The Base Apes Story:

The Base Apes were a group of kids into heavy music and getting un-bored by whatever means possible. "Yawn," "Adamn" and "Sambone" played instruments while "Billy Rotten" wrote lyrics and drew lots of pictures. The four made lots of music, had many adventures, and actually made some small-town history.

Original Base Apes audio was recorded on cassette or 1/4-inch reel to reel 4-track recorders between 1987 and 1990. With only four tracks, the monophonic drum track is often a mix-down of a drum track and a bass track. Such was the way of the teenage home studio before the PC wave. Long before CD burners, Base Apes albums were only available on cassettes—third generation at that, due to primitive double tape deck mastering. Regardless, fellow students scarfed up the product which was wrapped in copy machine-produced inserts fashioned from photo cut-outs, artwork duplicates, lyric sheets, black construction paper and scotch tape.

Fans showed their support at the band's infrequent gigs, many practices and talent shows, including the high school talent show where they mercilessly drove most of the audience out to the lobby and the parking lot. When the high school faculty halted production of materials on the library Xerox machine—and prohibited the sale of tapes to classmates for their lunch money—the Base Apes earned the slogan "Banned by Waynesville High" as well as a watchful eye and a shaking finger from authoritative WASPs with '80s Satan Fever. Also, the elders of Harmony Baptist Church delivered a tactless ultimatum to Sambone and Yawn's mom which resulted in their glorious excommunication. :) :)

But sadly, after a slew of tapes, one 7" record and a few shows, the group disbanded. Now, nearly thirty years later, due to occasionally resurfacing interest in the Base Apes, baseapes.com and this complete collection have been made to preserve a major part of our lives and a bit of Waynesville, Missouri, history.