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. 

P.I.G.Z.

The late 1970s Belgian punk explosion reached Kortrijk with P.I.G.Z., whose name stood for “Punk Is Grote Zever”. The group emerged in 1977, with Yves Lafère on vocals, Xavier Rathé on guitar, Mark on bass and Rik Masselis on drums. At a time when Kortrijk was only beginning to develop a local punk scene, P.I.G.Z. became one of its earliest names.

 
In 1978 they won the First Belgian Punk Contest in Brussels, a competition that preceded Humo magazine’s Rock Rally. The victory brought them a support slot for Iggy Pop, and the group also appeared on the live compilation documenting the contest. Their participation in Humo’s Rock Rally that same year was less successful, as they were eliminated during the preliminary stages. 

Their recorded output was extremely small. Apart from two tracks included on the 'First Belgian Punk Contest' compilation, P.I.G.Z. released the 'Bloody Belgium' 12-inch in 1978 on JW’s Records. The record contains “Bloody Belgium”, “Shall I” and “Stooges”, and was issued in a particularly primitive-looking package, with the group’s name glued onto a white paper sleeve. The vinyl appeared in several variations, including translucent and pink pressings, with a later black pressing also circulating.

 
The group lasted only around a year and a half and split in 1979. Drummer Rik Masselis subsequently became involved with The Definitivos, another important Kortrijk punk band formed after P.I.G.Z. The local scene continued to develop around places such as Punkcafé 21, with The Definitivos and other groups carrying the story forward into the early 1980s.

O.L.D.

Formed in Bergenfield, New Jersey, in 1986, the group that would become O.L.D. initially operated under the name Regurgitation, with guitarist James Plotkin at the center of the project. After the early incarnation evolved, the name Old Lady Drivers was adopted, eventually shortened to O.L.D. The name stood for “Old Lady Drivers,” a deliberately irreverent name that fitted the warped humour surrounding their early grindcore material. The lineup around the first recordings included Plotkin, vocalist Alan Dubin and drummer Ralph Pimentel. 

Their debut, 'Old Lady Drivers', appeared on Earache Records in 1988 and was recorded at Studio X in June of that year. The record is firmly rooted in the fast, abrasive side of late-1980s grindcore, with Plotkin handling guitars, bass and vocals alongside Dubin and Pimentel. Tracks such as “Total Hag,” “Corpse Full of Gunk,” “Supermarket Monstrosity” and “Bathrooms Rule” combine extremely short bursts of distorted guitar and manic vocals with the band's deliberately grotesque sense of humour. 

A major change came after the first album. O.L.D. moved away from a conventional three-piece setup, with Plotkin and Dubin eventually working as a duo backed by a drum machine. The change also opened the door to a much more experimental approach, incorporating electronics, programming, samples and heavier industrial textures. Their 1990 split release with Florida grindcore band Assück came during this transition, while the next full-length, 'Lo Flux Tube', appeared in 1991. 

'Lo Flux Tube' marked a sharp departure from the straightforward grindcore of the debut. Former Nirvana guitarist Jason Everman played bass on the album, while jazz saxophonist John Zorn made a guest appearance. The music pushed grindcore into much stranger territory, bringing together programmed rhythms, metallic guitar, electronics and abrupt changes in structure. Plotkin's increasingly experimental approach became a defining part of the O.L.D. sound during this period. 

The following 'The Musical Dimensions of Sleastak' arrived in 1993, with Herschel Gaer involved on bass, and continued the move toward alternative and industrial metal. The same year brought 'Hold On To Your Face', a remix-oriented release that handed O.L.D.'s material over to several figures from the hardcore techno world. Their final studio album, 'Formula', followed in 1995 and was completed by Plotkin and Dubin as a duo, with programming, keyboards, guitars and bass taking an increasingly prominent role.

 

Nachdenkliche Wehrpflichtige

Emerging briefly from the restless Hamburg and West Berlin underground around 1980, Nachdenkliche Wehrpflichtige brought together musicians, artists and writers from overlapping circles around the magazine Sounds and the wider experimental Neue Deutsche Welle scene. At the centre was Diedrich Diederichsen, then a Sounds editor, while the loose line-up included F.M. Einheit, Frieder Butzmann, Albert Oehlen, Bettina Köster, Nicola and Isabell. Rather than functioning as a conventional band, the project was essentially a short-lived collaboration between people coming from punk, experimental music, visual art and music journalism. 

The group’s best-known release was the 7-inch 'Politik Für Junge Leute', issued by Alfred Hilsberg’s ZickZack label as catalogue number ZZ 8. The record appeared in 1980, although Diederichsen’s own discography dates the EP to 1981. The material works more like a deliberately fractured collage than a conventional punk record. Football references, fragments of German popular culture, political slogans, literary quotations and snippets of familiar songs are thrown together in rapid succession. Contemporary descriptions of the EP emphasised precisely this hectic combination of current affairs, Hebbel quotations, football chants, Schlager and personal fragments, making the record difficult to fit neatly into any single genre.

 
The personnel also connects Nachdenkliche Wehrpflichtige with several important strands of the early-1980s German underground. F.M. Einheit would become a central figure in Abwärts and later Einstürzende Neubauten, Bettina Köster was a member of Mania D and subsequently Malaria!, while Frieder Butzmann was already developing his own experimental electronic and tape-based work. Albert Oehlen came from the visual-art world, and Diedrichsen continued his work as a writer, critic and cultural theorist. 

The project resurfaced on the 1983 ZickZack double LP 'Kirche der Ununterschiedlichkeit', which collected material from several related projects. Among the contributions was “Svengali Joe”, a piece later described by Hans Nieswandt as an early example of German-language rap. The recording came from the same Hamburg underground context and was made at Hafenklang Studio, linking Nachdenkliche Wehrpflichtige with the experimental recording culture surrounding ZickZack at the time, alongside records by Abwärts, Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle, Die Zimmermänner, Inzucht & Ordnung, The Wirtschaftswunder and Die Radierer, giving 'Politik Für Junge Leute' a clear place within the label’s early run of deliberately unconventional German underground releases. 

Mauro Teho Teardo

Born in Pordenone on 19 September 1966, Mauro Teho Teardo began his musical life far from the world of film scores and contemporary composition. He started playing clarinet as a child, but the discovery of punk records by the Ramones and Sex Pistols pushed him towards electric guitar and the local punk scene. At 17 he was already playing in bands, while developing his own experimental ideas outside the conventional group format.

 
In 1985 he founded the experimental project M.T.T. and set up M.T.T. Records, using the cassette format to circulate his music through the international tape-trading network. His early recordings belong to the underground industrial and experimental world, with releases such as 'The Birth Of The Day', 'Coliga Matari' and 'Abraxa'. During this period he also came into contact with artists from the international noise and industrial scene, and his work eventually appeared alongside names such as Nurse With Wound, Ramleh and Skullflower. 

The early 1990s brought a stronger focus on Meathead, the industrial rock project he formed and led from around 1990–91. The group combined noise, industrial music, electronics and a more recognisable rock framework, producing releases including 'Street Knowledge' (1992), 'Bored Stiff' (1994), 'Meathead Against The World' (1996) and 'Protect Me From What I Want' (1997). At the same time, Teardo was involved in a growing network of international collaborations, working with musicians such as Mick Harris, Lydia Lunch and Jim Coleman of Cop Shoot Cop. 

The 1990s were particularly busy, with projects including Matera with Mick Harris, Here with Jim Coleman and later Operator with Scott McCloud of Girls Against Boys. His activities moved between Italy, Britain and the United States, connecting the Italian underground with the wider industrial, experimental and alternative rock scenes. The same period also established Teardo as a musician interested in moving freely between electronic sounds, guitars, sampling and acoustic instrumentation rather than remaining tied to a single genre. 

A new chapter began around the turn of the millennium when Teardo increasingly moved into composing for film, theatre and other visual projects. His first major film score was for Gabriele Salvatores' "Denti", followed by work for directors including Guido Chiesa, Andrea Molaioli, Paolo Sorrentino and Daniele Vicari. His music for "Lavorare Con Lentezza", "La Ragazza Del Lago", "L'Amico Di Famiglia" and "Il Divo" established another side of his work, with the score for "Il Divo" earning him the David di Donatello for Best Music in 2009. 

Alongside the soundtrack work, he continued developing records that brought electronic processing into contact with strings and other acoustic instruments. 'Giorni Rubati', recorded with American cellist Erik Friedlander in 2006, was inspired by the poetry of Pier Paolo Pasolini. Later projects included 'Tower/Microphone', 'Music for Wilder Mann', 'Ballyturk', 'Grief Is the Thing with Feathers' and 'Ellipses dans l'Harmonie'. 

Another important connection began through the theatre project Ingiuria, created with Chiara Guidi and involving Alexander Bălănescu and Blixa Bargeld. The collaboration with Bargeld, the German musician known for Einstürzende Neubauten and his work with Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, subsequently developed into a long-running musical partnership. Teardo and Bargeld released 'Still Smiling' in 2013, followed by the 'Spring' EP, 'Nerissimo', 'Fall', and later 'Live in Berlin' and 'Christian & Mauro'. 

Teardo's work has continued to move between recorded music, live performance, theatre and cinema, with the common thread being the combination of electronic processing and acoustic instruments. His credits also include collaborations with artists such as Wire, Erik Friedlander, Jim Thirlwell, Alexander Bălănescu and others, while his film work has brought him awards including the David di Donatello, Nastro d'Argento, Ciak d'Oro and Premio Ennio Morricone. 

La Banda Trapera Del Rio

Emerging from the San Ildefonso neighborhood of Cornellà de Llobregat, on the industrial outskirts of Barcelona, La Banda Trapera del Río formed in 1976 around vocalist Miguel Ángel Sánchez, better known as Morfi Grei. Their surroundings were a long way from the fashionable image of punk then developing in London and New York. This was a working-class area of apartment blocks, factories, immigration and difficult living conditions, and that environment became an important part of the band's identity and songwriting. 

Morfi had moved to Cornellà with his family from Melilla. His early musical tastes ranged from the Beatles, Rolling Stones and Chuck Berry to Deep Purple, before Lou Reed became a particularly important influence. Around 1976, he began putting a band together with friends from the area around the Casino Cultural San Ildefonso. They initially played rock and roll covers, but soon started writing their own material and developing a much more confrontational sound and attitude. 

The lineup changed frequently during the early years, with musicians such as Tío Modes, Juan “Raf” Pulido, Rockhita and El Subidas passing through the group. Their musical backgrounds were not always rooted in punk either, with some members having previously played in progressive and symphonic rock bands. That mixture helped give La Trapera a sound that drew from rock and roll, garage and hard rock as much as from the raw energy of punk. 

Their first widely recognized performance took place on November 13, 1976, at the Poble Espanyol in Barcelona, during a tribute to Lina Ódena. From there, the band began building a reputation through increasingly wild and provocative live shows. Their songs dealt with drugs, sex, boredom, poverty, institutions and life on the outskirts, using deliberately crude language and humor rather than the more traditional political rhetoric of Spanish protest music. 

Songs such as “La Regla”, “Venid A Las cloacas”, “Curriqui De Barrio”, “Padre Nuestro” and “Nos Gusta Cagarnos En La Sociedad” captured that attitude, while “Ciutat Podrida”, sung in Catalan, became one of their best-known tracks. Their lyrics were direct, confrontational and deliberately offensive, reflecting the language and atmosphere of the streets around them rather than trying to make their music respectable.

 
In 1978, the group signed with Belter, a record company better known for commercial Spanish music and copla. They recorded their first material for the label that year, and 'La Regla / La Cloaca' appeared as a single in the summer. Their relationship with Belter was far from straightforward, however, and the release of their debut album was delayed. 'La Banda Trapera del Río' finally appeared in April 1979, although the musicians were unhappy with the finished sound and later raised complaints concerning promotion, sales and royalties.

 
The album brought together eleven tracks from their early repertoire. The record was pressed in relatively small numbers and also circulated through cassette copies, while the group's lack of interest in playing by commercial rules kept them firmly within the underground. 

Their live work was just as important as their records. By the end of 1978 they were already travelling to the Basque Country, where their concerts attracted considerable attention. During 1979 and 1980 they played in places including Gallarta, Barakaldo and Bilbao, establishing links with the rapidly developing alternative and punk scenes outside Barcelona. 

After several lineup changes and increasing problems, including drug-related difficulties, the original period came to an end in 1982. That year they recorded the material that would eventually become 'Guante De Guillotina', but the album was shelved and remained unreleased until 1993.

Interest in the band's early work resurfaced in the early 1990s, leading to a reunion and a second period of activity. They released the live album 'Directo A Los Cojones' and, in 1994, returned to the studio for 'Mentemblanco'. The group subsequently split again, while their original recordings continued to be reissued and collected. In 2006, Munster Records released '1978/1982. Grabaciones Completas', bringing together their first two albums alongside demos and live recordings from the period.