. I love them from the start, they play furious noisy post punk music. Great songs, great atmospheres. They are true friends. Their first record is a masterpiece.

PALI: Future plans with RAWWAR? Anyway it’s a cool name! So rad.

LUCA: The name of the band was an idea from Michel. I suggested The Hobos but that sucks. Gabriele got no idea about that. Michele told us RAWWAR and then we were thinking: “AMAZING!!”. You can say RAWWAR like the lion of Metro Goldwyn Mayer does before an old Hollywoodian movie: ROUUUAURRR!!!

PALI: What’s your favorite local liquor?

LUCA: My favorite local liquor is a kind of stuff that you drink here after eating a lot. It’s called Nocino. It’s a walnut liquor made by monks, but not easy to find real Nocino. The best I had was in Teramo countryside last week!

Thanx Pali, I hope to come back soon in Budapest to play.

When Luca played first time there with The Ultra Twist at RNR666 party

RNR666 Nemzetközi Béke és Barátság Est

AUG 12 BUDAPEST TITKOK KAMRÁJA

A KONCERTET AZ UTOLSÓ PERCBEN ÁT KELLETT HELYEZNI. AZ EREDETI EVENT, SOK-SOK INFOVAL.

Kibaszott jó lesz.

Fellép a ROUND EYE, a Stooges szaxofonosának utolsó bandája. Meglepő módon Shanghaiból, ahol kétszer is az év zenekarának választották őket. Zenéjük annyira eklektikus és szórakoztató, akár Mike Patton zenekara, a Mr. Bungle, csak vitathatatlanul punk. A csapat tagjai ott élő amerikai zenészek, meg egy olasz muzsikus.

A ROUND EYE története 2010-ben kezdődött, mikor Chachy az amerikai álmot kínaira cserélte, és egy nagy ugrással Floridából Shanghaiba termett, ahol megalakította kínai zenekarát. Amerikai zenekara a Libyan Hit Squad sem volt egyszerű eset, bár az is vitán felül punk volt, de olyan hatásokkal, mint a jazz dobos Buddy Rich, a free jazz alapvetés Ornette Coleman, vagy a hard rock Blue Öyster Cult. A ROUND EYE erre rátesz még két lapáttal, amiből valami elképesztő hc punk jazz ska rock and roll doo wop blues surf bolondéria kerekedik ki:

Első albumuk készítése idején csatlakozott hozzájuk a Stooges szaxofonosa, Steve Mackay, aki velük csinálta élete utolsó turnéját és lemezét, aminek megjelenése után négy hónappal elhunyt, de játéka még az idén megjelent második ROUND EYE albumon is hallható.

Ő egyébként úgy került a Stogees-be, hogy Iggy Pop látott valahol Detroitban játszani egy dob/szaxofon duót, és két nappal a Fun House lemez felvételeinek megkezdése előtt megkérte a szaxofonost, Steve Mackay-t, hogy csatlakozzon zenekarához. Eképp instruálta:

– Azt szeretném, hogy játssz úgy, mintha te lennél Maceo Parker, csak LSD-ben.

Maceo Parker akkoriban James Brown szaxofonosa volt.

MEG LESZ MÉG A CHICAGO BULLS,  egy ironikus sax’n’thrash csapat Pécsről, mely néha még a Bizottságot is eszembe juttatja:

meg RNR666 DJs, és számtalan békés és barátságos pillanat.

A BELÉPÉS DÍJTALAN, AZ ADOMÁNYOKAT MEGKÖSZÖNJÜK!

FIGYELEM! A beágyazott ROUND EYE videó végén a gép feldob még nyár közepi franciaországi koncert felvételeket! Azokon jól látható, hogy mi várható. És itt van még két érdekesebb videó a sok közül.

A Suntan azt figurázza ki, hogy a kínaiak meg vannak veszve a fehér bőrért. Az, az igazán szép. Meg az előkelőség, a gazdagság jele. Annyira, hogy napsütéses időben elnéptelenednek a parkok. Annyira vigyáznak rá, nehogy úgy nézzenek ki, mint egy mezei munkán sült paraszt:

Aztán ott van Phenjan, Észak-Korea két és fél milliós fővárosa, ahol nincs éjszakai élet. Itt is klipet forgattak. Persze engedéllyel, és csak engedélyezett felvételeket készíthettek. És kísérő nélkül sehova se mehettek:

“A többieket vártuk egy templom előtt. Nem messze tőlünk néhány gyerek tájképeket festett. Az lett a furcsa, hogy a képeken nem változott semmi. A gyerekek száraz festékbe mártogatott száraz ecsettel simogatták a megfestett képeket. Bazmeg, én legalább fél órán át keresztül néztem. Ahogy eljátsszák nekünk, hogy gyerekek festenek az utcán.”

“Egyszer őrizetbe vettek minket. Azért mert Kim Ir Szen – A Nemzet Napja, Az Örök Elnök – és fia, Kim Jong Il – A Vezérlő Nap Sugára, A Párt Örök Főtitkára – mauzóleumában a cipőtisztító automatát fényképeztük.”

RNR666 NEMZETKÖZI BÉKE ÉS BARÁTSÁG EST

AUG 12 21 óra BUDAPEST TITKOK KAMRÁJA

ROUND EYE – freak jazz punk rock and roll Kínából
CHICAGO BULLS – sax’n’thrash Pécsről

+ RNR666 DJs és számtalan békés és barátságos pillanat

További ROUND EYE koncertek a környéken: augusztus 13. Szeged – Jazz Kocsma. 14. Nagyvárad – Moszkva Kávézó. 15. Kolozsvár – La Tevi. 16. Szekszárd – La Palm Beach. 17. Győr – valahol.

or for what he has got a French cultural order recently

In his voluminous oeuvre there are two albums with French connections: Préliminaires in 2009 and Après in 2012.

Préliminaires was inspired by Michel Houellebecq’s novel La Possibilité d’une île (The Possibility of an Island). There are three main characters. Daniel, a successful comedian who can’t seem to enjoy life despite his wealth. He gets bored with his hedonist lifestyle, but can’t escape from it. He is disgruntled with the state of current society.  He has two clones who live an uneventful life as hermits in the distant future after nuclear and climate catastrophes. They scattered around are the remnants of tourist resorts, cities, consumer items, and some natural humans living in small tribes without any knowledge of the past or any civilization.

Après is a cover album with five French chansons. His label (Virgin EMI) refused to release it. They would have preferred that he does a rock album with popular punk songs because the money is rather in it than in those old-fashioned melodies. This is a strange point of view because the original performers of his covers sold a vast number of records. Finally, the album was released by himself and on a French label Le Rat des Villes.

Now you can listen to all of his covers together with the original ones. The cover of Les feuilles mortes are from Préliminaires, like Je sais que tu sais (I Know That You Know,) which song is not a cover, and the French parts are sung by Lucie Aimé.

And also you can read about the songs and the artists, how their careers started in the chaotic years of the XX Century. And those stories are always strange.

So Mesdames and Messieurs please welcome

The second song Les feuilles mortes (The Dead Leaves) was composed by Joseph Kosma who was born in Budapest in 1905. He was a Hungarian composer and conductor. He took part in the avant-garde movement too. Fled from Berlin – where he lived by a scholarship – to Paris in 1933 with his German wife without money and French knowledge. There he got acquainted with the poet Jacques Prévert and then started a new era of the French chanson. His mother and brother were shot into the Danube during the siege of Budapest by Hungarian far-right wing party members in 1944.

“The virginity of my criminal record is still a mystery to me.” Jacques Prévert wrote this about his juvenile lifestyle.

He was born into a lower-middle-class family in Neuilly-sur-Seine in 1900. Quit school at his age of 15. After the end of WWI, he went to Istanbul as a French soldier together with the painter Tanguy to occupy it. After he was doing small businesses and joined the surrealist movement. In 1928 he wrote his first poem, broke with surrealist, and joined a performance company called Groupe Octobre to make communist propaganda. They also played in factories during strikes, and even in Moscow in 1932. After the experience he devoted himself entirely to the cinema.

He wrote the poem Les feuilles mortes. The song has appeared first time in the Marcel Carné film Les portes de la nuit (Gates of The Night) but just only snippets were hummed by Nathalie Nattier and Yves Montand, who was born as Ivo Livi in 1923 in Monsummano Terme, Italy.

His father was a militant communist who fled from the Mussolini regime with his family to France. In Marseille, he started a small broom factory which was swept away by the Great Depression in 1932. His son was hairdresser, waiter, dock and factory worker. His showbiz career started in a cabaret as a warm-up guy who turned into a singer at his age of 17. He was discovered by Edith Piaf in 1944.

She was born as Édith Giovanna Gassion in Paris in 1915. Her father was a street acrobat, her Italian-born mother a café singer. Her mother abandoned her at birth. She lived for a short time with her maternal grandmother, Emma (Aïcha) Saïd ben Mohammed, daughter of a Moroccan acrobat. When her father went to the war in 1916, he took her to his mother who ran a brothel in Normandy.

In 1929, at the age 14, she joined her father in his acrobatic street performances all over France, she first sang in public this time. At her age of 15 she met Simone “Mômone” Berteaut and started to tour together as street singers. She was discovered in Paris by a nightclub owner.

During the German occupation she performed in various nightclubs and brothels and lived in a luxury flat above a nightclub and bordello in Paris. But he sang also in POW camps, even she was invited to sing in Germany together with other French artists in 1943. But in December 1944, she went on stage for the Allied forces together with Montand in Marseille. And he wrote the song La Vie en rose (The Life in Pink) in 1945 on the top of a smoky debris, called Europe.

She died in 1963 at her age of 47. The funeral mass was denied by the archbishop of Paris Cardinal Maurice Feltin because of her lifestyle.

The song Syracuse was published first in this year. It was performed by Henri Salvador. He was born in French-Guyana in 1917 as a son of a native tax collector. The family moved to France in 1929. He gained reputation first in Medrano Circus through his laugh. He laughed so loudly that the clown asked him to come back every Sunday, and taught him gags in exchange for his influential laugh. He turned his back on school at his age of 15, started to work as a clown on terraces of Paris, and learned to play music. In 1935 Django Reinhardt saw him at a cabaret and asked him to join his band. During the occupation he toured with the band of French jazz king (or Napoleon?) Ray Ventura in South America.

The Syracuse was composed by Salvador, the lyrics were written by Bernard Dimey. In 1972 Dimey was awarded the Charles Cros Prize of the critics for his album Ivrogne Et Pourquoi Pas (Drunk and Why Not) which he claimed to be a profession of faith.

A devotee of this credo Serge Gainsbourg was born as Lucien Ginzburg in Paris in 1928. His parents fled from the horror of the Russian civil war. His father worked as a pianist at bars and clubs in Paris and the casinos and hotels of Deauville during the summertime. From his age of 8 he went with him to play songs. Scarlatti, Bach, Vivaldi, Chopin. And there is the Jazz. Cole Porter, Gershwin, Fred Adison. And there is the radio. Ray Ventura, Charles Trenet, Maurice Chevalier, Edith Piaf, Jean Gabin, Fernandel. But there just was the radio. Because no radio for the Jewish. And no telephone, coffeehouse, restaurant, theatre, cinema, concert, library, museum, swimming pool and nothing. Jewish stay at home and can buy food just between 3-4 pm. If it need can use the last carriage of the metro train only. And they were awarded Yellow Star.

In 1944 he learned to play guitar by a gypsy and started to play at bars and balls. He was discovered by the writer and musician Boris Vian in 1957.

The song Javanaise was written in 1962 and was recorded and published by him and Juliette Greco almost the same time in 1963. But in this playlist I put the reggae version titled Javanaise Remake from the Gainsbourg album Enregistrement public au Théâtre Le Palace from 1980.

Georges Brassens was born in 1921 in Sete, Southern France. His father was an open minded anticlerical bricklayer, his Italian mother was a devout catholic, but both were music lovers. He wrote his first poems as a pupil, but maybe he thought the crime pays better than the poetry because together with his friends he started to steal from their families and others. He was expelled from the school and after a trial he went to Paris, lived with his aunt, and work at a Renault factory, but it was bombed soon by Luftwaffe in 1940.

Then he spent the days in the library, read poetry and write. His first collection of poems was published in 1942 thanks to the money of his relatives and friends. Then he was forced to work in a labour camp at a BMW plant near Berlin in 1943. After one year he was given ten days’ leave in France and did not go back.

Jeanne Planche, a seamstress, who was a friend of his aunt hid him. She lived with her husband in relative poverty. “We wash in cold water, there is no gas, no electricity, so no radio, nor mains drainage. In the small yard, a real menagerie: dogs, cats, canaries, turtles, hawks.” And Brassens lived there for 22 years.

He started to write and compose songs. In the beginning he accompanied himself by and old banjo. Later with the help of Jeanne he bought a used guitar. At first he performed his songs in Parisian cinemas between the news and the film. After several unsuccessful auditions he got a contract in a cabaret in 1952. Later this year released his first album La Mauvaise Réputation, ie. Bad Reputation.

The song Le Passantes was published in 1972. The poem was written in the early 1910s by engineer and poet Antoine Pol, who worked as a company boss, but he was fell in love with poetry, books, and butterflies.

Joe Dassin was born in New York in 1938. His father was the film director Jules Dassin who was blacklisted in 1950 during the communist hysteria because long before he was the member of the Communist Party USA (but left it after the Molotov – Ribbentrop Pact in 1939). He moved to France with his family. Joe got an MA in Anthropology and became actor and singer.

The song Et si tu n’existais pas (And if you didn’t exist) was published first in 1975. The music is by Salvatore “Toto” Cutugno and Pasquale Losito. The lyrics are by Claude Lemesle and Pierre Delanoë – who originally was a tax inspector, but later Elvis Presley, Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Nina Simone also sang his lyrics. And Iggy Pop

a son of former high school English teacher and baseball coach. He was born as James Newell Osterberg, Jr. in Muskegon, Michigan, 1947. He is German, English and Irish descent on his father’s side and Norwegian and Danish ancestry on his mother’s side. Moreover his father was adopted by a Swedish American family. He was raised in a trailer park in Ypsilanti, Michigan. He got a lot of care. His parents helped him explore anything he was interested in. This culminated in their evacuation from their bedroom in the trailer, because that was the only room big enough for his drum kit. He has begun his music career as a drummer in various high school bands in Ann Arbor, including the Iguanas in the early 60s…

Helló Susu! Van egy ilyen sorozatunk a RNR666-on, hogy ‘Hey Butt! What The Fuck?’ Lényege, hogy megkérdezzük attól, aki éppen eszünkbe jut, hogy Mi a faszom van?

Épp most olvastam, hogy kiadjátok a Másfél cucccait újra. Jó ötlet. A első két kazettát szerettem annak idején meg a Viperagarzon vót meg egy haveromnak cd-n. Meg azt is olvastam, hogy vinylen is ki szeretnétek adni egy válogatás Lp-t. Kábé mikor lenne ez? A többi újrakiadás az meg ilyen digitálgenyó lenne?

DJ SUEFO – Ja a többi az digitálgenyó, és akkor lesz vinyl válogatás, ha már minden újra lesz maszterelve. A legjobban sikerültek kerülnek majd rá.

– Apropó vótál te betrinyózva Másfélen?

– Mindenen voltam betrinyózva nem csak Másfélen 😉

– Mikor jössz mán el egy RNR666 Buliba végre? Vótál te egyáltalán? Végül is a kezdő lökés tőled vót még 12 éve mikor az MK2 (Mezőkövesd 2 ) rádióval összehoztál minket. Azóta van RNR666.

– Amúgy RNR-en kétszer tuti játszottam, de lehet, hogy háromszor. Közönségként voltam 5-6 alkalommal.

– Járod még a budapesti éjszakát mint Dj amúgy? Sok a paraszt?

– DJ-zés megy, be vagyok táblázva eléggé. Igazából most még 3 másik embernek is én adok melókat. És ja, sok a paraszt, egyre több. Külföldről se a jó arcok jönnek már, csak a white trash.

– Van pár kazettád, ami nálam maradt (hallgatva vannak) a kedvencem: A oldal Alboth! – Amour 1991 / B oldal Monster Magnet – Spine of God 1991. Micsoda párosítás!!!!!

– Örülök, hogy az Alboth jó kezekben van! A Neurotic műsoros nincs ott? Azt nem találom, már nem emlékszem kinek adtam kölcsön.

– Nincs nálam a Neurotic. Kőcsön se kértem vóna én azt.

Jó vót beszélgetni, helló nachbar Oi&DistrOi!

from the sunset till the sunrise

THE PUSSYWARMERS is a Swiss band. I wrote some years ago about them

“The Pussywarmers is a band of a traveling circus. They play swing for the rope-dancers, blues for the knife thrower, tarantella for the lion tamer, dixieland for the magician, cha-cha-cha for the trapezists, tango for the bears, polka for the poodles, waltz for the monkeys and criss-cross for the clowns on four languages.”

They have recently released the Nightride EP under the name of THE PUSSYWARMERES  & RÉKA’S ELEKTRONISCHE ABTEILUNG via Annibale Records. And it is totally different than their previous recordings. So I have had to ask what is the story of this project?

Réka: At the beginning of the year we introduced “The Pussywarmers & Réka’s Jizz Ensemble” which represents our “Tropical Big Band”. For the new record we decided to strip down to a quartet: “Elektronische Abteilung” which means “Electronic Department”. It´s a concept for an “Alter Ego Band”. Inventing this band in a Band-Project lead to more freedom in the creative process of composing and recording.

We have a hideout in the mountains of Italy where we are only allowed to play in a low volume.  These situations forced us to play around with loops which we kept on sometimes for hours. This sounds and loops created sometimes states of hypnosis. In this new found state we also started to experiment with new sounds and instruments. For “Nightride” we wanted to capture those moods and used instruments that would reflect perfectly those nights. From the sunset till the sunrise.

“Nightride” is very cinematique, so a big influence – for this new way of writing and recording music – were definitely movies. In Zürich exists the Institute of Incoherent Cinematography. Pablo Assandri – the head of IOIC – organizes silent movie events to which he invites musicians to create new film scores for these movies in a live situation. He invited us a couple of times and we loved it. To compose music to images is a very different approach. Music can be created which would never arise in normal practicing situations. Characters and scenes of the movie can become your muses. For example we played for Fred Niblo’s film The Temptress (1926).

The event series is called “The Underworld in Silent Film”. Here is an old trailer just for the feeling

Next silent film event will be on 30 March. Marena Whitcher’s Shady Midnight Orchestra will play on the film Der Geisterzug (Ghost Train, Germany/UK, 1927) by Géza von Bolváry.

NEXT PUSSYWARMERS & RÉKA SHOWS

30.3.2017 / Geneve (CH) / Bongo Joe / NIGHTRIDE RELEASE TOUR
1.3.2017 / Basel (CH) / tba / NIGHTRIDE RELEASE TOUR
1.4.2017 / Zurich (CH) / Bundeshaus Residency 68 / NIGHTRIDE

A new series on RNR666 about serious questions. Next chapter

TALES OF DESIRE

PALBERTA is a band, three girls from Upstate New York. Best describe their music what I’ve found on their FB page

“You wanna wabbada? Wap wap wap dabbada?
You see that mabada? ding ding dack dabbada?”

Their new album has been released recently on Wharf Cat Records. I was listening to it when I suddenly burst out – Hú bazmeg!

It was the 5th song, titled Nose. Hú bazmeg! is a Hungarian phrase, we use it on the occasion of sudden revelation, surprise, shock or in similar cases. For example when you drink a shot of spirit, and it is unexpectedly strong. It means literally Oh fuck!

This was the moment when I have thought I ask them what they are reading. I don’t know why.

Lily: I most recently finished reading Tales of Desire by Tennessee Williams just began Narcissus and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse. I read Tales of Desire because my dad gave it to me for my birthday and I trust his taste. It was really freaky and awesome and I highly recommend it. I’ll get back to you about Narcissus and Goldmund when I’m done. It’s the story of a young man, Goldmund, who wanders aimlessly throughout Medieval Germany after leaving a Catholic monastery school in search of what could be described as “the meaning of life,” or rather, the meaning of his life.

Ani: I just finished I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. For some reason, I slacked on reading this book and it is amazing. A super emotional book and reading it in our current political climate is so heavy and also necessary.

– Excuse me, that I am cutting into, but I need to explain what is so heavy.

At the age of eight Maya Angelou was sexually abused and raped by her mother’s boyfriend. She told her brother, who told the rest of their family. The man was found guilty but was jailed for only one day. Four days after his release, he was murdered, probably by Angelou’s uncles. Angelou became mute for almost five years. Later she held many jobs, among others worked as a prostitute, table dancer, and madame.

Learned modern dances and became a professional dancer, joined the civil rights movement in 1960, and maybe of course, she was also a pro-Castro activist, but like so many other fans she also did not know anything about the real nature of the Castro regime, she just wanted to believe her dreams.

In the first half of the 60s she lived in Africa, first in Egypt – with a South-African lawyer and civil rights activist -, later in the newly independent Ghana. She worked as an editor and journalist for various media as The Arab Observer, African Review, Ghanaian Times and Radio Ghana, but also worked and performed for Ghana’s National Theatre.

In Ghana, she met with Malcolm X. Then she went back into the States and helped him to build the pan-black Organization of Afro-American Unity, which was described as a threat to the national security by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover. Mr. X. was assassinated by members of the concurrent black power organization Nation of Islam in 1965. Not long after Angelou’s first autobiography, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was published. It is up to 1944 when she was 17.

Ani – So I just finished it. Now I’m in a totally different direction, or maybe not but I have yet to find out. I am starting the book Dune. I’m trying to explore the other worlds out there and I haven’t spent much time in the science fiction realm so here it goes!

– Do you know about the never realized film adaptation by Chilean director Jodorowsky? Starring Orson Welles, Gloria Swanson, David Carradine, Geraldine Chaplin, Alain Delon, Hervé Villechaize, Mick Jagger, and Salvador Dali as the mad emperor of the galaxy. With the music of Stockhausen, Henry Cow, and Magma. It was planned in 1975 and was so grandiose that a documentary has been made about the unmade film.

Nina – I am reading a book called The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson, and am loving it so much because it’s an incredibly bold, courageous, smart, funny, insightful memoir. I feel like I am learning new, nuanced ways of thinking about gender – specifically lesbian and trans identity -, motherhood, and identity in general.

– On the picture lying the body of Jane Mixer, aunt of Maggie Nelson. She wrote two books about the murder of her aunt. Jane was a 23 years old law student in 1969. She posted a note on a college ride-share bulletin board, seeking a lift to her hometown. She was strangled with a nylon stocking and shot twice in the head with a .22. The killer pulled up her jumper to reveal her underwear, then carefully covered the body with her yellow raincoat and positioned it atop a grave, and set Mixer’s shoes and her copy of “Catch-22” near the body.

He was unveiled in 2002 on the basis of three drops of sweat and one drop of blood which were found on the victim’s panties.

a new series on RNR666 about serious questions

MOUNTAIN BIKE is a very funny and playful Belgian garage rock band. Sometimes so pop like the Blur. Please click the play button for the full experience now!

– How turned this stupid name Mountain Bike out? I’m especially curious about the circumstances of the name giving. It was during a crazy night, or was it a hangover in a café, or a lazy afternoon? How did it happen?

– Well you know, we had no ideas, picking a name is always a pain in the ass. This band wasn’t supposed to last, It was just a joke. Running out of proposals, we chose “Mountain Bike” because we saw someone wearing a Mountain Bike T-shirt. How stupid is that?! And you? How did you end up with such an original name? R’n’R 666…

– It was a beautiful May afternoon. I was walking along the boulevard Nagykörút in Budapest when my phone rang. Lavór called me and asked

– Hey, want to do a biweekly rock and roll radio show with me and Pali?

– Why not?

– Ok. Then find its name out!

I went in Csiga Pub on the Rákóczi tér and ordered a beer. I was sitting at the table, the sun was shining, the beer was cold, and my brain played the song Killed by Death by Motörhead, and RNR666 was born. Anyway, what is the story of Mountain Bike? How did it start?

– It all started as a fun side project, we all had other bands as Thee Marvin Gays or  Warm Toy Machine, but we wanted something a bit different with no pressure. We soon had a couple of songs that we recorded with only two mics as equipment. Our friends really liked it so we put out a 7″ and started to play shows. Then we recorded a whole album at a friend studio, and we found the Humpty Dumpty label, that helped us to promote our record. That’s about it. Belgian and French medias seemed to like our debut album and we got to play a lot of shows in several countries as Belgium, France, Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, UK, et cetera. We got very lucky and now Mountain Bike is our main band.

And it’s a very funny and playful garage rock band. Sometimes so pop like the Blur. If you have pushed the play now you are listening to their first album, but the second album out now on HUMPTY DUMPTY (Belg) and TEENAGE  MENOPAUSE RECORDS (Fra).