KREL gigged around Stockport and Manchester supporting the release of their first tape and soon built up a reputationfor their live performances (dayglo spectaulars featuring dancers, jugglers and mime artists). In addition to the headlining gigs, KREL were building a reputation as a reliable and efficient support band, including gigs withOzric Tentacles.
In December 1991, Krel were asked to play a couple of support slots for Hawkwind at Bradford and York, as a small tasterfor Hawkwind's 1992 spring tour of the UK. Krel continued to gig locally and also played at a Club Dog event in London.Krel were chosen as suport for the entire spring tour and spent the next few months rehearsing and recording material for the next cassette release 'Dark Star' which was released to accompany the tour with Hawkwind, which covered 23 townsand cities. Over 45,000 people witnessed KREL's own audio-visual brand of entertainment, as they played a selection of newand old tracks, even inserting a Hawkwind cover version into the set.
The next cassette release, 'Earth Zero', generated high levels of interest, with ORGAN magazine describing it as 'by far the best tape they had put out'.
In 1993, the group played did further benefits and supported the Enid. An illuminated 200 feet high red-brick viaduct was the backdrop for a gig in Stockport in June 1993.
1994 and 1995 saw long periods of rehearsal work for the band members. Mr Dibs left the band in 1995, going on to formSpacehead, while Martin continued to record.
In 1996, the newly finished KREL album was presented to Andy G, who thought the tape was so good, it just had to be put out on CD, and so the Dead Earnest label was created and the album, 'Ad Astra' released.
KREL have been at the forefront of the space-rock scene and in the specialist music magazines for a number of years. CROHINGA WELL magazine called them 'one of Britain's best space-rock bands of the '90's'. The album has already received praiseworthy and rave reviews from magazines throughout the world.
2007 UPDATE:
Nearly ten years after the release of "Ad Astra", the story of Krel finally took a new turn. Dead Earnest had wanted to release a compilation CD of the remastered tracks from the previous cassette only releases. Initially it was decided to put together 2 tapes minus one track that could not fit on. Then it was decided to do a compilation single CD across all the tapes. A track list was decided but then Martin found an old live concert tape that had been previously unreleased, and announced to Dead Earnest that this was what he wanted out. Then he changed his mind and decided that the album would be two thirds the live concert and one third new tracks. This was finally put together - the first part of the album consisting of the live tracks, the rest of it, the new studio tracks. At the last minute Martin told the label that this wasn't what he wanted. The label waited. At long last, the result came back - a seamless and continuous space-rock trip that mixed the live and studio tracks together to form one magnificent space-rock opus - the "Out Of Space" album. Release came in 2005.
Since then, with his vocals suffering from ill health, Martin has turned his attention to video production rather than new music.
