At times, we can all feel like the internet moves at a pace that not even Usain Bolt could catch up on. While, there’s always the latest “must-watch” video or Tumblr blog to check out, it’s worth highlighting that the net can also be a valuable resource for collating information on ephemeral topics, microscenes or time periods almost forgotten. Wikipedia proves that. On a local level though, here’s a superb example of such ingenuity.
Dead Elvis was a Irish record label which was active between 1994 and 1999 and put out releases from Wormhole, Rumble, Alan Lambert, The Sewing Room and Jubilee Allstars amongst others. Eamonn Doyle, Marc Carolan, ‘Og’ Crudden and Eamonn Crudden ran the label and Eamonn Crudden recently began posting up songs, memories and multimedia from that time on http://deadelvisarchive.tumblr.com.
The blog is a great resource for reminiscing about the bands playing around Dublin during the 90s but also serves as an insightful history lesson into that period. It all started when Crudden attended the 40th birthday party of a member of one of those bands – Female Hercules earlier this year. “I was prompted to start the blog by the unexpected wave of affection and emotion I felt meeting many of those who contributed in many ways to the quite subcultural scene that Dead Elvis was a part of,” Crudden says.
The reaction so far has been positive. “What has been amazing about the response is the way in which quite a gang of people have started to help me gather material and kind of reconstruct various events of the time,” Crudden explains. “I’m firmly convinced that a lot of the stuff I’m searching out and making available from Dead Elvis bands and their contemporaries is great forgotten treasure.”
