Music

I am in two bands. You will have seen us on Top of the Pops unless you weren't watching closely enough.

The first band (the serious band) is called CRATER. The music we play is experimental and entirely improvised, so you might not like it much. Our line-up is this:

Paul Bavister – Electronics, bass, sitar
Seb Hunter – Guitar, electronics
Steve Gibson – Drums, percussion, piano

The second band is THE TRASH CAN JUNKIES. This one is just stupid (our reformed HM band from the late 80s). I would actually leave this band, except we don’t officially exist as such – it’s all quite confusing and pointless. Every now and again we play a gig and no-one likes it – not even us. Our line-up goes as follows:

Owen Bones – Vocals, synthesiser
Trapper Ragg – Bass, farm
Seb ‘n’ Hunter – Guitar, vocals
Little Johnny Evans – Drums, metres²

I hope to be able to put up a few mp3s of some of this stuff soon - if you're particularly unlucky.

MP3 : The Trash Can Junkies

Here are 3 tracks from the Trash Can Junkies' attempted 'album', recorded  at London's Vonns studios in the Summer of 1988:

Under The Table | 5747 KB
Suicide | 10398 KB
Steamroller You | 12085 KB

I was going to comment upon the histories of these individual tracks, but I think they speak more powerfully just by themselves. Lyrically, Under the Table is about drinking, Suicide is about nothing, and Steamroller You, according to Owen, is about 'the environment'; indeed noted environmental campaigner George Monbiot is known to have been influenced by this track back in his Glam days, when if you gave a shit about Saving the Planet, it was either us or Hear 'n' Aid.

MP3 : Cat Ballou

This is the first Cat Ballou demo, from I think 1991. It was recorded at La Rocka studios in north London, and features Pat on vocals, me on lead guitar, Martin on rhythm guitar, Ricky on bass and stand-in Vic on drums. I converted it into mp3 through a shitty old tape recorder via a shitty old tape - not that there was much fidelity in the first place, to be honest. But you'll get the gist.

I think Pat wrote What You Gonna Do; we used to open with it. Very tossed-off, very punky, very rock 'n' roll - certainly the best, or at least most effective, track of the three here.

I wrote For All Your Sins. It's a bit ponderous I'm afraid. I think I was trying to be all clever-clever with the chord changes, and less overtly "scene-like". The song sounded better live, where a little volume and grinding worked more in its favour than the somewhat sterile and jerky version here which features - unless anybody would like to challenge me on this - possibly the shittest backing vocals of all time. Performed by Martin and me. We were terrified and half-arsed - never the best combination when it comes to singing into a microphone. When I say singing, I really mean cowering.

I Can't Help You was a group compostion. At the time we considered this song particularly cutting-edge, as it features a Baggy drumbeat. "We're, like, Guns 'n' Roses meets the Stone Roses!" we bellowed into people's ears at 2am in the Hellfire Club. Nobody believed us; or cared; or could hear what we were saying, fortunately. I'm quite proud of its guitar solo; indeed all these guitar solos are pretty cool. I used have a few chops back there! And though Pat couldn't really "sing", he was undoubtedly a damn fine Singer. Or growler. He was compulsive; you should have seen him onstage - he used to have these SPASMS.

For All Your Sins |  6972 KB
I Can't Help You | 5970 KB
What You Gonna Do | 5070 KB

Sadly I don't have a copy of the second Cat Ballou demo. If anybody reading this is sitting on a copy then please do contact me, as I'd sincerely love to hear it again as well as, of course, stick it up on here for download. We were proper good when we came to record that, and I remember being really proud of it at the time.

MP3 : Crater

For all things Crater, go to www.myspace.com/crateruk
We play regularly here: www.myspace.com/kaliflowerpromotion

Here's a small selection of (older) Crater music. If you'd like us to come and play, then you can contact us through the Contact section of this website, or through Paul at the Audial Sense website.

Backward Horizon Dub | 4484 KB
Thrown | 4807 KB
Khronos | 15265 KB

Crater are available for corporate events, funerals and donkey rides. Anything else, get knotted.