I Have Never Heard These Bands That Start With The Letter V

Heck, I dunno.

Voice Farm - SF synth band. 'Famous' for their first 'tighty whities' album cover.

Why no Valves or Vice Creems or Victim or ViP's?

Vivabeat - Missing Personsish Cali dancey girl-led new wavers maybe? Sounds familiar; I think there was a reissue a couple years ago.

Voice Farm - Also sounds familiar; I must've had a track on some compilation once. They were probably, um, somewhat arty in some way.

Vox Pop -- Sludgepunk noise from California; connected with 45 Grave, featuring Samoans/Powertrip dude Jeff Dahl. One great 45 called "Cab Driver"/"Just Like Your Mom" (Bad Trip Records 1980; #93 in the appendix in the back of Stairway to Hell) which I stupidly no longer own; one three-song 12-inch EP called *The Band the Myth the Volume* (Goldar, 1982) which I slightly less stupidly no longer own; were they also on that *Hell Comes to Your House* horror-punk compilation? I'm not sure. My Stairway to Hell review says they covered Grand Funk and Faust and the Runaways live. Also says the EP has a "C-side" which "lands you inside an eternal closed groove," which means I better mention it on that 3-sided album thread. Review also says they sounded like Flipper if played at 33 RPM, like Blue Cheer if at 45.

UK, I think. "Men from China" was the big song from the album and did, as mentioned, feature whistling. They also had a great import single called "Scream of Pain" which I can find nary a trace of.

I have never heard these "V" bands from Joel Whitburn's Top Pop Albums 1955-1996 book:

(At least I don't think I have. At least not much. Unless I'm wrong about a couple, but so what):

Vain
Valjean
Jimmie Vaughan
Tata Vega
Martha Velez
Vesta
Vicious Base
Victor
Victory
The Village Stompers
Vio-Lence
Joe Vitale
Vitamin Z
The Voices of East Harlem
V.S.O.P.

Notes:

Voivod had an album hit #114 once! (Guess which one.)

Theo Vaness is filed by Joel Whitburn under the T's instead of the V's. I have no idea why. Wasn't he just one guy? Sure seemed that way on his LP cover (which blatantly references Lou Reed's Transformer cover, by the way.)

Maybe Whitburn misread that as The Vaness? (Never seen his record anywhere but I do remember "Bad Bad Boy" you betcha.)

Voivod hit #114? Gotta be Nothingface - that's their big seller, right?

VSOP was Herbie Hancock's '70s back-to-basics quintet - basically the '60s Miles quintet with Freddie Hubbard in place of Miles. Good stuff unless you're a bit of a 60s snob like me (when I'm not being a '70s snob, that is.)

You can listen to some Valjean here. I'm not as keen on it as the commenters.

Maybe Whitburn misread that as The Vaness?

Nope, because it would have wound up in the V's then, not the T's, right? ("The" names don't go in the T's.) What's weird is that it doesn't seem to be a mere brainfart, since in the V section there's a n note that says "Vaness, Theo -- See THEO." So, clearly a conscious decision was made. In the T's, the book calls Theo Vaness a "French disco act," not "singer." So maybe they were just a group with a guy's name, like Max Webster or Molly Hatchet?

Voivod hit #114? Gotta be Nothingface - that's their big seller, right?

Yep, that one, though I'd never realized it sold big enough to make the charts. Weren't they touring with Soundgarden (and, um, Faith No More maybe?) to support that one? (I saw one show of the tour; can't remember who the third band was.) Maybe they were also getting airplay on Headbanger's Ball or whatever MTV's metal video show was at the time?

Though h ha, actually Molly Hatchet is a girl's name.

Anyway, Discogs says Theo was one dude, but Dutch:

http://www.discogs.com/artist/Theo+Vaness

(At least one youtube post of his song with no video attached agrees he's one guy, but German instead.)

This site says "Sylvester-style disco singer," but not where from. He clearly belongs in the V's though:

http://www.disco-funk.co.uk/v/THEO_VAN.HTM

Google search confirms tour was Voivod/Soungarden/ Faith No More. (Voivod won, to my ears and eyes.)

Theo van Es was the singer of a very successful (in the Netherlands, at least) beatgroup, The Shoes. Major successes from '65 to '71. Quit, reformed, then went solo as Theo Vaness in '76. Apparently "Back to Music" ('77) was quite popular on European and American dancefloors. 2nd solo album Bad Bad Boy was doing even better (single hit #1 in US discocharts) but on the brink of an American tour he backed off and the momentum quickly waned. The Shoes got together irregularly in the following years. He's still doing solostuff, not disco though. (I'm quoting info from dutch websites).

http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~vaness/

Vain came in at the tail end of GNR-style metal/rock, ca. late Eighties. A bit glammy, a bit Aerosmith, a bit Stonesy/London Qireboys-like, a bit hard to listen to. Similar to The Throbs, another obscure band from the same period.

i have this martha velez album:

http://popsike.com/pix/20040415/4007754830.jpg

it's hot. hard & heavy blooooooze rock with fat solos by jimi and eric. she's a wailer. never bought anything later than this one though.

i have the first victory album. pretty good 80's metal/hard rock/ cock rock.

You forgot Vicious Barreka and Vic Missy. Lehigh Valley Rocks 1984-1994. In that decade, I either played on bills with or wrote about all these bands for the Allentown newspaper. Hey, Vic Missy once advocated their crowd kill me at a dive bar date while I was there. I survived, too! This is on CD Baby, is a two disc set and I'll tell ya, at 9 USD, it's worth every penny. To me, at least.

vitamin z put out one of my least favorite songs of the 80's "burning flame". my hometown college station played it ALL the time and it drove me crazy. i don't know why. i watched it on youtube not that long ago and i was actually impressed by how weird it was:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=iN2STHc7VE8

and vio-lence were great thrash too.

and vio-lence probably STILL are great thrash. as every thrash band that ever put out a demo in the 80's is currently active. it's hard to think of a thrash band that HASN'T reformed/reunited/toured in the last five years or so.