Like Absolute Grey – looked at by Music Reissues Weekly early last month – The Jet Black Berries were from Rochester, New York, a city in the north of New York State on the southern shore of Lake Ontario. Kim Gordon was born there, as was Lydia Lunch – both of whom made waves on New York City’s arts and music scenes. But the first band to be widely recognised as Rochester's as such were Sixties-indebted Chesterfield Kings, whose first single came out in 1981.
And also like Absolute Grey and The Chesterfield Kings, The Jet Black Berries had a yen for The Sixties. Their own take on it, that is. The first album credited to them, March 1985’s newly reissued Sundown On Venus had a sticker (pictured below left) affixed to its shrink-wrap saying they had “such diverse influences as Joe Meek, Aleister Crowley, psychotronic films, liquid-light shows, the Sun [presumably the orb in the sky, rather than the UK tabloid paper], Brian Jones and Deram [the UK record label].”
Reviewing Sundown On Venus, the US music trade paper Billboard said, in full: “Psychedelic retro-rockers, this quintet makes its debut a ‘musical western about Venus,’ throwing in an extra six-song EP as a bonus. Oddly charming, if rough-hewn, garage rock.” On the same page, there was also an assessment of The Smiths’ Meat Is Murder. “British quartet's dour world view hasn't brightened, but the band's taut playing supplies an often seductive pop energy, exemplified by ‘The Headmaster Ritual’” was the verdict.
Both reviews appeared in the Recommended section, dedicated to “releases predicted to chart in the respective format; also, other albums of superior quality.” This, then, was a thumbs up for Sundown On Venus.
What neither the review or sticker disclosed was that Sundown On Venus was not quite a debut album. Recorded in August 1984, it was by a band which up to that point operated as New Math. Their debut LP had come out earlier that year. There were line-up changes but this was essentially a New Math album, albeit one made with a different credit.
On record, New Math pre-dated The Chesterfield Kings by surfacing in 1979 with the ever-wonderful independently issued powerpop/new wave single “Die Trying.” It got a UK release on CBS, and even scored some evening airplay on the BBC's Radio 1. But it wasn’t a strong seller. After this, following another US indie single, New Math issued a 12-inch EP on San Francisco’s 415 label – the connection probably came though CBS’ Howard Thompson, who produced “Die Trying” and had signed Roky Erickson to UK CBS; in the US, the former 13th Floor Elevators frontman was with 415. The fantastic 415 New Math EP, They Walk Among You, has a slight goth edge to its overall garage rock/psychedelic feel, as does the only New Math album, 1984’s also-first-rate Gardens (issued by a New York State-based label).
The release of Gardens was swiftly followed by the name change and the recording of Sundown On Venus. Adopting a new identity was a very curious move to make in the wake of a debut album arriving in shops.
While active at the same time as Absolute Grey, and with their shared interest in Sixties music, there was otherwise little similarity between the two Rochester bands. Whatever the sticker on its cover said, Sundown On Venus was in a similar oddball Americana-meets-new wave bag to that of Wall Of Voodoo. There are also hints of New York's Fleshtones and a slight Gun Club undertone. An eccentric album, its garage-rock stew also evinces broad nods to country and Spaghetti Western soundtrack music. The reissue is bafflingly and misleadingly marketed as an album by "punk legends" – this is not, in any way, punk. New Math / Jet Black Berries were not punk, anyway. Despite being on Pink Dust, a subsidiary imprint of the hip Los Angeles indie label Enigma, Sundown On Venus did not break through into the mainstream. The closest they got to the brass ring was the inclusion of "Love Under Will" (a re-recording of a previously issued New Math track) alongside cuts by The Cramps, The Damned and Roky Erickson on the 1985 film soundtrack album The Return Of The Living Dead. There were two further Jet Black Berries albums in 1986 and 1988, and a reformation around 2010. Currently, the band is again active.
What was credited as The Jet Black Berries’ debut first hit shops as a double album of sorts – the fourth side was blank: it was a three-sided album. Some not-so-great cover versions were included: “Bluebirds Over the Mountain,” “Shakin' all Over,” “Cara Lin.” These were complemented by pointless re-recordings of New Math’s “The Restless Kind” and “They Walk Among You.” The new reissue excises all of these and resequences what’s left to make a much more satisfying listen than the original three-sider, with a better flow and cohesiveness.
Sundown On Venus has worn well, and is a fine example of late-period US new wave from the point when college radio was firming up the burgeoning alternative rock agenda. While this is not an album which made the world sit up and beg back in 1985, it is a non-conformist oddity which is well worth seeking out.
