HeroPress Characters: AstroAthlete (Matt), Royal Wells' resident speedster, and The Prophet (Nick), a long-haired hippy type armed with a pair of hi-tech frisbees. He may have had some sort of illusion power as well, but he is mainly remembered for running the Dove Model Agency which supplied ladies for Flame magazine in its early days.
My old school friends Matt and Nick weren't really gamers, but humoured me by playing the odd game of Call of Cthulhu (a monster-free gangster/bootlegging adventure), James Bond RPG, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons and Villains & Vigilantes. The latter being where their HeroPress characters came from.
However, their biggest contribution to the HeroPress Universe (both old and new) was the amazing catalogue of 'supporting characters' we all conjured up through our music and film-making in the mid to late '80s. The three of us formed an experimental improv/punk/garage band - who never did anything more than record a succession of 'albums' on audio cassette in various rooms of their parents' Pembury home - under the name of The Bondage Girls, which, of course, I morphed into the controversial band of the same name in the game.
We also shot a couple of strange, surreal films on VHS video - namely the now-deleted horror film Bloody Hell about a murderous Vietnam vet (as in veterinarian) terrorising holidaymakers in Pembury woods and the totally 'out there' Conscious-Free Brothers , a tale of love, betrayal and violence that featured, among many memorable scenes, a toy car chase and Matt giving birth to a cat.
Matt and Nick went on to enjoy a degree of local celebrity in the band Chekov Plays Pop, which they formed with their elder brother Adrian and Nick's university friend Paul. Playing gigs in Tunbridge Wells and London - even performing polished versions of some old Bondage Girls' creations - they developed a solid following and had great local press coverage. I was the entertainments editor for the Kent & Sussex Courier at that time!
The Bondage Girls were of course a tremendously creative and excellent band in their own right, a la Spinal Tap and The Rutles, although not derivative or a parody of other bands or genres. In terms of current bands I would see their 'journey' as very similar to that of Damon via Blur / Gorillaz / The Good The Bad & The Queen, although the Bondage Girls actually pre-dated 'Brit-pop' by almost 10 years! In fact, the Bondgae Girls more or less invented Brit-pop - it's just that no one except them realises this...
ReplyDeleteI think the new media age will see a resurgence of interest and probably a re-forming of the band - I mean, look at Take That, Boyzone, Spice Girls, Police etc - they're all at it!
Cheers,
Brad.
Matt is an all-round hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is. As a present colleague I am still waiting to see if there is anything he can't do. His book should be a meisterwerk.
ReplyDelete