2011-04-05: Planks at CabaRadio 2nd anniversary broadcast

Sometimes, the opportunities come so close together there just isn't time to write them all up! Late the night of Apr 5th, a crew of five Planks , perhaps our biggest yet on the radio (including Dr. Stelhand's debut on the chacharangi and Ludwicka LePearl's debut on the beverage dispenser), joined Teddy Smooth and E-Roc (and practically a cast of thousands: Andrea Superstein formerly of the Marmaladies, Ligia Oancea, Jane Stanton, Suzy Shameless and Iona Beerwagon from the Terminal City Rollergirls, and Burgundy Brixx & the Purrfessor of Kitty Nights) to celebrate the 2nd anniversary of CabaRadio over at CiTR.

You can hear us here! Our first song, the Volga Boatmen birthday song, begins at 8:41 (CabaRadio enjoys great production values, and it enjoys them at its leisure), which we follow up with Psycho Killer at 9:40, our Kishka Anthem at 13:34, and Kiddie Closer again for kicks at 17:56.

Memories! Sights to rival the sounds from the CiTR lounge:

2011-01-26: Creaking Planks radio takeover on CaBaRadio and Accordion Noir!

In promotion of our fabulous 6-year-anniversary show next Monday night, we've hit the airwaves! Last night we joined Teddy Smooth and E-Roc at CaBaRadio again over at CiTR in the UBC student union building, where we played tunes and made strange innuendo late into the night. Always good times. We hadn't confirmed the engagement with enough advance warning to let potential listeners know, but ... in all honesty, how many of you would be tuned in to campus radio after midnight? (More than I expect, hopefully!)

We lifted a page from our friend Ryan Fletcher at CJSF's Melodies in Mind and as guest troubadors took it upon ourselves to musically interpret some public service announcements the show wanted its listeners to know about, including a very special rendition of a song from the Rocky Horror Picture Show, screening this weekend... well, you'll get all the info in the recording. Also excitingly present, though you have to wait through the whole recording -- a world exclusive sneak peek of some recent studio work we've been doing on Phaulonious J Knucklebones' original songs, thanks to new friends made at the Orange Party! Admittedly this recording isn't done yet, but it's more than half-baked ... and it's been a very long time since we were committed to any permanent media in any form. A better representation of us, to be sure!

We managed to mine the Plankian portions of the show from its podcast and serve it up to you here; in the meantime, it's not too late to catch the black wave of our promotional hype, as we'll be on the air tonight down in the downtown eastside studios of CFRO Co-Op Radio at Accordion Noir, whose audience we haven't joined since an Accordion Noir Festival promo appearance back in 2008. Excitingly, we're hoping to take on the challenge to do our own version of their lovely theme song -- and would encourage you to do the same!

In the meantime, here's a log for our truncated CaBaRadio recording:

• Creaking Planks - Dead Man's Pants (Al Mader) 3:39-5:54 (2m15)


• Creaking Planks Duo - announcements medley - LIVE! 6:56-10:37 (3m41)


• Creaking Planks Duo - The Girl In The Pink Canoe (Big Rude Jake) - LIVE! 16:14-19.25 (3m11)


• Creaking Planks Duo - Womanizer / Toxic medley (Britney Spears) - LIVE! 22.28-28.28 (6m00)


• Creaking Planks - Kishka Anthem (debut!) 32.06-34.57 (2m49)

We've also managed to skip the queue usually involved while waiting for the Accordion Noir folks to post their episodes online as a podcast. It's here, 12 hours later, and though we don't have a full track listing (edit: the AN folks do, up at their website, with creative song titling), here's all the places you can hear four mighty Planks playing their hearts out:

• Creaking Planks Quartet - Accordion Noir theme (Andy Fielding) - LIVE! 0:00-2:32 (2m32)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Insane in the Membrane (Cypress Hill) - LIVE! 11:07-14:30 (3m23)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Flatbush Waltz (Andy Statman) - LIVE! 15:03-17:14 (2m13)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Tanz Tanz Yidelehk - LIVE! 23:47-27:33 (3m46)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Sometimes All Of The People Aren't Here All Of The Time - LIVE! 29:39-32:49 (3m10)


• Creaking Planks - Kishka Anthem (studio mix) 33:04-35:53 (2m49)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Vanha Jatsi Station ID - LIVE! 42:52-43:38 (0m46)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - Psycho Killer (Talking Heads) - LIVE! 44:00-47:41 (3m41)


• Creaking Planks Quartet - the Song of the Count / Bones Bones Bones (Sesame Street) - LIVE! 50:20-56:58 (6m38)

Also eminently worth mentioning -- us welching on our word! We were going to take all January off to develop new material for our anniversary show, but we did join the cool cats at Bandidas again for their own anniversary back on Jan 6th. We didn't promote it since it was their own private party of sorts, but we played the heck out of lots of great songs there. Many happy returns and hope to see you again there next January, Bandidas!

2010-09-28: Creaking Planks live on CaBaRadio

It was a cold, wet, late night at UBC, and as the witching hour approached we wondered if any of our fans would be hearing the three of us make merry music over the airwaves, courtesy of Teddy Smooth and E-roc at CiTR's CaBaRadio. Maybe not. But still -- there's always the Internet's long memory (sorry, tail) to fall back on. Thrill as we (eventually) reflect on our origins and quip regarding the recent Accordion Noir Festival! And enjoy three great tunes, including one recently exhumed while Stateside from the ancient past.

Here's the recording! And here's the playlist!

• Creaking Planks Trio - Insane in the Membrane (Cypress Hill): 12:57-16:30 (3:33)
• Creaking Planks Trio - CaBaRadio stinger: 16:31-16:40 (0:09)
• Creaking Planks Trio - Kiddie Closer (Nine Inch Nails): 16:41-20:34 (3:53)
• Creaking Planks Trio - (Hit Me) Baby One More Time (Britney Spears): 26:42-29:29 (2:47)

Bonus! Hear us simmer in the background as we promote a different radio station's affairs!

2009-11-12: Creaking Planks on Live From Thunderbird Radio Hell

Picking up on an invitation from former Butchershop Floor cohort Ben Lai, the jug band of the damned convokes at UBC for the first time ever in order to spread our curious musical taint out over the public airwaves (CiTR 101.9 fm or later as a podcast) as the second hour of a special two-hour station fundraising extravaganza installment of the long-running live music radio show Live From Thunderbird Radio Hell. Beware! We go live from 10-11 pm!

Edit! Missed the live broadcast? Fortunately, the show podcasts!

Track listing:

• 1. Dead Man's Pants (1:31)


• 2. I'm A Lousy Lay (3:58:)


• 3. The Girl In The Pink Canoe (10:31)


• 4. I Want You (But I Don't Need You) (13:52)


• 5. Rhymin' And Stealin' (20:15)


• 6. Fight For Your Right (To Plunder) (23:15)


• 7. Insane In The Membrane (31:33)


• 8. Womanizer / Toxic medley (34:51)


• 9. The Song Of The Count (45:07)


• 10. Kiddie Closer (48:23)

2009-02: Planks catchup

On Friday February 6th, Free Geek Vancouver (one of our now three "house band" arrangements, though admittedly they don't have incredibly frequent occasions on which to call on us) invited us to do a brief set opening for a speech on copyright and freedom by renowned hacker Richard Stallman at the Maritime Labour Centre.  We rolled out a couple of technological standards (Korobeiniki aka "the Tetris song", Kraftwerk's "Computer Love") as well as a new piece for the occasion (Flanders and Swann's "the GNU song" -- enjoy this rendition by the Muppets!)  Most harrowingly, however, the organizers hoped for us to join the evening's main speaker for a stirring rendition of his Free Software Song, in the unorthodox time signature of 7/4.  Due to complications, we were unable to secure either a sound check or a moment's rehearsal with the main attraction, so what follows is a raw document (c/o Alan Zisman, who recorded our whole set -- perhaps to be exposed here once it's recovered) of us bucking up and boldly plunging once more unto the breach.

(The Feb 19th, 2009 episode of Each For All at Co-op Radio used a recording of our Korobeinki rendition to open the episode before discussing Free Software and rebroadcasting Stallman's lecture.)

Also, cheers to Julie Peters who threw our new, "kid-friendly" rendition of Closer (straight from our CJSF apperance, from one campus station to the next) on the Feb 11th episode of her radio show Audio Text (on CiTR, 101.9 fm) alongside passionate appearances from RC Weslowski, Magpie Ulysses, and Duncan Shields.  If you like, you can download a podcast recording of the episode here -- though we only turn up with the one song.  The rest of the crew do their bit to make it a charged, erotic recording that meets its holiday occasion head-on.

Unrelatedly, If anyone out there (I'm looking at you, Portland) has ended up with any early Creaking Planks demo material, would it be possible for you to send us a digital photo of the design and packaging (such as it is)?  We're perversely interested in putting up a gallery here of merchandise that is essentially unobtainable.  See what you missed?