ArtistInfo

Nadagen

Band, 1982-1983 NL, Amsterdam
Singer / Musician of Alternative, Electronic and Rock

Nadagen started in the first half of 1982 as Doheo’s Nadagen with founding members; Vocalist (Chanteur like he would prefer to describe his own vocal efforts) Marc Josten; Bassplayer (since a fortnight) Peter Simons and (hardtrying) Guitarist Rob Besjes. It all started just for the fun of making some kind of music in Rob’s two room apartment on the second floor of a narrow street near the citycenter of Amsterdam - Holland. All three were students with roots in the dark south of the Netherlands. After some of the neighbours were driven crazy in the creative process going on in Rob’s apartment they had to come to some kind of arrangement. So they started meeting up there regularly one night a week for two hours. Most to their own surprise in just a few weeks time the three of them with (or even more thanks to) their minimal musical capacities or education created that many songs they could easily fill a set of one hour. The influence of Punk wasn’t that far away but Nadagen preferred their influences from the New Wave bands of the late seventies early eighties. Nadagen kicked off the spring of 82 with their first ever gig. It was in the loft of some friends house; a party with around eighty guests. They played two sets of 45 minutes carried by the marginal beat of a borrowed Dr Rhythm drumcomputer they eager programmed the day before. The next day Nadagen accepted the generous offer to use this place as their rehearsal studio. At the end of the spring of 82 they were introduced to a guy with a synthesizer; Lex van Moorsel. Lex had a broader musical background and even more he also had a guitar, an amplifier and a driving licence! Nadagen now had found a driving force to make their songs musically more solid and sounding. Together the four of them invested in another additional bandmember all the way from Japan: they bought their own Dr Rhythm drumcomputer. Now a four-piece-plus band Nadagen did some gigs in and around Amsterdam; In september 1982 they went to a small 4-track semi-professional studio in the Amsterdam Punk-dome Oktopus. They recorded a demo-tape containing six songs: Wachten - Oorlog - Rusteloze - Nachtbraker - Zondagmiddag - Steden The demo generated more gigs and Marc got that confidant with this musical adventure he even dared to invest in his own microphone and amplifyer-set. With the money coming in from gigs the band paid for the transfer of one Japanese bandmember for another: they bought a Roland TR606 drumcomputer. This investment excelled their creativity and they kept generating new song upon new song. At the end of 1982 Nadagen met up with Guus Bauer. Guus was very ambitious trying to make his way and name in the world of bookpublishing and in Dutch literature. But he also had the eager wish to die as a celebrated and omniknown drummer. To achieve this he planned to make a recording of one of his unique beats and present this to the world on a vinyl record. Because he only had one unique beat to put to record he was looking for a song to put on the backside of a 7” vinyl. He liked one song of Nadagen in particulate: Kult. Somewhere in the beginning of 1983 Guus and Nadagen did some recordingsessions in the Nite Flite Studio in Amsterdam. They recorded the Nadagen songs Kult - Fin De Siècle - Staccato - Onder 4 Ogen - Binnenstad - Buitenwijk. Songs that finally found their way to vinyl on two 7” records released pre summer 1983. Guus joined Nadagen as a member of the band previous to the launch of the first 7” Nadagen single with Kult as the A-side song and Fin de Siècle + Buitenwijk on the B-side somewhere in march 1983. More recorded songs like Gordijn and Gelijkspel didn’t make it to vinyl because the production of a 12” record was cancelled after Kult didn’t managed to get airplay on radio and never took off as expected. Shortly after this frustrating experience Marc took all the mischief on his side and decided he had to leave Nadagen. He felt his incapability to be a “real” singer set the band back. But after Marc left the band Nadagen never excelled any further. Finally all bandmembers went their separated ways in music and live.

Members

Peter Simons b