Second time out for the Wormholes following on from their anthology, this one an unreleased album recorded in a concise burstof seven nights in Dublin’s Sun Studios in the spring of 1996. Originally envisaged as being The Wormholes’ second album, the follow up to their 1994 debut “Chicks Dig Scars” unfortunately the end result of the sessions – Parijuana – would not only be ignored by their label Roadrunner but also just as quickly be dismissed by the band themselves.

Eamonn Crudden, the manager of the band, had manged to extract some money from their label Roadrunner to record them demos of new tracks as soon as the release cycle for their debut was over. The budget was so small as to cover studio time but not even enough to buy the tapes. With things going south with the label – classic 90’s tale of the A&R man who championed their cause being given the boot – the intention was to get something out on another independent and keep the momentum around the band going but at this stage they were listening to Can, Faust and music based on casual recording, improvisations and extemporization. For them the album was too rock and with no label they no longer felt under any obligation to release it.Time for a fresh start. Their next recordings would not be ‘for’ anyone but themselves. Today bassist Anto Carroll admits that “at times we were our own worst enemies” and with the benefit of hindsight both he and guitarist Graham Blackmore wish they had gone ahead and released the album at the time. However, back then, they thought they could do better and they did go on to make more inventive and unique sounding versions of some of these songs with Stan Erraught producing just a short time later.

It’s highly unlikely too many listeners today will share the bands view that the abum was too clean. This version of Parijuana is dirty, raw, messy with plenty of experimentation. Songwriting as strong as their debut, played with more confidence, very much the sound of a band starting to find their own sound. It provides the missing link from the conventional indie of their debut to the more drawn out free roaming second album proper Scorpio. Unfortunately the band’s erratism and gradual erosion of their formerly close relationship with their manager Crudden meant things never kicked on but with the success of the anthology original studio engineer Marc Carolan has remastered the versions for an official vinyl.