Sandy Duncan’s Eye
I know virtually nothing about Sandy Duncan’s Eye other than they were from LA , they released a record or two on the Flipside label, and their guitarist Dave Rice was originally in Detroit’s L-Seven. Given the label I was surprised to discover that the tracks were in the noisy/grunge pop that would have been at home on Subpop or even Amphetamine Reptile. “A” side “525 NTSC” is the more immediate of the two tracks, uptempo and driving with distorto vocals. The flip “Sub” is slower drone with vocals that almost remind of J Robbins. I never came across the band’s lone LP. If anyone has it and wants to share some tracks let me know.
Sandy Duncan’s Eye - 525 NTSC.mp3
Sandy Duncan’s Eye - Sub.mp3
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The only thing I remember about this band is a T-shirt a roommate had of them that had a Snuggle type bear on it looking very sweet with its arms outstretched and it said HUG on it. When you examined it closer the bear had an erection. It sure cracked me up at the time.
i guess it’s the only good thing that comes from Sandy Duncan’s having a glass eye…
They were from LA and well they didn’t like LA but it helped their music a lot… Their full length was amazing and I lost my copy of the CD and hearing these MP3’s bring it all back. They also released a 7″ on Sub Pop as part of their single of the month club then they disappeared. I managed to release a Sandy Duncans Eye track on Self Mutilation 7″ which was re-issed here http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000001HRL/qid=1133661326/sr=8-3/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i3_xgl15/102-5381226-1898558?n=507846&s=music&v=glance
Found this article from Fiz Magazine
http://members.tripod.com/~Phil_Wahl/articles/Sandy_Duncans_Eye.html
also Dave Rice of the band has a website http://dave-rice.net/
see photos of SDE in 2002!
http://www.dave-rice.net/sde1.jpg
also cover of Sub Pop 7″
http://www.vinyltap.co.uk/shop/item/498921371260283.aspx
Also forgot to mention Steven Albini produced the Sandy Duncan’s Eye LP on Flipside
I had completely forgotten about these guys, Flipside put out some pretty diverse titles.
These guys had a great sound. I pull out the CD every once in a while and rock out. Good stuff…
Ahh yes, Sandy Duncan’s Eye. I was a Flipside staffer for years, so I was there for all of this. Here’s some more info about the band including some info that people will probably be pissed off at me for mentioning. Following, that, an early Xmas present for you all. Ok, the band leader was a guy named Roberto. The drummer’s name was Campbell. You already know the guitarist. 525 NTSC was a single that came from a (I believe it was) a 5 song recording session that they did circa 1990. When that demo was turn in, both Al (and I, and many others on staff) were hardcore fans. We went to tons of their shows, and they are some of the most memorable shows from the era that I remember (another kick ass live band from that era was called “Oiler” but that’s for another blog reply). At any rate, Roberto (bass, vocals) was the band leader. Frankly, he was a nice guy, but he was very very pissed off at life and extremely shy (I’d almost say he suffered from agoraphobia). This made him hard to deal with on all levels. He also was extremely aloof and seemingly uncaring about SDE’s reputation. To wit: when Al asked him to go record an album, Roberto procrastinated for months, finally, at the last minute, turning in the SAME 5 song demo, along with four more songs that they probably scraped off of a sidewalk somewhere (actually, they DID record those four with Steve Albini, but for reasons that Al and I never found out and that never made sense, we had NO idea WHY they didn’t record the whole thing with Steve because they were supposed to. WHY, when they are given money from Al to go record, do they go to Steve’s and then only do four songs, and then add the 5-song demo to that and call it an album? Laziness? Who the hell knows. It really pissed Al off though I remember. Roberto was also supposed to write a few more songs for it and never bothered. In other words: the album was as half-assed as the day is short in the winter (even though it’s great). Steve Albini was then asked to make sense out of it all, and he basically tweaked the recordings some. The reason for the final loop at the end of the album is because, without it, the album is an EP (too short) because of what I just told you previously (they were supposed to record a full length and didn’t. So the loop is actually filler to make it seem longer than it really is). NOW, with all of this being said, please realize I’m trying to remember some stuff that happened years ago that didn’t seem like anything really worth paying attention to when it happened… plus as an editor of Flipside I was always under the gun jamming on zine deadlines anyway–Al was the one who focused on the label more), so this MIGHT be wrong in places, and some of it IS based on (although fairly informed, they are only but mere) assumptions. However, one thing that is for certain: SDE would have been a lot more prolific (and should have been) if Roberto cared about getting the word out about the band. He didn’t, and it caused a LOT of band infighting as well. SDE was very very unstable. They even had a few “problems” in stage in the middle of shows! Regardless, SDE had quite a buzz in Los Angeles and the Flipside staff also loved them (Al and I never missed a show), and they just never took advantage of this. It’s a damn shame too. Finally, I DO have video footage of SDE which perhaps I’ll share one day, but today, I give you, the extremely hard to find LP that nobody seems to have… well, you do now. Download it here: http://media.buttwrenching.com/Sandy Duncan’s Eye (1991 Flipside).zip Peace, Thom Bone