Cardiacs--where to start?

[chalkpie]

Frankie I'm really trying ...
Two Bites Of Cherry is totally awesome !
somehow after a few songs I throw the towel..
dunno I guess I need to "crack " some code

Udster -

what albums do you have, or have you just done the YT thing? I'm curious as to what you've heard so I can direct you accordingly

[chalkpie]

This is Flippin' amazing! I can't stop watching this.

[chalkpie]

How dare PE let this thread on the greatest band of all time, next to Hatfield and many incarnations of FZ, drop tp page 2?

Shame on you.

[chalkpie]

I've been playing "Hope Day" (Garage Concerts) and "The Everso Closely Guarded Line" (On Land) every day on my way home. I cannot get enough of those two masterpieces.

[PeterG]

Chalkpie, you need to listen to "Wooden Ship on Wheels" and "Nurses Whispering Verses" a lot as well Two of my favs! As for Nurses, listen to the original version from Toy World or The Seaside, it is much better than the new version on STG.

[PeterG]

This is Flippin' amazing! I can't stop watching this.

Thanks for finding that on youtube. I've been waiting for years to see it. I've got several others on VHS, but this one escaped me. Excellent stuff.

[marinaorgan]

Udster -

what albums do you have, or have you just done the YT thing? I'm curious as to what you've heard so I can direct you accordingly

Maybe this one? If just for its total uniqueness... just when you think they've reached all their peaks, out comes Guns, and this track:

[marinaorgan]

…as far as I am concerned them being best or second best or whatever means nothing...the game they play with releasing their music devaluate whatever they ever done...in the past I was trying to chase their CDs...now I am not interested...

That's harsh. They have never 'played a game' with releasing the music, but, frankly, battled to get it made and battled to get it out there.
Cardiacs were pretty much forced to be a total DIY cottage industry due to the attitude of the UK music industry. They released all their albums themselves aside from Affectionate Friends and Heaven Born and Ever Bright which came out on Rough Trade pretty much the week Rough Trade went bust. I could write a short thesis here on how slack and degenerate and at times fraudulent the whole system of getting your music heard, distributed and physically into the shops was from the early 90s to the Noughties was in the UK; suffice to say that it was no fun at all to deal with and frankly crushing. Cardiacs went back to how they started, selling much of their stuff mail order and at gigs. There was a time when much of the music press wouldn't even print their gig listings, let alone run a feature (partly down to the tastes of the indie kids in charge, but mainly due to the music press developing a policy of never covering bands that did not have backing from established labels with advertising budgets). So a band pretty much reliant on people going to gigs to make a living (just like all bands now) were cut off from that, even, until the internet kicked in and you could circumvent the whole rotted system. So with a whole new following and Tim doing mail order of CDs and merch and a new album just waiting for vocals and more gigs everything was finally looking a lot better by 2008. And then Tim's illness happened.

[chalkpie]

That's harsh. They have never 'played a game' with releasing the music, but, frankly, battled to get it made and battled to get it out there.
Cardiacs were pretty much forced to be a total DIY cottage industry due to the attitude of the UK music industry. They released all their albums themselves aside from Affectionate Friends and Heaven Born and Ever Bright which came out on Rough Trade pretty much the week Rough Trade went bust. I could write a short thesis here on how slack and degenerate and at times fraudulent the whole system of getting your music heard, distributed and physically into the shops was from the early 90s to the Noughties was in the UK; suffice to say that it was no fun at all to deal with and frankly crushing. Cardiacs went back to how they started, selling much of their stuff mail order and at gigs. There was a time when much of the music press wouldn't even print their gig listings, let alone run a feature (partly down to the tastes of the indie kids in charge, but mainly due to the music press developing a policy of never covering bands that did not have backing from established labels with advertising budgets). So a band pretty much reliant on people going to gigs to make a living (just like all bands now) were cut off from that, even, until the internet kicked in and you could circumvent the whole rotted system. So with a whole new following and Tim doing mail order of CDs and merch and a new album just waiting for vocals and more gigs everything was finally looking a lot better by 2008. And then Tim's illness happened.

Man this is killing me. Can't believe it, really. Not only is it sad for Tim for obvious health/everyday reasons, but also where his band was heading. The Duck and Roger the Horse has been my favorite tune for the past few weeks.

[chalkpie]

[iguana]

Man this is killing me. Can't believe it, really. Not only is it sad for Tim for obvious health/everyday reasons, but also where his band was heading. The Duck and Roger the Horse has been my favorite tune for the past few weeks.

it's all true. read the novel “kill your friends” by john niven, which is set in the music industry during the year 1997.

[Kavus Torabi]

Thank you Marina. The very idea that not making CDs available was a 'game' indeed.

[PeterG]

Man this is killing me. Can't believe it, really.

Believe it, every word is true. For nearly 2 decades the only place I could read about Cardiacs was in The Organ (Marina's mag) and the odd article in new indie mags (Lime Lizard did a short bit) and on the gig posters, that was it! None of the established music mags or papers wrote anything about them, never reviewed their albums, and rarely advertised their gigs. The only shops that sold their CDs seemed to be Sister Ray and the other one in Berwick Street and Rough Trade. Finding a Cardiacs CD or LP in HMW, Virgin, Tower or Our Price was like finding the Holy Grail.

[PeterG]

Thank you Marina. The very idea that not making CDs available was a 'game' indeed.

+1

[Progmatic]

I am sorry that British music industry is so difficult to deal with.

I may be naive regarding this business but just looking around on this forum I see that PE members have easy access to the key people of at least 3 different record labels (Cuneiform, Esoteric, LaserEdge). Any of those labels demonstrated over the years that they are willing to take much bigger risks on the bands than band like Cardiacs. Am I missing something?

[PeterG]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6jw95LgBRM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUxBgXJL06s

[Steve F.]

I may be naive regarding this business but just looking around on this forum I see that PE members have easy access to the key people of at least 3 different record labels (Cuneiform, Esoteric, LaserEdge). Any of those labels demonstrated over the years that they are willing to take much bigger risks on the bands than band like Cardiacs.

What are you saying?

I ask because it isn't clear at all, and I doubt that I wish to be dragged into this.

Thank you.

[Progmatic]

What are you saying?

I ask because it isn't clear at all, and I doubt that I wish to be dragged into this.

Thank you.

Sorry I used your and other labels names only as examples.
I was expressing my surprise with alleged Cardiacs difficulties to reissue their CDs.

[Kavus Torabi]

As a member of Cardiacs I can assure you our difficulty in releasing the CDs is not 'alleged'. To explain in very simplistic terms: Tim took care of ALL the business/ bureaucratic side of things. The heart attack and subsequent stroke left him incapable of speech and most movement. While his mind remains miraculously intact, his communication is limited to him spelling words out on a board.
While frustrating, this works fine with conversation but hashing out the minutiae of business details is both hardly a priority and virtually impossible. Many of the people involved in the band and Tim's friends have been working to make the release happen but there is a Dickensian labyrinth to brave, legally speaking.
As I mentioned in a previous post, we are much closer to these albums seeing the light of day however, given the traumatic circumstances, I'm grateful *most* fans have been understanding and patient.
While I don't expect you to be aware of the boring ramifications going on behind the scenes, I do find your assumption that there are ulterior motives, if not trollish, a little insulting.

[Progmatic]

I do find your assumption that there are ulterior motives, if not trollish, a little insulting.

I am sorry I did not mean insult or troll. As I said I am not insider so I have naive view of how music business is run.

[Kavus Torabi]

Ok, sorry. No insult taken. I suppose what I should make clear is I get folks hassling me on 'social media' on an almost daily basis about the lack of availability of the albums.
The hassle is understandable but sometimes I get accused of 'not doing enough' to help Tim regarding the CDs being unavailable...like it was down to me. It's made me become rather defensive!

[adap2it]

[ The only shops that sold their CDs seemed to be Sister Ray and the other one in Berwick Street and Rough Trade. Finding a Cardiacs CD or LP in HMW, Virgin, Tower or Our Price was like finding the Holy Grail.[/QUOTE]

I bought all my Cardiacs CD's in HMV in Brighton, while on vacation in the UK...

Dave Sr.

[PeterG]

I bought all my Cardiacs CD's in HMV in Brighton, while on vacation in the UK...

Dave Sr.

One sunny day does not a summer make!

[Esoteric]

[ The only shops that sold their CDs seemed to be Sister Ray and the other one in Berwick Street and Rough Trade. Finding a Cardiacs CD or LP in HMW, Virgin, Tower or Our Price was like finding the Holy Grail.

Can I just mention --this is always nothing to do with labels/artists and everrything to do usually with stores buying policies and choice of what to stock. Big retail describe taking your releases as "renting shelfroom". and they tend to take what shifts quickest in most of the relatively mainstream stores.

[marinaorgan]

Thanks Kavus and Peter. To be fair to both an up and coming generation, and people outside of the UK, as time goes on it gets harder to envisage the weirdness and stagnation of the music industry in the mid 90s now that we can just disseminate the actual music at a mouse click. I've read a couple of articles about that John Niven book; he worked for London Records' nutso UK branch so I suspect it's not entirely a work of fiction.
Even from my first encounter with Cardiacs - I thought that surely I'd find a review in a magazine or a record in a shop the week after I saw them support Marillion 1n 1984, and was just baffled by their absence. In the end I had to get on a train a few months later and go to my first London gig just to hear them again and connect with them and buy their music. I guess the upside of this media isolation was that Cardiacs were allowed to grow and create without artistic interference or too much pigeonholing; one of the (many) downsides was that for years we'd be coming across people who had been Cardiacs fans and had lost touch with them and assumed they'd split.
We ought to sing the praises of a certain Cardiacs fan who worked in Our Price for a few years who made sure there was at least one place you could get the full catalogue!