Radium Wreckords: Albums (selected)

Third Street by Radio Rats (1995)

#	Track Title
1.	God Bless The Rolling Stones
2.	Wild Rose
3.	Where Have All The Usherettes Gone
4.	Free State Rain
5.	Angst Inside The Met
6.	I Don’t Mind
7.	Poxy Music
8.	Third Street
9.	Born In The Age Of Gasoline
10.	Long Hot Summer Afternoon
11.	Into The Night We Slide
12.	Voodoo Doll
13.	Pop Star Housewife
14.	Welcome To The Weekend
15.	I Don’t Know Why (But You Make Me Blue)
16.	Welcome To My Car

Compiled for the Rolling Stones visit to SA in 1995. James Phillips took 5 cassettes to their hotel – but I’m sure the Stones never got them / played them.

Jonathan Handley, 2007

Guitar on ‘I Don’t Know Why’ played by Steve Fataar from The Flames.

Theatre Of Electric Chairs by Radio Rats (1995)

This Radio Rats album was wreckorded at 5 Bacon Road, Orkney in the Northwest – in 1995. Niall Bell plays drums. Dave Davies sings. Jonathan Handley sings, plays guitar. Jimmy Florence plays piano. Gil Marais-Gilchrist plays guitar. James Phillips plays piano on ‘The Day is Connected to the Night’, then crashes his car a month later as we all know. This is probably the last wreckording James made. The same song is for Linda Dawson, the late daughter of the even later Neville Dawson. Melinda Ferguson sings with Dave on ‘Theatre of Electric Chairs’, a nice old Springs song. Mixed by Jonathan and Mastered at Sweet Sixteen by Graham Handley.

#	Track Title
1.	Intro
2.	Mr Lazir
3.	Jiving And Dying
4.	In Loving Memory Of Me
5.	Leave In The Dead Of Night
6.	Born In The Age Of Gasoline
7.	Don’t You Ever Leave Me Baby
8.	The Day Is Connected To The Night
9.	Interlude
10.	Theatre Of Electric Chairs
11.	My Baby Treats Me Right
12.	Lucky No. One
13.	Can’t Say No To Love
14.	Doris
15.	Katy Glow
16.	Padded Rooms
17.	Ten Year Lunch Break (live) (bonus track)

Primitive Nania by Nani (1999)

• Nani: vocals, guitar
• Riaan Esterhuizen: drums on 1 & 2
• Dave Pickover: drums on 8 & 10
• Jonathan Handley: drums on 9 & 10 and bass, guitars, keyboards, harmonica, flute, marching bass drum on 3, 4 & 7 and harmony vocals on 6.

#	Track Title
1.	Shine
2.	Linger Longer
3.	Vinegar
4.	Ride Your Horses
5.	Shades And Tones
6.	Mirror Image
7.	Catch 22
8.	Part Of Your Soul
9.	Untouched
10.	Whiskey

Released in 1999 on Radium Wreckords.
Engineered and produced by Jonathan Handley from the Radio Rats / The Glee Club.

Jonathan “Radio Rats” Handley has a new discovery and her name is Nani.
Martie Tinanie van Niekerk was born 21 years ago. She is currently doing ART
(photography, film, painting) at the Art Academy in Klerksdorp (Cortina Interceptor City).

Available from Radium Wreckords.

{Editor: Nani has an incredible voice, similar to that of a Kate Bush or Stevie Nicks. This is great CD with some powerful folk-rock, hard-edged songs. Musicians include Jonathan Handley, Riaan Esterhuizen and David Pickover. Recommended.}

SA Rock Digest Issue #22, 30 June 1999

Home Decorating For Beginners by Radio Rats (2004)

• Jonathan Handley: Vocals, bass, rhythm guitar, drums

#	Track Title
1.	Trade
2.	Ant Bath
3.	Obz Cafe Blues
4.	Song For Doomed Lovers
5.	Perlemoen
6.	Brandy And Coke
7.	Main Road
8.	Doomville Sunny SA
9.	Been Down So Long
10.	Zig Zag Road
11.	Mirror Man
12.	Stateway Cruise
13.	Fall Into The Beat
14.	Totally Under The Influence Of You

Wreckorded in a garage in Rondebosch (Cape Town, Sunny SA) in 2003 using the saddest-looking drum kit on Planet Earth.

Released 14 August 2004.

Entertaining From Your Freezer by Radio Rats (2005)

James Handley plays percussion on ‘Welcome To My Dark Side’.
Chris Quirke plays guitar on songs 2, 3, 6, 8 & 9.
Emma Wiid and Camilla sing on ‘Sasolburg By The Sea’
Jonathan Handley plays guitar, bass, drums, harmonica and sings.

‘Sasolburg by die Sea’ is a tribute to the late Johannes Kerkorrel.

These are Radio Rats demonstration Wreckordings, Cape Town 2005.

#	Track Title
1	Big Road
2	Psychotrucker
3	Stuey The Kid
4	Nothing To Do Today
5	Passion’s Poison
6	Welcome To My Dark Side
7	Grey Nomads
8	Direct Emotional Manipulation
9	A Certain Mr Smith
10	Teenager From Hell
11	Sasolburg By The Sea
12	Zipster
13	Snuff Mill
14	Sorry I Treated You Bad

Locomotive Hotel by Radio Rats with Roger Lucey (2005)

(including the mini-musical Casino Concerto)

Wreckorded in a garage in Rondebosch, Cape Town, South Africa. Mix: dry.

If you want reverb remove all lounge furniture and play moderately – this will give a repossession vibe to the album. Play quite softly – I mean, what about the neighbours?

Recorded by the Radio Rats in 2003 with Roger Lucey on all the spoken bits.

#	Title
1	Roads Hills And Stairs
2	Obz Cafe Blues
3	Taboo
4	Temperance Hotel
5	Monologue 1
6	Casino Of Love
7	Monologue 2
8	Casino To Casino
9	Monologue 3
10	20 000 Slot Machines
11	Monologue 4
12	Sorry I Treated You Bad
13	Monologue 5
14	Death Of A Gambler
15	Monologue 6
16	Good News
17	Monologue 7
18	Thank You
19	Steadfast Heart
20	Rock And Roll School

Pure Pop 1985-1988 (2006)

• Jonathan Handley: vocals and all instruments
• Gil Marais-Gilchrist: guitar on 8, 10 and 11.
• Dave Davies: vocals on ‘Lucky No. 1’

“Agony” is by Titus Groan

• Dave Davies: vocals
• Dave Allen: guitar
• Peter Peyrl: drums
• Jonathan Handley: bass, vocals

#	Track Title
1.	Simple Love
2.	Oh You Make Me Low
3.	Hey Lee
4.	Bop To The Comet
5.	Lucky Number 1
6.	Never Run Away From Love
7.	Heaven
8.	Meet Me At The End Of The Road
9.	Hunchback Love
10.	Rock ‘n Roll Is Dead
11.	Come With Me
12.	Sex Rays From Radio Toyland
13.	Agony
14.	Industrial Devolution
15.	Zipster – Elektraluv

A collection of rare Radio Rats demos never released on CD.

All these recordings predated The Radio Rats album “Via Dolorosa” recorded in 1988.

“Via Dolorosa” was re-recorded by Shifty Records in 1990 and released on vinyl as “Big Beat”.

None of these songs ever made it to the next Radio Rats albums, hence this compilation.

All songs wreckorded by Lloyd Ross of Shifty Records between 1985 and 1988.

Song one deals with sitting in an empty house in Dalpark Ext 6 Brakpan and missing kids and wife in UK desperately. Song two I forget – just a standard, lustful and fanciful lyric about how things tend to end sadly.

Song three is for Lee Johnson of Springs who crashed into a tree outside our house in 1976 and died [with Les, who was with him]. Lee had a golden Fender Les Paul and played the blues. Song four is for the visit of Halley’s Comet. Song five is sung by Dave Davies and was written while driving into a rising full moon from Klerksdorp to Boksburg.

Song six is married to song one. Song seven is about endorphins being heaven on earth. Song eight deals with Frankie Lauder of Welkom who had a notorious brother and came from a poor family but was a cool guy. Song nine is about the Quasimodo in all of us trying to get out. Song ten is about dying in an hotel room and being discovered the next day by your kids, Punk and New Wave and Metal and Disco and Techno and Rap. Rock ‘n Roll had many children, some of whom he’s ashamed of.

Song ten is about a hairdresser and the vocal was done in the back seat of a Mitsubishi Colt. Song twelve is about pure teenage sexiness and innocence. Song thirteen says that love is close to grief as is agony to ecstacy. Song fourteen is guilt-ridden for my baby sister who I teased terribly and then dreamed about apocalyptically.

Song fourteen is inspired by the Prizzi trilogy. Song fifteen states that love is electronic and involves molecules and chemical bonds that are strong.

~ Jonathan Handley, 2006

Welcome To Joumasepoesfontein by The Ferrets (2008)

• Jonathan Handley: Vocals, bass, rhythm guitar
• Chris Palframan: drums on 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 & 8
• Jimmy Florence: Hammond organ on 1-8
• James Handley: lead guitar on 5
• Paul de Fleuriot: lead guitar on 1, 2 & 4

#	Track Title
1.	Roads, Hills And Stairs
2.	Small Town Garage Toilet Blues
3.	Joumasepoesfontein
4.	Let Your Conscience Be Your Pilot
5.	Wrapped Around A Tree
6.	Liquid Kids
7.	You’re So Mean
8.	Itchy Feet
9.	Sugar Trade
10.	Perlemoen

The debut album from The Ferrets, February 2008, reissued in 2015.