Last Tuesday was a rather special day for me. It wasn't because of the rather lame indiepop by Lake but when I entered the venue a voice said "Hello Didier" and I immediately recognised the face of Wim Lecluyse.
Wim handed me a bag of old Original Sins (when it was on paperform) as my mum incidentally threw them away, but no one can be mad at his mum even if she threw away my lifework. While watching the gig that bag full of zines was on my lap and I became overwhelmed with what people tend to call melancholic feelings.
Now who's that Wim? Well, he's the founder of one of the most gentle labels I ever got in touch with. During the whole gig I was thinking of the old days, it made me almost teary, mopester that I am. At the end Wim handed me the latest Morc-release which is a collection of old works from Drekka.
When listening at the weird noisescapes I was thinking that it'd be better to write something about Morc Records rather than penning down some review that's been lost after a couple of days.
I guess this is my tribute to you, Wim....
The Original Sin is back as some say but not many of you know what this fanzine standed for in those days. It was never important but it was a sort of gathering from people who found it was time that there came an end to the overruling importance of the mainpress.
For young people, it's hard to imagine as now rockjournalism is totally dead simply because everyone writes their own reviews and articles on blogs or self created websites. In the 90's it was different.
Difficult how to say how I ended up being a fanzinewriter but I knew I was totally amazed by the British press (just honest) and when I saw my first fanzine, a German one, I decided to start one too.
It was that different approach which got me into other musical dimensions.
There seemed to be many subcultures from unexplored genres and The Original Sin wanted to follow most of them. I remember labels like Mick Magic, Best Kept Secrets, Plastic Pancake Records, Org Records, 25 Records, Abuse records, Bliss Tapes and so many others. What was great about those DIY-labels was that every "owner" of the label released their fave stuff because they were fed up by the fact that all their preferred music stayed unreleased.
Many people asked me why I never considered starting something like Original Sin Records, simply because it wasn't my passion. Writing was/is my passion and I'm afraid it's the only thing I'm good at, if I'm good at it...
Fanzinewriting also shaped my musical tastes and so it happened that one day I got in touch with Wim from Morc Records. You can lie, you can be honest…I prefer to be honest. Being the musicmaniac I am I was familiar with Brian Eno or someone like Robert Fripp, I even had lots of industrial stuff here at home but I wasn’t aware of bedroom DIY-experimental rock that consist mainly of soundscapes.
How can you be aware of that anyway? You never hear it on the radio, the traditional press don’t even consider to write a word about it…it’s simple : if you’re not into the undergroundpress you can’t know this…
I even would have been considered as a dummy if I talk with those guys, as all I could say was something like…sounds a bit like Coil or Nocturnal Emissions. I am even not a musician so all these complicated technical datasheets that are coming with such releases were (and still are) Chinese to me…and no I even don’t wanna understand it all.
All I wanna do is enjoy it, and just like every “normal” person was something like “What the f**** is that? Is this still music?”. I do consider it now as music but without a label like Morc it would never could happen I think.
In all honesty I must say that from the moment I started reviewing industrial stuff (I hope it’s OK if I name this league of music like that even if I do know that it’s not that correct) I got sent a lot of stuff.
I can’t tell you how many C90’s (in those days it were tapes, TDK preferred!) I listened to in my life, some of them bored them to death but I decided to become a reviewer and you can only review something if you listen to it even if you don’t like it, I know you don’t have to but then you’re not only fooling yourself, but your readership too and then you’re not worth it writing one letter….
I was lead by other fanzines (“Robots and electronic brains” is one that spring to mind and a label like Morc Records).
I remember very well the early days in where Wim was proud to send me his releases, all on tape of course. Just like me, Wim aged too (nah you can’t see it) and if you take a peep on his website it’s rather amazing how many artists that were once on Morc.
Anyone who had progressive fanzines in his hands will recognize artists such as Richie Cunningham, Wio, De Portables (legends in their genre), Minmae, Iditarod, The Ordinary Seaman (click further on our interviewsection and you’ll find a full interview with him) Jessica Bailiff or Drekka (very funny that this band landed on Morc because Wim read about them in The Original Sin…I can’t remember but Wim told me that I wrote in my review from Drekka’s tape that it’d be something for his label).
I am talking about 10 till 15 years ago, but now we have modernization called the internet….in the early days The Original Sin was even handwritten.
If you go to the Morc-website you’ll discover a huge range of mp3 from every artist that was on Morc. It’s damned difficult to pigeonhole Morc as it goes from industrial ambient till bedroomtape-artist (aka the many Daniel Johnstons this world is aware of). And most important of it all…give it a try, no give it several tries…
Just like all the other bedroomlabels Morc releases are always joined with a wonderful artwork (when I opened my Drekka-CD I immediately showed my wife the beautiful inner booklet).
The hardest thing about Morc was reviewing them though….
It was always a pleasure to listen to Wim's releases but the hardest thing in the world was to review them, especially as I always want to write in my own way...from the moment that I write like I'm adding some dull booknotes, please inform and I'll shut up immediately.
Morc Records worked like some filter in the experimental/bedroom scene. (I’m not pretending Morc was the sole label, but this article is about Morc).
So I guess Wim must be the owner of tons of tapes that's been sent from all over the world, but he's the kind of guy who has the perfect ear to filter the stuff...it's like you're getting the cream of the crop from the experimental bedroomscene.
Check out http://www.morctapes.com/
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