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As with many of my old network friends, when M&E decided to crash and burn in late 2003, I lost touch with Didier. It was only thanks to the cyber age that I'd so long rallied against that I caught up with him again on our return a decade later, by this time involved with a webzine called Peek-A-Boo, which Luminous Dash describes as 'goth-tinted'. More recently, he and a young lady by the name of Ann Cnockaert started up Luminous Dash. That webzine will be continuing and I had a brief chat with Ann about that a week or so ago; "Luminous dash originated from the love for music." She explains, "Inspired by Indie labels, the Manchester Music scene, many gigs and festivals home & abroad. The name Luminous Dash refers to the gene in our DNA which lights up when enjoying music." You truly do learn something new every day doing this, you know! I asked about the scope of the magazine, would it be as global as The Original Sin used to be? "We focus on Belgian artists." She says, "So very new and fresh music. Unsigned artists, artists they don't play on the radio. But we also write about the things we like - I like the Factory-label music, some writers like goth, indie, noise, jazz or metal." Fingers crossed we will have a good relationship with Luminous Dash in the future, and may I take this opportunity of welcoming Ann to our little world.
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De grappige naam is een samensmelting van een hit van Perry Como en één van The Platters die op zijn verjaardag hits waren, maar met de Atlantische Oceaan ertussen. Net zoals de meeste van zijn releases (het lot van de meeste tape-artiesten) was Magic Moments At Twilight Time op commercieel vlak allesbehalve een hoogvlieger. De band maakte muziek op allerlei (meestal bevriende) labels en de releases waren wereldwijd verkrijgbaar, naar het schijnt in Afrika niet. Lijkt nu een logische zaak, maar beeld je maar eens in wat voor een huzarenstukje dit in een wereld zonder internet was!
En hoe obscuur ook, is er
vandaag nog altijd interesse in deze releases. Hoewel Magic Moments At
Twilight Time al lang niet meer bestaat, werd onlangs Creavolution Reborn
uit 1996 op cd gezet. De opnames vonden plaats in de Brain Dead Studios
dat al 34 jaar ter beschikking staat voor artiesten van alle genres, van
folk tot metal.
ENGLISH TRANSLATION;
It used to be better.
Although we are more inclined to put these kind of words under the blah
blah blah, there is sometimes something of truth. In the 1990s, long
before there was the internet, there was a real network of underground
artists. We also know that now, but then the artists did not drown in the
often too turbulent sea of information that there is now. Armed with a
photocopy machine and a fortune on stamps, artists themselves managed to
break the power of the music industry. Because, well, who does not get a
chance, you just have to do it yourself. How difficult that is ... LINKS; |
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Sadly, it looks
like we'll be losing another of the original 1990's networkers from the
fold now, Didier Becu tells me he too is ready to throw in the towel. It's
always sad to write about old friends that are about to give it all up,
but then who am I to talk? I also suffered the dreaded underground burnout
and disappeared for a decade, shit happens. Back in the day, Dider
produced a zine called The Original Sin in his home in Belgium. Much the
way we all did, cut and paste (with scissors and glue, ask your dad!),
typewriter et al. In spite of Flemish being his native tongue, the zine
was in English (or 'rock & roll esperanto' as we called it), and
frequently featured reviews of MMATT and M&E output, a great support
indeed. Come the internet age, which seemed to catch many of us on the
hop, the paper zines began to disappear and The Original Sin passed into
memory.
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Didier,
meantime, sounds like he is serious about his 'retirement', I recognised
the tone of his answer when I asked why; "It was a mixture of illness,
getting too old for this shit and some artists who pretend to claim my
life when I was not in for their stuff." He states bluntly, "I must
confess that by the age of nearly 51, I kind of lost the urge to hear 500
unsigned bands per day." Yeah, it resonates, I'm sure a lot of old time
networkers will be nodding their heads in sympathy. Luckily, he was kind
enough to review our "Creavolution Reborn" CD last October (6 months ago,
I'm slack, I know, but I've only just caught up with him, sue me!) before
heading for the sheltered accommodation at Happy Valley Retirement Home
(where we hope he gets to put his feet up, enjoy life and know how much we
appreciate all the support he has given us across the years) and picking
up his bus pass. Here's what he had to say, both about the remastered
album and the amazing underground network that was, first in the original
Flemish, then followed by a quickie translation...
MAGIC
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