The Trypp

In 1985, Rod and his lady Christine Cotter teamed up with Steve Lines and Paul Ricketts of Unhinged magazine for another recording-only project that they called The Tryp. The whole thing had started out as a hoax when issue no.2 of Mardenbeat featured a gig review of an imaginary Oxford band. This was entirely made up neither the band nor the songs mentioned existed at the time. The hoax worked for a while, but when the secret got out that Tryp didn't exist, it was decided to produce a tape by this non-existent band in order to further confuse the issue. The recordings were subsequently put out on Mardentapes only to be picked up by Acid Tapes a bit later (by Alan Duffy who ran the label before going off to found Imaginary Records; it had been going strong for quite some time by then, as "My Brain Collapsed" was number 31 in their catalogue). The Tryp was meant to explore the same musical wastelands as The Bevis Frond (bearing in mind the fact that this kind of music didn't really take off for another few years and that of course none of the participants had ever heard any of Bevis' stuff). The recordings were made from August to December 1985. When Simon House visited Rod that year, he also joined in.
RR: "I wrote "Doctors Pond" on 12th August (it was to appear on my solo LP in 1990) and Chris and I recorded "My Aunty Lives in Russia" two days later. That same week I appeared live onstage with a band led by Steve Lines called The Mystery Girls. On August 19th Steve Lines, Paul Ricketts and l all got together back at The Freeth and recorded our first three songs together. Now things really began to pick up pace. There were 15 bands active in little old Calne and Mardenbeat magazine attempted to document it all and at the same time become a catalyst for the whole scene. In issue 3 (July '85) it printed news of an upcoming series of cassettes featuring tracks by local bands. It went on to say "1985 is one of those rare years when everyone "gets going" musically, like punk in '77 and beat bands in '63. everyone is picking up instruments and forming groups. The media's hot on the bands from America re-shaping music for the eighties but there's a hell of a lot going on here in the U.K. too. You can send £ 1.75 to Acid Tapes for a sampler of newEnglish bands that you've never even heard of. And here in the Marden Delta, after years of disinterest, there are groups all over the place"