The Tesco Bombers

Coming out of the late-1970s London post-punk scene, The Tesco Bombers operated more as a loose project than a fixed band, with a constantly changing line-up drawn from musicians active around the city’s punk and experimental circles. The project was closely associated with artist and musician Neal Brown, who had previously been involved with The Vincent Units, and the shifting personnel included figures such as Jim “Amos” Welton, Keith Allen, Inigo Batterham, Richard Dudanski and vocalist Sara Fancy. The group also crossed paths with The Raincoats, The Mo-Dettes and other bands moving through the same West London venues. 

Their best-known recording appeared in 1982 on Y Records, with the 7" single 'Hernando’s Hideaway' backed by "Break The Ice At Parties" and "Girl From Ipanema (Instrumental)". The title track was a stripped-down, eccentric version of the song from the musical "The Pajama Game", while "Break The Ice At Parties" pushed the project further into jerky post-punk territory, mixing clipped guitar and saxophone lines with bass and drums.

The Tesco Bombers were also part of the loose network of musicians and performers around venues such as The Chippenham and other West London spaces where punk, post-punk, reggae, funk and more experimental sounds overlapped. Their connection with The Mo-Dettes is especially interesting: an early incarnation of that group performed as The Bomberettes after opening for The Tesco Bombers, linking Neal Brown’s project directly with the formation of the later band. The Tesco Bombers’ brief recorded output has since been included on post-punk compilations such as 'Cease & Desist: DIY! (Cult Classics From The Post-Punk Era 1978–1982)'. 

Zana

Formed in Belgrade around 1980 by keyboardist Zoran D. Živanović “Žika” and guitarist Radovan Jovićević “Radovan II”, Zana became part of the lively Yugoslav new wave scene at the turn of the decade. The early lineup also included singer Zana Nimani, whose first name was adopted for the band, as well as guitarist Igor Jovanović, bassist Bogdan Dragović and drummer Aleksandar Ivanov. Marina Tucaković was also closely involved as a lyricist and member, contributing to the songwriting that helped shape the group’s first period. Their first single, “Nastavnice” / “Sveta”, appeared in 1980, and the group made its first major Belgrade appearance that November, opening for Generacija 5 at Pionir Hall. 

 
The debut album, 'Loše Vesti Uz Rege Za Pivsku Flašu', followed in 1981, combining the group’s new wave beginnings with pop-rock and reggae touches. Around the same time, “Leto” became a successful single, while songs such as “Moj deda”, “On” and “Ti Si Neko Staro Lice” helped establish the group across Yugoslavia. Their second album, 'Dodirni Mi Kolena', released in 1982, marked a stronger move towards synth-pop and more polished pop-rock, with Živanović’s keyboards becoming particularly important to the sound. The title track became one of their best-known songs, while the album also included “Majstor Za Poljupce”, “Pričalica” and “Via Amerika”. 

 
A third album, 'Natrag Na Voz', arrived in 1983 and continued the increasingly accessible direction, with “Jabuke I Vino”, “Mladiću Moj” and the title track among the better-known material. The lineup changed during these years, but Živanović and Jovićević remained the central figures behind the group. In 1984, Zana went on a temporary hiatus while Jovićević and Živanović completed their mandatory military service, and Zana Nimani left to pursue a solo career. She subsequently recorded her own album 'Noćas Pevam Samo Tebi' in 1986, while the remaining members continued the group under the Zana name.

 
During the second half of the 1980s, the group went through several vocal changes, with Nataša Gajović and later Nataša Živković taking over the microphone. Releases such as 'Zana' (1985), 'Otkinimo Noćas Zajedno' (1987), 'Vojna Pošta' (1988) and 'Rukuju Se, Rukuju' (1989) followed as the sound moved further towards mainstream pop. In the 1990s, Zana operated for a period as a trio centred on Jovićević, Živanović and vocalist Jelena Galonić, who had joined the group at nineteen and later became involved in writing lyrics as well. Jovićević left in 1999, after which Živanović and Galonić continued working under the Zana name. 

 
The catalogue continued with albums including 'Nisam, Nisam' (1991), 'Tražim' (1993), 'Zanomanija' (1997), 'Prijatelji' (1999), '21' (2001) and 'Kao Nekad' (2006). Later lineups continued to perform and record, with Živanović remaining the long-running member connecting the different eras of the group. Zana has also been represented through numerous compilations and retrospective collections, including 'Najlepše Pesme 1980–1990', 'The Platinum Collection', 'Original Album Collection' and the 'Dijamantski CD Box Set 1980–2022'. 

 

Yeah!

Following the breakup of Anti Troppau Council, Yannis Drenoyannis teamed up with guitarist Vassilis Spyropoulos, known for his work with Spyridoula -an important name in the Greek rock underground-, bassist Hrysa Pantazi and drummer Takis Giannoutsos to form Yeah! The group continued the musicians' involvement in the Greek alternative and underground scene, with Drenoyannis taking on vocals and guitar. 

Yeah! released their self-titled debut album in 1988, followed by 'Festival' in 1992. The two albums belong to the late-1980s and early-1990s period of the Greek independent scene, when musicians connected to punk, new wave and alternative rock were moving between different groups and projects.  

After Yeah! split up, the members moved in different directions. Drenoyannis went into journalism, writing articles mainly about new cars and motorbikes, while Takis Giannoutsos developed a career in radio and became a familiar media personality after also presenting a morning television show for a period. 

Xanadu

Lasting only around three months, Xanadu was a short-lived group from Detroit, Michigan, formed in 1979 around Cary Loren, Ben Miller, Laurence Miller and Rob King. Their brief existence placed them within Detroit’s fertile underground scene, where punk, experimental music and DIY culture were crossing paths in increasingly unpredictable ways. 

The group recorded and released a single EP during 1979, leaving behind a very small recorded legacy that reflects the temporary nature of the project. Cary Loren was already active in Detroit’s experimental underground and would become closely associated with Destroy All Monsters, while the Miller brothers and Rob King were part of the same loose network of musicians and artists operating around the city’s independent scene. With the members moving on to other activities, Xanadu disappeared almost as quickly as it had formed. 

Walking Wounded

Based around singer, guitarist and songwriter Jerry Giddens, Walking Wounded were part of the Los Angeles rock scene during the mid-1980s. Giddens, originally from Louisiana, built the group around a mixture of folk-rock songwriting, acoustic guitar, electric rock and touches of reggae, with lyrics dealing openly with social and political subjects. The early lineup included Michael Packard on lead guitar, Tom Lillestol on bass and backing vocals, and drummer Billy Mintz. Their live shows around Los Angeles became an important part of the group’s activity, while songs such as “Words” and “Helpless” addressed issues including the wars in Central America and homelessness. 

The self-titled 'Walking Wounded' LP appeared on Stonegarden in 1986, followed by 'The New West' on Chameleon in 1987. The lineup changed during this period, with Giddens remaining at the center of the group and musicians such as Kent Earl Housman contributing to different stages of the band. Former Plimsouls guitarist Eddie Muñoz joined around the end of 1987, replacing Michael Packard. Muñoz also worked with Trainwreck Ghosts, connecting Walking Wounded with other musicians from the Los Angeles underground rock scene. 

The lineup around 'Raging Winds Of Time', released by Chameleon in 1989, included Giddens, Eddie Muñoz, Roger Prescott and Tom Lillestol, with additional contributions from musicians including Tony Marsico and Chalo Quintana. The album brought together country, folk, Mexican and Southwestern influences, with songs such as “Raging Winds Of Time,” “Remember Ruben Salazar” and “Hollywood’s To Blame.” Walking Wounded continued into the early 1990s, with 'Hard Times' appearing on Doctor Dream in 1991 and featuring Giddens, Prescott, Housman and other musicians. Giddens also maintained a parallel solo career, releasing 'Livin’ Ain’t Easy' in 1989, while Walking Wounded continued through changing lineups around his songwriting. 

Vacuum

Formed in Christchurch during the mid-1970s, Vacuum grew out of the city’s emerging underground scene, with Bill Direen at the centre alongside Stephen Cogle and Peter Stapleton. Peter Fryer was also involved, contributing keyboards and violin, while Alan Meek joined later. The group was sometimes known as Vacuum Blue Ladder and developed a raw sound shaped by 1960s garage rock, American psychedelia and The Velvet Underground, filtered through the atmosphere of the late-1970s New Zealand punk scene. Their early appearances included the anarchic Mollett Street space, where they shared bills with other Christchurch underground groups.

 
The group began recording in 1978 at Orly Productions in Christchurch, although those first tapes were later lost. A further session at Robbins Recording Studios produced several surviving tracks, including Direen songs such as “Love In The Retail Trade”, “Remember Breaking Up” and “Inquest”. Vacuum gradually became more active onstage during 1979, playing venues around Christchurch and Lyttelton including The British, Suburbs Hall, Dux de Lux and the Gladstone. The surviving recordings later provided an important document of Direen’s earliest work, despite not being issued at the time they were made.

 
There were two distinct songwriting strands within the group, with Direen developing his own material while Cogle and Stapleton worked together on songs such as “Better Off Dead”. The changing line-up eventually included Jon Markie, also known as Jon Segovia, on bass, and the group evolved into Kaza Portico around 1980. Direen subsequently developed The Builders, while Cogle and Stapleton carried their songwriting partnership into the Victor Dimisich Band and later projects. Vacuum recordings remained scattered for years before appearing on Bill Direen’s 'Split Seconds' collection and archival releases, including material issued by Siltbreeze in the 2010s. 

UA

Emerging from the Spanish new wave and synth-pop underground around the early 1980s, UA was built around Raimundo M. Luengo, who handled vocals, keyboards and composition. The project went through several line-ups, Among the people connected with the project were Juan, later known as The Muses Rapt, who worked with his sister Teresa, as well as Mariano Lozano-P, associated with YHVH and later Séptimo Sello, and Miguel Ángel Guillermo. Other musicians associated with UA included Luna Estebaranz, Juan Antonio García, Celestino Charro and Miguel Ángel Guillermo, while later personnel included Agustín Villafáñez on drums, María Luisa Muñoz “May” on bass and Mario Gil on keyboards. The changing line-up reflected the loose, collaborative nature of the Madrid-area underground, where musicians frequently moved between different groups and projects. 

 
The best-known UA track was “Cantante De Ópera”, an underground hit from 1982 built around Luna Estebaranz’s striking operatic soprano vocals. The recording featured Juan Antonio García on keyboards, Miguel Ángel Guillermo on drums and Celestino Charro on bass, giving the song a particularly unusual combination of synthetic textures, electronic pop and theatrical vocals. 

 
From 1983, after Luengo had moved to Valladolid, UA effectively became a solo project under his direction, and he renamed it BIT-32. The change marked a new stage in his work with keyboards, electronic sounds and programmed or synthesised textures, while some of the musicians who had passed through UA continued their activities in other Spanish underground and new-wave projects.

 

T.R.A.S.E.

Growing out of a teenage fascination with electronics, science-fiction soundtracks and the emerging synth-pop of the early 1980s, T.R.A.S.E. -short for Tape Recorder And Synthesiser Ensemble- was essentially the home-recording project of Manchester teenager Andy Popplewell. The project began around 1981, when Popplewell was just 16, although his interest in building electronic equipment had started a couple of years earlier. After finding construction plans in electronics hobbyist magazines, he built his own six-channel mixer and later constructed a synthesiser based on the Elektor Chorosynth design, along with electronic percussion, effects units and other pieces of equipment. 

Much of the project grew directly out of Popplewell's school interests in woodwork, metalwork and science. He also worked as a sound and lighting operator for school plays, giving him an early opportunity to experiment with recording and electronic sound. Money from paper rounds and various odd jobs went into the project, while a junk-shop piano keyboard and tools inherited from his father became part of the makeshift studio. He even produced his own circuit boards, gradually putting together a small recording setup in which the limitations of the equipment became part of the process. 

The recordings made under the T.R.A.S.E. name were mostly Popplewell's own work, with him handling the synthesiser, electronics, recording and vocals. His younger brother occasionally contributed guitar, including the rhythm guitar on "War Machine". Working with reel-to-reel equipment and cassette recording between roughly 1981 and 1983, Popplewell developed a mixture of minimal synth, experimental electro-pop, robotic funk and atmospheric electronic pieces. His influences included John Carpenter's film scores, Kraftwerk, Gary Numan and Tubeway Army, as well as Giorgio Moroder, The Human League and The Glitter Band. 

 

After the T.R.A.S.E. recordings came to an end, Popplewell moved towards a professional career in audio. He received training in London through employment with the BBC and subsequently worked as a tape engineer, editor and archivist, becoming involved with the restoration and preservation of vintage recordings. The connection between that later work and his teenage experiments became particularly relevant decades later, when the old T.R.A.S.E. tapes were rediscovered.  

The material remained almost completely unheard for decades. Popplewell had recorded his music for himself rather than attempting to release it commercially, and his album existed as a single cassette copy. The story resurfaced in 2012 after Popplewell crossed paths with Andy Votel, whose Finders Keepers label was involved in archival and reissue projects. The surviving tapes were restored and prepared for their first proper release, resulting in 'Tape Recorder And Synthesiser Ensemble', issued by Finders Keepers in 2013 as a double LP and CD. The collection brought together recordings made during Popplewell's teenage years, including "Sketch-1", "Harmonium", "Electronic Rock", "Talk To Me", "Unrequited Rock", "Twilight" and "War Machine", along with a cover of The Glitter Band's "Angel Face" and Gary Numan's "We Are So Fragile". 

SNFU

Formed in Edmonton, Alberta, in 1981, SNFU became part of the first wave of Canadian hardcore punk, combining fast, abrasive music with a deliberately irreverent sense of humour. The band’s name was never tied to a single fixed meaning, and throughout their history it was given various interpretations including “Society’s No Fucking Use”, “Snot Nosed Fuck Ups” and “Sit Not For Us”. The ambiguity fitted their approach to punk, where absurdity, sarcasm and social observation were often mixed together.

 
The original lineup featured singer Ken “Mr. Chi Pig” Chinn, guitarist Marc “Bunty” Belke, bassist Brent Belke and drummer Evan C. Jones. Mr. Chi Pig remained the central figure throughout SNFU’s history, while the lineup changed considerably over the years. Their early recordings established a sound rooted in hardcore but with enough melodic movement and eccentricity to separate them from more straightforward practitioners of the style. 

During the 1980s, SNFU developed a strong following through touring and a series of releases that helped connect the Canadian hardcore scene with audiences elsewhere. Their songs frequently dealt with everyday frustrations, social behaviour and the strange details of ordinary life, using humour and deliberately twisted perspectives rather than adopting a strictly confrontational lyrical style. 

The group relocated from Edmonton to Vancouver in 1992, placing them closer to another important centre of Canadian punk activity. The move coincided with a period when SNFU were reaching a wider audience, and their later records continued to combine hardcore energy with catchy guitar work, unusual arrangements and Chi Pig’s distinctive vocals. 

A recurring detail in their discography was the construction of their album titles. Each full-length album was given a title containing exactly seven words, usually forming an intentionally elaborate or absurd phrase. This became a kind of running joke across their catalogue and reflected the same playful attention to language that appeared in their lyrics and the various interpretations of the band’s acronym. 

Mr. Chi Pig was also known for his physical stage presence, incorporating acrobatics and energetic movements into SNFU’s live performances, that became closely associated with the group, matching the fast pace of the music and the irreverent character that ran through their work. 

SNFU remained active through several different periods, with breaks and lineup changes along the way, and their history ultimately stretched across several decades of Canadian punk. The band’s recordings from the Edmonton hardcore years through their Vancouver period document the changes in both their lineup and sound while retaining the humour, wordplay and energetic performance style that had been present from the beginning. 

Radical Dance Faction

Emerging from Hungerford, Berkshire, in 1986, the group began life under the name Military Surplus, with Chris Bowsher at the centre. The project soon developed into Radical Dance Faction, usually shortened to RDF, with Bowsher remaining the only constant member through its various incarnations. The line-up changed frequently over the years, with more than thirty musicians passing through at different points, giving the band a fluid sound and personnel that could shift considerably from one period to another. 

Their music brought together punk, reggae, ska and dub, with Bowsher delivering his lyrics more as spoken-word or beat poetry than conventional singing. His writing dealt with social and political subjects, often drawing on events and experiences around him. “Chinese Poem”, for example, addressed the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, while “Hot on the Wire” was connected to Bowsher’s experience of witnessing the Hungerford massacre in 1987. 

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, RDF became closely associated with the British anarcho-punk and free-festival circuit, including the scene often described in the press as “crusty”. Their live activity extended beyond Britain, with tours in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. They signed with Southern Records in 1990 and released material through their Earthzone imprint, including the albums 'Borderline Cases' and 'Wasteland'. They also appeared at larger reggae and alternative events, including Germany’s Summerjam festival, and shared bills with acts such as Rebel MC and Ziggy Marley. 

The cassette releases 'Taking Refuge' and 'Hot on the Wire' appeared in 1989, followed by 'Borderline Cases' in 1990 and 'Wasteland' in 1991. The single “Landing Party” came out in 1991, while “Beast in the Doorway” followed in 1994. 'Raggamuffin Statement', issued in 1995, combined live recordings, remixes and new material, including “Martin Foran”, concerning the case of a prisoner who had been wrongly convicted. After the original run ended in the mid-1990s, RDF returned to activity in 2006 and played a number of festival dates in the following years. Another reformation took place in 2012, coinciding with the release of 'Ammunition' and appearances including the Bearded Theory Festival. Later releases included 'Daydream Dystopia' in 2018 and 'Welcome to the Edge' in 2023, while Bowsher also continued working with musicians from the RDF circle on related projects. 

Across the different line-ups, Chris Bowsher has remained the central figure, with his spoken delivery providing the most recognisable thread between the early Military Surplus recordings, the classic RDF period and the later material. The personnel around him have included musicians such as Steve Swann, Phil Astronaut, Linda Goodman, Mark McCarthy, Sarah Edwards, Tim Hill, Graham Spey and Martin Jenkins, among many others who passed through the band's constantly changing line-up.