Friday, December 26, 1986

Friday, December 19, 1986

Friday, December 12, 1986

Flyer: Friday December 12, 1986

Some skinheads showed up to this show. The Hammer skins were known for being racist skins. they were denied entry to the show, so they tried to break in through a side entrance and the crowd pushed them out. The show was stopped and then 7 Seconds broke into a rendition of Colorblind, which Ray Cappo from Youth of Today did the rap vocals in the chorus too.

Wednesday, December 3, 1986

Release - SNFU "If You Swear, You'll Catch No Fish" LP

This is SNFU's second full length and songs like "The Ceiling" and "Mind Like a Door" were written and being performed live before the first album came out."Mind like a door" was a suggestion by the singer of his own mental health issues.


In his book "SNFU: ...What No One Else Wanted to Say", Chris Walter describes the new material as "still fast and furious punk rock, but not as basic". SNFU used the same studio (Power Zone) and producer (Dave Mockford) as the first album. The second album was recorded in April 1986. Dave Mockford was inexperienced and the record cover says that the album is casually mixed by Dave Mockford and Ken Chinn, so Chi was their for moral support. It was Dave's nervousness that made him work extra hard at getting the sound right and the band was blown away.

There are a number of sound effects used on the song "Scarecrow" which include birds chirping borrowed from a sound effects record that Brent borrowed from the public library. There was also a beer bottle dropped on the strings of a piano, hand claps from a Yamaha RX drum machine, and acid style guitar leads courtesy of the Belke Brothers showing off the band's interest in experimenting.

On "Black Cloud", David and Ken doubled most of the lead vocal tracks.

Guitar effects were added by the producer to "He's Not Getting Older, He's Getting Bitter".

Brent and Muc added leads like "Mary Had a Little Lamb" to at least four songs on that album.

On "Humble Life of Disarray", Marc, Brent, dave , and Jn all take turns singing lines of a verse and Ken sings the chorus alone.

The song "Snapping Turtle" was written about a cranky roomate that he had at the time. this song also suffered fom being recorded last. Chi didn't have much throat left, which partially led to making it the last song on the release.

The title came from an old flyer that Chi made for a show at Spartan's. There was a blank space that he filled in with a fortune cookie message he got at the Double Greasy (the nickname for the Chinese Restaurant really called "Double Greeting Wonton House). This would set a rule that all album titles from here on in had to contain exactly seven words.

The cover art featured an abstract sculpture by Edmonton artist Blake Senini and Ken Hensen pulled together the design end.

The record was pressed in Mississauga and the band would arrange to pick them up on their next tour. The messages "Gang Green Sucks Bud" and "Rectum Damn Near Killed 'Em" etched on the inner grooves of the record.

The songs that make up this album are:

1. The Devil's Voice
2. Where's My Legs
3. Better Homes and Gardens
4. Scarecrow
5. Black Cloud
6. I Forget
7. The Ceiling
8. Mind Like a Door
9. He's Not Getting Older, He's getting Bitter
10. Electric Chair
11. Welcome to My Humble Life of Disarray
12. Snapping Turtle

Flyer - Wednesday December 3, 1986

This was MSI's first show. I was super excited to see them play seeing as I hung out with them and went to a lot of their practise sessions. I was so excited to see them play live. Circus Lupis was the band that morphed out of Mike Markey and the Sailors and would become Rocktopus. And I think this was the tour for SNFU where "If You Swear, You'll Catch No Fish" came out. This might have been a Reuben Kincade show. The Latvian House wasn't used for too many shows, but I remember taking a phot of Chi Pig jumping off the speaker stacks at this one and he must have been about 20 feet in the air. He was known for his aerial acrobatics at the time.

Monday, December 1, 1986

Flyer - Monday December 1st, 1986

SNFU plays in Guelph. The show is sponsored by CFRU, the local campus community radio station.

Zine - Nerve #30

Issues 30 of Nerve Magazine has David Lee Roth on the cover. Unusual for Nerve but I think this was the time when he was leaving Van Halen to become a solo artist and was wearing flash dance clothes to fane like a new waver. Aside from a feature on David lee Roth, this issue also contains a piece on Fishbone, the Brunswick House, the Pig Paper, the New Jazz fest, Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Hunters & Collectors, Woodentops, SST Records, and a column by Dave Bidini about L'Etranger and Vital Sines.