Beg For Eden

BEG FOR EDEN is an American Post-punk group formed in the Fall of 1986, in New Paltz (SUNY) in upstate New York. Originally a duo with a drum machine consisting of Peter Messina and Jacques Cohen. In the Spring of '88, Peter Messina (vocals & bass) and Jacques Cohen (guitar), entered Rich Woods Studio in Poughkeepsie, to record The Stark Elusive "12. It was released in 1989 via the Trance Technologies label. Beg For Eden''s crucial third member, Greg Scott, joined shortly before the EP's release. Greg added ambient noise, loops, and analog synth to the band's sound, and helped to designed The Stark Elusive's insert which was printed on unique double thick translucent onion paper stock. The band was greatly inspired by writers of speculative extreme fiction such as J.G. Ballard, William S. Burroughs, Philip K. Dick,Georges Bataille, and the [book]REsearch 'Industrial Culture Handbook'[/book], (http://www.researchpubs.com/books/ichprod.php) and it's collection of first generation Industrial artists (SPK, Survival Research Laboratories/artist], TG / Coum Transmissions, Cabaret Voltaire et al). Their sound was one that incorporated the atmospheric drone of British Post-Punk (The Psychedelic Furs , The Chameleons , Killing Joke , Echo & The Bunnymen , The Cure , Joy Division, Felt and The Durutti Column ) the energy of American Post-Hardcore influenced guitar bands such as Mission of Burma , REM , Hüsker Dü , The Meat Puppets and (mostly) NYC art-noise bands of the 80s: Live Skull , Sonic Youth and Swans . And The Butthole Surfers . For the release of The Stark Elusive "12 EP, in 1989, the band officially changed it's name from SURGERY to BEG FOR EDEN. BEG FOR EDEN played CBGB’s in 1990 to 1992 with the following groups: The Jesus Lizard, The Ex and The Fluid. They also played The Pyramid, Space at Chase, Downtown Beirut and supported The Jesus and Mary Chain at The Chance Theater in Poughkeepsie in 1992. Their first show took place under the moniker SURGERY, in Spring 1987. Previous to The Stark Elusive EP, A 10-song cassette recorded and mixed down on an X-15 Fostex Four-Track recorded that Summer. It was simply called SURGERY, and came with xerox art cover art (a female Greco-Roman statue surrounded by four helicopters in the sky making up the background) and a special lyrics sheet. Additional members of BEG FOR EDEN included: Rob Hale: Drums (1989-1990), and John Dale: Drums (1990-1991). The members of BEG FOR EDEN ended their collaboration in 1994. -----------------------| EPILOGUE – *Find Our Hearts Again* |------------------------------ The never released, follow up to The Stark Elusive EP, Find Our Hearts Again EP (recorded 1992), as well as other recordings, will be made available in the future. [Please check back here, or follow on Twitter @BegForEden for further announcements.] PETER MESSINA works in the New Media and lives in Brooklyn. JACQUES COHEN went on to engineer and produce many bands (Bright, Mercury Rev, Silver Apples, Take One Car, Jerkwater, Kings County Queens, Windy and Carl, Hopewell, Swallow the Ocean, En Dogma, BaDaBing Records!) at his "The Space" Recording Studio in Poughkeepsie, NY. He passed away from the complications of a brain aneurysm on March 31, 2012. [A scholarship has been set up in his name at Duchess Community College:: http://www.jacquesrocks.com/ or http://www.sunydutchess.edu/cgi-bin/makeagift.php.] GREG SCOTT carried on working at a psychiatric hospital on Staten Island. Continuing his explorations and cataloging of various transgressive movements and other outre art and music (Industrial, Fluxus, Coum Transmissions, Vienna Actionists) and by releasing POWER ELECTRONICS noise/music as the group HYDRA with Peter M. playing guitar (live) and Jacques Cohen providing recording and studio support. Scott also released material as, IDS, with Intrinsic Action and as HYDRA on an Italian pressing (**********) of the extreme noise HYDRA 7- inch ANAL TEST. Greg passed away Sept. 9th 2003. ~|~ Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.