Fort Lauderdale's Nectar and Mindflower (1994 to 1996)

Songs: “Celebration” and “Mindflower."
Let’s see if I can remember this, right, as we go from Talk of War to East of Gideon to Planet Boom to Nectar to Mindflower during Broward county's alt-rock ‘90s.
A guy by the name of Randy Bates, aka Randy Christopher, from Fort Lauderdale’s Stranahan High School, formed a band called Talk of War in a Pompano Beach garage in 1987. By February 1988, ToW received their first, mainstream press in the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel. They had successful shows at the popular Broward clubs, Penrods -- which opened their own alt-club-within-a-club, The Underground (May 1987), and Confetti -- which came to open their famed, adjacent sister alt-club, The Reunion Room.
Those shows -- along with local radio airplay from non-commercial, school-based radio stations in the tri-county area (non-com DJ Scott David, the first DJ to air the music of and interview Marilyn Manson, was the first to air ToW's music) -- led to the band booking South Florida opening gigs through Cellar Door Promotions for Concrete Blonde, The Fixx, and (Jefferson) Starship at major tour venues such as The Button South and the Sunrise Musical Theatre. By February 1988, ToW made an industry showcase appearance at Club 1235 (on Collins Avenue in Miami) for the South Florida Winter Music Conference. (Why am I also remembering them opening for Living Colour at some point and doing an opening gig at Woody’s on the Beach for another band? Was that the Living Colour show?)
Anyway, a deal seemed on the horizon. Then Talk of War fell apart.
Randy Bates ended up in L.A. with a band, East of Gideon (that got its start in South Florida). And that band fell apart in the midst of a deal with a BMG subsidiary label. Then there was Planet Boom, Nectar, and Mindflower.
Planet Boom -- a bona fide “supergroup” that made the national press in Billboard -- consisted of Randy, then formerly of East of Gideon, alongside fellow South Floridian Phil Varone, he the ex-drummer of Saigon Kick (which morphed into Super Transatlantic, for the most part, with an ex-Love Canal and Naked Rhythm members), Bill McKelvy of Fort Lauderdale’s Young Turk (which had two major label deals; one with Virgin . . . and one with MCA, as I recall; but why am I recalling they were part of Johnny Depp’s The Kids axis that morphed into Rock City Angels when they moved to Los Angeles), and Tony Cortese of L.A.’s Bonedozer. (At the time, Tom DeFile from Saigon Kick had his own “supergroup,” Left for Dead; their tape is tucked away in our “Lost Local Tapes” playlist, if you’re interested.)
Planet Boom made their debut to an over-capacity house at the Reunion Room ($5 bucks in the spring of 1994!) -- featuring songs from their demo tape that included “Mind Slide” and “The Voyeur,” which received local airplay. (Sadly, that tape is lost . . . I’d love to hear it again.)
So . . . along came the Broward-based Nectar with the full-length CD, Heavy Liquid Grooves. Then came the L.A.-based Mindflower (that began in South Florida, as I recall) with the full-length CD, Cydonia. South Florida non-commercial radio turned those band’s respective songs, “Celebration” and “Mindflower” into local radio hits. As I recall: both bands, at least Nectar, featured an ex-member of Velvet Revolution (Sean Synder, I believe) - which had their own local hit with “It’s Love” (and yet another lost CD with no copy of the song on tape).
I seem to recall both bands - Nectar and Mindflower -- existed at the same time, in the same South Florida-verse: two-bands with the same rosters, but different styles: Nectar was more grunge-cum-Alice In Chains while Mindflower was more Soundgarden (think “Black Hole Sun”) psych-trippy. Remember when Rene Alvarez from Forget the Name got together with ? from ? (Natural Causes, I think) and formed the bands Milkcan and Sixo: Milkcan was punky-scruffy and ? wrote and sang those songs; Rene wrote and sang the poppy Sixo stuff. Remember when they did local shows as both bands? Well, Nectar/Mindflower was sort of like that . . . they didn’t do shows together, but existed together. . . .
Anyway, Nectar died and Mindflower grew . . . and ended up back in Los Angeles . . . again for Randy, who was there before, with what was left of Talk of War that became East of Gideon.
Sadly, those Talk of War and Planet Boom tapes are, regrettably, long-lost. However, we have those two “local hit” singles from Nectar and Mindflower to share and enjoy. If you head over to the YT Page "Dream of the '90s," they have Mindflower's second, full-length CD Mindflower.com (1999) uploaded at • Mindflower - Underwater .
And so it goes. . . .
The Sun-Sentinel article (February '88): www.sun-sentin...
Miami New Times (May 1994) on Planet Boom: www.miaminewti...