Monday 25 April 2011

From the Top Drawer XIII - Children Of The Bong

Moving forward to the '90s once again, here's the 1994 demo tape from Children Of The Bong, presumably the one mentioned in this bio on the Planet Dog Records site, and the one that got them signed to that label. Most of the tracks here were re-worked for their 1995 album 'Sirius Sounds' with the aid of ace engineers Andy Guthrie and Matthew Denny, except for 'Ultrascope' which appeared on the compilation 'Quadruped V.1', and 'U.V.F.' which seems to be exclusive to this tape (ooh, one for the completists then...).


With beats rooted more in electro, hiphop and dub rather than in 4/4 techno or trance, the two Children cooked up a tasty and full-on funky stew of electronica dominated by their use of original well-programmed sounds with the lead parts played by a trusty analogue synth called the Korg MS20. As a previous owner of one of these somewhat cantankerous machines, I admired their capacity to reign in its eccentricities and tuning drifts to get it to work successfully over MIDI, no mean task. Live performances were very much in yer face/ears and hugely enjoyable, Rob on the keyboards and Daniel on the mixing desk - I remember a particularly good one at the Basement club in Brighton, the old student union bar, after which I bored Rob no end talking about the workings of the Korg! Unfortunately I had to sell mine a few years later when I was short of cash, bah...
Highly recommended.


Ripped @320kbps as two side long tracks
Download HERE


8 comments:

  1. Your blog is great and your choice of music is stupendous. Thanks a million.

    Thanks. Rob.

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  2. Hi Rob, and many thanks for your kind feedback - much appreciated.

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  3. second that great selection of tapes man! ive got some nukli and omni opera somewhere! if ya need

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  4. Cheers anon...keep coming back matey.

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  5. Gutted. Found your woderful site just after megupload killed..damn!!

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  6. @ Anon - Jan 21
    Don't worry - have got a new hosting account and all links should hopefully go live again within the next day or three...

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  7. Looked for this a few years ago but nobody had uploaded it back then, so thanks muchly!

    I bought my old copy from the stall at Whirl-Y-Gig Shoreditch xD

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    Replies
    1. Keep checking back Dan, I may have something else to post by the Bong-sters in the near future.

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