The Distant - Secrets of Desire (1986)
2 hours ago
What's that? Not enough action you say? Listen!
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| Art Bergmann by James O'Mara (1990) |
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| The Royal Albert Arms Hotel, back in the day. photo: NDI fb |
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| Poster from show at The Albert. (not from the 1994 show) Photo: NDI fb |
The first thing you notice when you listen to the first track of Radish's Hello, is how young the singer sounds. What is he, 12 or 13 years old? Actually he is, the singer is a young Ben Kweller who was 12 when he formed Radish. Hello was recorded when he was 13, a pretty amazing accomplishment for anyone, especially an eighth grader. This isn't a prefabricated gimmicky act like that Bieber kid, but a talented musician that had a dozen songs under his belt by the time he was nine and won an honorable mention in a songwriting contest sponsored by Billboard magazine.
In 1993, Ben Kweller formed Radish with drummer John Kent and bassist Ryan Green (he was later replaced by Bryan Bradford) and played in and around Greenville, TX. They released two independent releases, Hello and Dizzy before they signed to Mercury records and in 1997 recorded the full length album, Restraining Bolt.
What I've posted is the hard to find debut from Ben Kweller and his band Radish, Hello, and it gives an early indication of his musical talent that would lead to bigger and better things. It's pretty evident he has the chops and he displays his confident solid songwriting style. The quality of the songs and recordings improve with every release, especially on Restraining Bolt, which earned the band a large cult following in England and they toured Europe several times. I will also post the second Radish album, Dizzy and possibly Restraining Bolt, if there is interest. Please leave me a comment or email me if you want more Radish!
Enjoy!
RADISH
Hello (1994)

his CD along with their other official release, The Bottle & Fresh Horses, are underrated classics that have all the hallmarks of great albums; catchy melodies, humour and memorable songs. Years ago I heard there was a pre-Fuzzy disc called, Wheelie which was their true debut and was sold at shows. Reports of it's rarity are varied depending on who you talk to. I've heard there was 500-2000 copies floating around, but according to Refreshment's bassist Art Edwards he believes there are no more than 5500 copies in existence. Supposeably it's fetching big bucks on eBay, but thanks to the web I found a mp3 version of the CD and it is well worth the download. The songs on Wheelie were later reworked for Fizzy and sound slightly different, with the exception of the track, Psychosis which is exclusive to this release. The song B.O.B.A is an acronym for, "Buffett on bad acid" and was re-named Mexico when it re-recorded for Fizzy... If you miss the Refreshments as much as I do, check out Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers!
ross Canada and the US (they only toured in summer months because of university classes) during their 7 year career and I saw the band live four times. I also had the pleasure of talking to guitarist Amanda Braden of Plumtree after a show in Steinbach (30 minutes outside of Winnipeg) back in 2000, we talked about their tour and music and of course got all the band to sign their third CD, This Day Won't Last At All. In case anyone is interested, I recorded the Plumtree shows on my trusty Walkman tape recorder.