You What!?

"Unsigned bands are a pain in the arse...."

"Unsigned bands are a pain in the arse. Especially when they are totally devoid of tunes, ideas, personalities, friends, and money for the bus fare. They don't fill venues, don't bring in advertising, don't sell newspapers and make remarkably crap interviewees. "

And if this isn't enough to put you off then perhaps the following facts will help.

1. On 29th March Milton Keynes held its own parody of the Brits upstairs at Zazoos nightclub. Over 200 fledgling MK stars were in attendance. ablemesh won the prestigious Radio Dukes Awards for best band and best 12" single of 91. The band also scooped the best t-shirt award although, as MC George Webley said, the only sample he could lay his hands on was so worn it was "not fit to clean the windows of your car!"

2. On the morning of 21st May 92, MK Horizon Radio's transmitter was mysteriously jammed in order to give the new ablemesh 'Shareware' CD its first public airing. This hijacking of the airwaves was made possible by sympathisers of the band working at BT who were particularly nonplussed that Horizon had failed to give the local band's debut Crown Jewels EP a single play.

3. At the end of May 92, Ablemesh made a pre-emptive strike on Music Industry lethargy in general. Realising that the impossibility of securing national distribution and a general lack of consumer confidence were the main difficulties facing quality unsigned bands, ablemesh came up with the revolutionary idea of putting out Shareware, a relatively small run of CD's with the potential to reach a disproportionately huge self-targeting audience. The back of each CD bears the following instructions:

PLAY CD. TAPE IT IF DESIRED. SIGN LIST. PASS CD and LIST onto a FRIEND. SHAREWARE is an EXPERIMENT to see how quickly a quality mastercopy of the latest ABLE MESH release can be distributed through a NETWORK of friends. The success of this attempt to make Mesh songs available FREE OF CHARGE now relies on YOUR PARTICIPATION. The band encourages TAPE COPYING so that the Master CD can continue its JOURNEY without delay. A cassette cover is provided for your convenience. Please add your name to the growing SHARELIST and include your address if you wish to be notified of future releases. Should you be the TENTH PERSON to join the chain, PLEASE RETURN the CD and LIST to MESH, c/o

A pre-copied cassette of shareware is enclosed. The shell is one of a batch of some 100 or so kindly 'donated' by an unwitting Major London Record Company Rep.

A permanent copy of the Shareware CD resides at MK County Library. Others should be making their way in your direction in due course...if you've got any ' friends' that is.

Ends | 25 May 1992 | Republished Aug 2017