Guy Tavares

Guy Tavares
Guy Tavares
	;
Background information
Birth Name	Guilherme Tavares
Alias	Johnny Cohen,; Schmerzlabor,; Sulphur Surfer,; Sulphurnova
Occupation	Musician, Producer
Genres	Acid Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Garage Rock, Garage Rock, Blues Rock, Electronic, Techno, Electro
Instrument(s)	Drums, Electronics, Synthesizers, Vocals
Years active	Mid 1980s - Present
Labels	Motorwolf, Bunker Records, Acid Planet, KK, Leaf Hound Records
Associated acts	Orange Sunshine, Godzilla Vs. Metalhead, Moengo Tapoe, Los Hermanos Rodriguez, Unit Moebius

Guilherme Tavares, best known as Guy Tavares, is a musician, DJ and label owner best known for his twenty-year tenure with the stoner rock band Orange Sunshine, along with being a long-standing elecronic/techno musician in the Dutch scene. Tavares is also known for his tenure with two Dutch record labels: Bunker Records (An electronic/acid/techno label) and Motorwolf Records (A punk rock, garage rock and rockabilly label).

Biography[]

Orange Sunshine (1999 - 2018)[]

Orange Sunshine would start up in 1999 by the trio of Arthur, Guy and an unknown bassist wanting to make music that worshiped the late 60s acid rock, especially inspired by the first two Blue Cheer albums among others bands. After some toiling around the band would release an eponymous EP in 2001 (Which notably featured covers by Cream and Deep Purple along with two originals.) before following with their debut Homo Erectus via Motorwolf. Notably the first press of the LP contained custom 3D glasses to view the special cover, this pressing selling out within six months. The next year would see the band attaining a new bassist in Mischa Poppe as the band toured the United States for the first time. Otherwise the band's earliest known show took place at the Zebra Festival in Gemert on 16 August 2002.

With better equipment and a new resonating influence of rhythm n' blues along the likes of Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley and Jimi Hendrix along with Cream, Orange Sunshine began work on a second record. The band's recording style was done in the style of a "professional" recording circa 1970, with only an 8-track tape recorder, old-school condenser microphones and no digital mastering. Ultimately Love = Acid, Space = Hell would see it's release circa 2003. Around the same time Orange Sunshine would sign with Japanese label Leaf Hound Records. Orange Sunshine would tour the East Coast United States, followed by a tour of Germany around the next Christmas season.

2005 would see Orange Sunshine on their first of many appearances at Roadburn Festival. However before their appearance at Stoned From The Underground, Mischa Poppe would quit the band due to severe hearing damage. After Antal Buisman (The Zippies) would fill in for several shows the band would settle on a new bassist in Mehdi Rouchiche. Mischa would still contribute to a third studio album in 2006's Bullseye of Being, released that year via Motorwolf but released next year via Leaf Hound. The band would tour with the likes of Debris Inc. and be especially productive on the road for that year. 2007 would begin with the band's only tour of Japan for Leaf Hound's inaugural Doom Age Festival, performing with the likes of Church of Misery and Eternal Elysium. Extensive touring would happen throughout Europe and The United States in support of Bullseye of Being over the next few years.

Through the early 2010s Orange Sunshine would perform live with several bands including Danava, Lecherous Gaze, Candybar Planet, Toner Low, Samsara Blues Experiment, Baby Woodrose and The Devil's Blood among appearances at Roadburn Festival and Freak Valley Festival. In 2013 the band would release two live albums: Live at Freak Valley and Burnout At Roadburn. However by 2014 the band's live performances would slow down, their last known being around January 2014. On 23 June 2014 the band announced that all future shows and show proposals would be canceled due to the declining health of guitarist Arthur Van Berkel, who had been suffering from Chron's Disease for several years. The band would reissue much of their discography on Bandcamp and also reissue Burnout at Roadburn in 2017 via Roadburn Records. However Orange Sunshine would come to an end as Arthur Van Berkel would pass away on 12 June 2018, aged 47.

Unit Moebius and Bunker Records (1990 - Present)[]

Unit Moebius and Bunker Records were set up in 1992 by three white and Eurasian middle-class nerd punks who had just moved into the squat zone of central The Hague from the suburban newtowns of Zoetermeer and Alphen a/d Rijn (where Rude 66 also hails from). Since no label was interested to release the music of Unit Moebius, their (now legendary) 'acid planet' squat parties in Den Haag, with twelve hours of non-stop comatose acid-house music, no lights but heavy strobes and a very freaked out audience (partially due to the strong and pure LSD sold by one of the Unit Moebius members) of punks, squatters, junkies and patients from two nearby psychiatric institutes, made it possible to release Bunker 001 and 002. The next two releases were paid for with money made from selling LSD (silver surfers!). Soon the fucked up standards for The Hague's hard, dark and crazy industrial techno music were set and the acid scene exploded. Unit Moebius attained a reputation as the godfathers of the Hague's industrial techno/planet rock scene, evolved gradually from deep alienating lo-fi acid house and crazy rigid jack trax (mixing the best of the detroit and chicago styles) to hard pounding dark industrial techno, freaky techno funk pop and mean minimalistic machine music. Raw primitive production and sound (the first 7 albums were recorded on a nearly-broken cassette recorder - it was all they had!), very diverse in style, but always with that typical twisted, paranoid and fucked-up drive, a bad sweaty groove that feels like a mindfuck.

More freaks, more drugs, more artists, more music, so Bunker started to release records by other musicians to support the local scene. Many records, CD's, tapes, comics and videos followed. Despite the downfall of Unit Moebius (a soap opera about drugs (speed!), sex, money, psychoses and depressions) in 1997, the decline of The Hague's acid scene (more speed!, ketamin, heroin, crack, hospital admissions, overdoses, suicides and other unnatural causes of death, mind fucking, paranoia and all kinds of psychiatric ailments) and the financial bankruptcy of the label in early 1998 (due to non-paying distributors). However by the end of the year the label would re-activate with the new 3000 series (as the last 'old' Bunker was 029) to bring you the latest La Haia Bass/electro funk, Industrial planet rock, new wave techno-pop and La Haia coca disco from The Hague's electronic freak scene.

to date both Unit Moebius and Bunker Records remain active, with the former performing mainly at festivals in The Netherlands.

Other Bands and Motorwolf Records[]

Tavares' earliest bands aside from Unit Moebius and Orange Sunshine would be Moengo Tapoe (A hardcore band active in the late 1980s.) and Panty Boy (A garage punk band active between 1992 and roughly 2000). Tavares also assumed several psuedonyms for various side projects, such as Sulphur Surfer, Sulphernova, Schmerzlabor and Johnny Cohen.

Motorwolf Records was also established in the mid-1990s to release the early music that didn't fit the electronic motif of Bunker Records. Along with Orange Sunshine's studio efforts the label also released hardcore, garage, speed metal, psychobilly and trash punk music. The label's last known release came out in 2014.

Tavares would join The Mercury Boys in 2017, recording an EP in 2018 and featuring members of Supersonic Blues and Ragged Barracudas. The quartet would release an EP entitled Return to Cinders in 2020, which would be dedicated to Arthur Van Berkel.^[1]

Bands[]

Moengo Tapoe - Drums, Vocals (1988 - 1990?)
Unit Moebius - Various Instruments (1990 - Present)
Panty Boy - Drums, Vocals (1992 - 2000?)
Sulphur Surfer - Various Instruments (1994 - 1995)
Godzilla Vs. Metalhead - Electronics, Vocals (1995)
Orange Sunshine - Drums, Vocals (1999 - 2018)
Johnny Cohen and The New Age Nazis (As Johnny Cohen) - Vocals (2000 - ?)
Los Hermanos Rodriguez - Electronics, Vocals (2002)
Schmerzlabor - Various Instruments (2009 - Present)
Mercury Boys - Vocals (2017 - Present)

Selected Discography[]

With Orange Sunshine[]

Homo Erectus (2001, Motorwolf)
Love = Acid, Space = Hell (2003, Motorwolf; 2004, Leaf Hound Records)
Bullseye of Being (2006, Motorwolf; Leaf Hound Records)

With Other Bands[]

Unit Moebius - Untitled (1992, Bunker)
Unit Moebius - Untitled (1993, Bunker)
Unit Moebius - Untitled (1993, Bunker)
Unit Moebius - Acid Planet 6 (2004, Acid Planet)
Unit Moebius - Untitled (1994, Bunker)
Unit Moebius - Untitled (2007, Bunker)
Unit Moebius - Disco LP (1995, Disko B)
Unit Moebius - Status (1996, KK)
Unit Moebius - Work (1997, KK)
Panty Boy - Allright! (2000, Motorwolf)
Unit Moebius - Untitled (2007, Bunker)
Mercury Boys - Return to Cinders (2020, Who Can You Trust?)

External Links[]

References[]

↑ Never Mind The Hype

[1] Never Mind The Hype

[1]