381) Good Flying Birds - Talulah's Tape

Punk produced many great bands and music, but what it also taught people was that you did not have to play the guitar as well as Jimi Hendrix or have a perfect voice like Dusty Springfield. This inspired many a band to just simply have a go even if they did not know that many chords or were not pitch perfect.With the rise of many artists we also had the rise of the indie labels or bands self-financing their own releases either paying for their own records to be made or releasing their music on good old cassette, throughout the 80s in Glasgow there would be the odd busker banging away with a suitcase next to him where you could buy his latest release on cassette.Fast forward a hundred years and Kellen Baker is sitting in Indianapolis making music in his bedroom and releasing tapes and using this little known website called YouTube to get his music out there.Now with record company interest these recordings were put out as an official tape and have now been released on record.

We have sixteen songs in forty minutes as a Liverpudlian accent welcomes us into Down On Me then a shout of a live crowd before they groove along and a fuzzed-out guitar at one point, rough and excellent. The beating of the drums and guitar on I Care For You are infectious and on Wallace listen to the piano that ends the song.Fall Away arrives as a thrash, a glorious noise but the vocals could do with being turned up a notch but that’s maybe the joy of this rough and ready recording and talking of joy Eric’s Eyes a wonderful recurring guitar on the chorus and a sudden reminder of early Go-Betweens for me. 

Fellow bandmate Susie Slaughter shares the mic on Glass as the jangle will take you back to the early 80’s and they both combine on Pulling Hair as the drummer decides to go into overdrive and Susie is essential on, I Will Find.

Last Straw ends the record and is five minutes of thrashing, jangling, harmonising, and insane catchiness, pretty much like the rest of the record.

Let’s hope they do not lose their innocence and charm as they become more successful which they most certainly will with this delightful record.

7/10

GIVE IT A STREAM: I Care For You