well hello all you psychocats.

we've got another great

issue for you, full of news,

reviews, and typoes, tipos,

tiepoes, typos.

over the summer we plan to

give you more tiki nights at

the St James Tavern, bigger

Stay sicks at the blind tiger,

our record label launch

at the green door store

(probably), a full radio

show, djing the playgroup

festival and much more!!!

stay sick!

turn blue!

Chris & Neil Sick

Welco me to the Sinful world of STAY SICK ! ! !

In amongst the terrible movie soundtracks Elvis did there are some gems. Famous remixes of “Little Less Conversation” and “Rubberneckin’” have shown that there is still live in the old quiffed corpse yet

1. A BIg Hunk o’ LovE – revved up piano rock ‘n’ roll with killer twangy geetar from Hank garland (it was the first session that did not include guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black)

2. I goT STung – huh huh huh yeah, fast paced bopper b-side to “one night” from ‘58

3. FEvER – sultry, smouldering version of the Little Willie John track, full of reeeeal cooooool fingerclicks. Like so…far… out!!

4. WITCHCRAFT – written by Dave Bartholomew and originally released by The Spiders. Elvis sticks a bossa nova beat to the verse5. BoSSA novA BABy – great Leiber & Stoller dancer from the 1963’s “ Fun in Acapulco” soundtrack.6. Long-LEggED gIRL (with the Short Dress on) – the movie version rather than the studio one- wonky intro7. Spinout- title track from EP’s 27th Album, this songs have more incongruous motor innuendoes than you can shake a gearstick at!

8. Do THE CLAM – for a man who didn’t like seafood this clearly has another meaning (nudge,nudge, wink, wink). This Bongo-based ditty was later covered by The Cramps on their ’87 live album RockinnReelininAucklandnewZealandXXX 9. guITAR MAn – check out the funked up version from the black leather jumpsuited ’68 comeback special 10. DIRTy,DIRTy FEELIng- From the Movies"Tickle Me" this has some of the creepiest lyrics Elvis ever sung hidden in jivin’ little track. More of a rape song than a love song “I hear you’re pretty good at running / but pretty soon your going to fall / that’s when I’ll drag you home with me girl / and chain you to the wall” Fritzl would be proud of him!

Top 10 Elvis records you’ve never heard of...

By Chris Sick

Last May (2011), the Stay Sick unholy trinity (me, Greg & Neil) put on these San Fran alt garage punks and it was the best gig of the year. So we were so pleased to hear they were comin’ back for more. If you haven’t seen them, then this review will give them no justice… like Frank Zappa said “Talking about music is like dancing about architecture” SO GO SEE THIS BAND!!!

This was one of only two UK shows on their 31-date European Tour and people travelled far and wide. This included a baguette of Frenchmen from Cologne, an achtung of Germans (I think those are the collective nouns?!?). The Hydrant had been double booked, so we were downstairs and the UK Subs were upstairs. Cue a hundred beer-bellied, middle age punks with balding mohicans and missing teeth

(you gotta love ‘em). Downsta i rs

has been revamped to become one of the best medium sized venue in town. The sound is amazing and a broken urinal (an essential for any proper punk venue), reminiscent of the old Hobgoblin.

First on the bill,

The Kits (Aussie garage rock’n’roll scientists) has a slightly lighter touch than fellow Aussie punks as Radio Birdman and The Saints, but with no less conviction. They remind me of the bands I grew up watching in the late 90s/ early 00s. Back then, kids, it was called Indie, before indie became a by-word for drippy, floppy haired wank. And I’m not talking about Oasis, Blur and Coldplay, I’m yakkin’ ‘bout homegrown (and largely unknown) bands like Crashland, My Vitriol, JJ72, Ikara

Thee Oh Sees

at the Hydrant 26th May 2012

Colt, Reuben & King Adora. With songs hewn from rock and hooks that lure you into this world 60s psych pop and pounding Indie Punk Rock, this band played a solid set.

Next up, Deadbeat Descendant, named after a Fall song, so you know where their coming from. Post-punk this gang of four consist of tight angular guitar playing razorblade riffs, stompin’ kraut rock drums, thumpin’ Stooges bass, Fallen spoken vocals, add a touch of Bauhaus and a Roxy/Iggy mince, all pumped up to boiling point. Sweat dripping off the ceiling as more and more of crowd piled in. The Deadbeats played like a nuclear holocaust as they fired off an arsenal of incendiary songs from their new album “Calibrate Now!”

And finally, Thee Oh Sees took to the small stage. Everyone held their breath. John Dwyer’s child like singing, peppered with tourettes-style yelps, pulling faces as if possessed by the spirit of 60s garage. But this was new and original, not another band trying to sound revivalist. This had elements of the Pixies and Sonic Youth. With a driving hypnotic rhythm section, the crowd enthralled by the bands every move. This was more like a cult gathering before a sacrifice. Blistering melodies float over the congregation like apocalyptic hymns as the sweaty steam fills the room. I push my way to the front in awe of

this holy band. Then a random fist to the face, a crowd surfer’s foot to the back of the head, launching me, eyeball first, straight at the kick drum mic stand. Bang! The sacrifice is made. The rest is a blur; I leave for the sidelines, blinded in one eye. But was it worth a scratched cornea, 2 hours in A&E and 2 days sat in the dark with my eyes shut? Oh Yeah!

Casualty Chris’s Sick ScaleOver the years I have managed to succumb to a number of rock’n’roll (and some not so r’n’r) injuries in the name of music.

1. SCRATCHING MY BALLS at thee Oh “eye” Sees- an accidental punch in the face from a fellow mosher with a skull ring on, leaves me with a scarred eyeball- 2h at A&E, 2 days in the dark with my eyes shut, no tv, no alcohol.

2. IGGY POPPED MY ‘ROIDS- after a case of the farmer, I ended up bleeding through my skinny black jeans for 4 days after a rather rough bout of moshing to the Stooges’ Raw Power Tour. 6h at A&E, shitting blood for a week.

3. WAx SPINNER- after a night of boozing and Djing, I blew out a candle that ignited from my alcohol-heavy breath, creating a disco inferno leaving me with boiling hot wax all over my face. 8h in A&E (because apparently you have to be sober to be treated) no eyebrows and a face like a boiled ham.

4. DEAFEN IN THE MOONLIGHT- after crashing a student ball in Bournemouth (don’t ask!), I got rather drunk and passed out with my ear next to the PA speaker whilst Toploader played their soporificly dull music. 2 days Tinitus and the rest of my life deaf in one ear.

5. BLEEDING IDIOT - When I was a guitarist in a band many moons ago, I once tried to play without a plectrum cos I thought it was cooler and more authentic. I ended up with bloody fingers, black nails, a bloody scratchplate, and the blood had even sprayed all over my pale jeans, right in the crotch. Not a sexy look when you are trying to pick up girls after a gig. 1 week of plasters all over my fingers, and no girls.

So let that be a lesson to all you kids out there.

Crashland, My Vitriol, JJ72, Ikara Colt, Reuben & King Adora. With songs hewn from rock and hooks that lure you into this world 60s psych pop and pounding Indie Punk Rock, this band played a solid set.

Next up, Deadbeat Descendant, named after a Fall song, so you know where

photos by Greg Sick

Julie New

mar

Barry Gray – No Strings Attached.Barry Gray is probably best known for his work on soundtracks during the 1960s with Gerry

Anderson, creator of Thunderbirds, Stingray, Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons and Joe 90.

Following the wartime stint in the RAF, Gray worked on projects for the BBC and with such artists as Vera Lynn, Eartha Kitt and Hoagy Carmichael.

In 1957, Gray teamed up with legendary Producer Gerry Anderson

where he began writing music for his p r o d u c t i o n company AP Films – later r e n a m e d Century 21 Productions - recording the scores in his

own house. The rooms were lined with egg boxes for sound proofing and Gray would record each set of musicians (brass/woodwind etc.) separately during the course of a day, overlaying these together and then mixing them as one whole song post-production.

His first score with Anderson was The Adventures of Twizzle (1956), followed by the show Torchy The Battery Boy (1958). The next production was Four Feather Falls (1958), a Western-themed puppet show, of which Gray was writer of the pilot episode.

But it was Gray’s later output in the 1960s that would put him on the musical map. He wrote the majority of his most famous themes during this period: Supercar (1960), Fireball XL5 (1962), Stingray (1963), Thunderbirds (1965) and its feature film Thunderbirds Are Go! (1966), Captain Scarlet and The Mysterons (1967), Joe 90 (1968) and The Secret Service (also 1968).

The themes we now know and love went through various mutations before they were chosen for the show. The

Thunderbirds end credits theme was a pop-vocal arrangement. Captain Scarlet had Gray experimenting with vocals through one of his many early synthesisers, before recording it with the aptly-named group “Spectrum”. The guitar

riff in Joe 90 was twanged by none other than Vic Flick, guitarist on the original

James Bond Theme in Dr No (1962).

His “Musieffects” as he dubbed them, were maybe the first journeys with sound effects using primitive electronic synthesisers. A

pioneer of sci-fi noises, including Dr Who and The Daleks and its

sequel, Daleks’ Invasion Earth 2050 AD, Gray supplied the

sound effects for these movies such as Dr Who’s

TARDIS, and the Daleks’ spaceship.

Leitmotifs occurred frequently throughout the

shows he worked on: a particular theme assigned to

each of the Thunderbirds’ machines, or characters

such as the moody music associated with Scarlet’s

nemesis, the evil Mysteron agent Captain Black.

Gray was an avid collector of the early versions

of the modern day synthesiser. His love for sonic

experimentation using - at the time – this relatively

new technology in electronic music, as well as his

overlaying of tracks DIY style in his own home has

led to his influencing many sound engineers, music

samplers and special effects wizards today.

The themes are timeless, incorporating full orchestras

with groovy vocals, twangin’ guitars and far-out

space age effects. A special concert to celebrate the

centenary of his birth was held in 2008 and there

is currently an restoration of the full Barry Gray

archive underway.

F.A.B.! by Oli Lane

The debut self-release (Vengeance 666, 1978) from the Cramps highlighted their obsession with vinyl. A brave choice of two covers: one showing off their rockabilly roots; the other a novelty hit for the Trashmen, itself a Frankenstein mash-up of two Rivingtons songs (“Papa Oom Mow Mow” and “The Bird’s the Word”), just proving the historical ancestry of rock ‘n’ roll. It shows the Cramps could steal and assimilate other people’s songs and present them as their own, stripped back to the bare bones. Even removing bass from the usual line up. This was in fact an accidental twist of fate when

Bryan Gregory bought a guitar and Lux and Ivy didn’t have the heart to tell him he was pencilled in for playing bass.

“Surfin’ Bird” was a vicious prod at the bloated carcass of pretentious Prog and the Stadium Rock that had lost its Roll along time ago. And a dangerous attack on the bland MOR of the US charts. Musicians had retreated into the safety of the studios to produce “art” and The Cramps wanted to get back to the days of the one-take live performances of the Sun and Chess Studio days. This stripped back R’n’R expressed the fun of Frat Garage and reintroduced the primitive that Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley pioneered in pop music. It inspired fellow CBGBers, The Ramones to record a version. The meaningless howls and screams pour out of Lux Interior like a possessed animal spewing junk tourettes, showing the raw, unrestrained power of the music over the cerebral Prog of the time.Punk – 1 Prog - 0 The song climaxes with a mess of guitars and orgasmic cries, with Nick Knox pounding out a tight hypnotic rhythm.

A Study in Crampology. lesson 1. ”Papa Oom Mow Mow”

“The Way I Walk” was a cover of Jack Scott’s single that reached 35 in the US charts in 1959 (on Carlton Records). The original is a little tame rockabilly track that the Cramps transform into a visceral “FUCK YOU” to mainstream society and a celebration of individualism. They discard of the barbershop backing vocals and replace it with Ivy’s screams. They also put more emphasise on illicit sexual urges than the Jack Scott would ever admit to.

6000 copies were made with hand-screenprinted covers and the single became a minor hit with college radio stations. The Cramps manage to show that their music is teenage rock ‘n’ roll, full of angst and childish energy set to a primitive soundtrack. They also provided the template a new genre of music that they would later estrange themselves from: PSYCHOBILLY

Christmas. I looked round and saw Ivy, gagged

and bound like a fetish video.

We managed to pull each other's gags of with our

hands still tied behind our backs.

"What the hell is happ'nin round here? I've been

knocked out twice, gassed and buried alive, then

attacked by zombies! And how come you're alive??

Last time I saw you, you were covered in blood

and deader than toad with a brick up its ass!" I

whispered gruffly like I'd been doing shots of

sand, with a gravel chaser.

"It's a long story"

"Well I don't think we got much time, sweet lips,

give me the crib notes."

"On the night we met I was followed home by

something in the shadows. After a bottle of

bourbon you passed out on my sofa and I went

to bed. Suddenly I woke up with a dozen dark

If you want to live, you must die!!!a punk noir periodi-calepisode 5: I n n o c e n t b l o o d

my name's chris sick:

Framed for a murder

I didn't commit, a girl

called Ivy who turns

out to be alive and

kicking ass. After

knocked out and

stuffed in a coffin, I

get broken out of by

none other than Ivy.

Then being attacked

in a graveyard by

a bunch of zombies

(don't ask!) who stop

after the sinister

peel of the churchbell. Then

some ninja priests with guns

rock up in a truck and bash me unconscious. Now

on with the show.

I woke up with a sore head like a hangover in

Hell, and the Devil's got a new set of bongos for

figures gnawing at my flesh, I

was in a daze and slowly dying,

being drained drier than a nuns

nasty. I was powerless, my

body screaming with a muffled

pain that consumed me, then

nothing. I awoke, shaking like

a shitting dog, in a body bag.

I was in a metal tube, colder

than Christmas and smelt of

death and bleach. I pushed hard

above my head, and the drawer I

lay on moved. Florescent light

streamed in and I was blinded

as I fell to the hard floor. I

slowly opened my eyes and saw

I was in a morgue, and looking

down I saw a huge Y-shaped

scar across my chest. Some

fucking med. Student had done

an autopsy on me whilst I was

still alive!!!

Then the craving started. The

first time you crave blood is

the worst. It's not addiction,

its necessity. You either do it

or you die. You don't feel like

"you" until you've had a cup of

crimson. It starts of a dull

thumping pang in the pit of

your stomach, and then shoots

up to your head like black

needles. Your body throbs

with nausea. Your dry mouth

starts drooling a metallic

tasting sputum and you start

sweating a cold grease.

Muscles start to twitch and

you feel itches like a thousand

crabs crawling over you.

Instinctively, I opened up a

draw and sunk my teeth into

the black bodybag, piercing

it with my canines, drinking

deep. Its harder to feed when

their dead. No warm heart

pumping the blood through

the veins. I had to chew a

bit to get enough to sate

my hunger. I pulled away,

disgusted. What had come over

me? I unzipped the bag only

to discover I had mauled to

face of a little girl. Blonde

pigtails covered in sticky

burgundy plasma. I threw up.

As I looked down I noticed

the autopsy scars had almost

disappeared, just a red

scratch was left. What the

fuck was I? And where could

I go?"

Will Chris Sick and Ivy

Escape the evil clutches

of the mysterious ninja

priest?

what has ivy Become?

who's controlling the

zombies?

find out next time...

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FoR all you

RockERs, RollERs,

50s thRowbacks, 60s

GaRaGE ZombiEs,

poison ivys, thE black

lEathER JackEt clad,

punks, vinyl addicts,

pool shaRks, iGGys

and shakERs !!!

for mo re great tunes chec k out the S tay Sick

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