mastered: The Smiths *stereo* Demos & Outtakes 2xLP

I've put more work into this than any other non-live audio project that I can remember.

Thanks to Steve over at smithstorrents, we now have a spectacular stereo version of the now-legendary 2xLP bootleg release that has set the Smiths world on fire for the past couple weeks. What many/most don't realize is that the tracks they're swooning over (and swoon they should!), are not fully captured in their full glory by the original leak.

The original leak on morrissey-solo.com during Christmas week 2010, covered by mainstream media including Rolling Stone, NPR (American public radio), The Word, and the Los Angeles Times - not to mention blogs and discussion boards the world over - was an accidental *mono* rip of the double vinyl set. But it was enough as a taster, as reaction proved.

What's special about this new version is how much was *missing* in the original mono rip. There are Johnny Marr guitars that were only hinted at in the original rip, that leap out of the speakers in wild pans from left to right in full-on stereo. Other tracks seem to have brought out more fidelity, more "oomph" in the music that was - in comparison - lacking from the original mono rip. It's really hard to explain without doing an actual A/B comparison, so I'll just let the new version speak for itself. Suffice it to say anyone who thinks the mono "original leak" version is the shit, well, just try this one out instead.

I worked extremely hard in mastering these tracks up to as much snuff as I could humanly do with the tools in my arsenal. Where there was a previous reference point available for EQ, I matched up B to A as best I could (in that "The Queen Is Dead" now sounds identical - in EQ, that is - to the official less-lengthy version, for example). Where there wasn't, I used similar sounding tracks from (ideally) the same recording session. And when I couldn't do that, I trusted my ears. But every track needed a fair touch of massaging, not Steve's fault but rather due to the nature of the source itself.

This isn't perfect; about half the tracks might be rejected by a label for inclusion on any box set (as presented here that is) due to flaws in the original transfer (basically, sibilance and some slight inner grove distortion on the tracks that ended each side of the double vinyl set). I was able to compensate and correct for most of this, but it's not perfect, and I don't expect to ever get it perfect until someone leaks the CDs these were obviously taken from.

But it's better than we have any right to expect and only audio engineering snobs like me would take offense/notice of any of these flaws I describe above. There is little to no remaining evidence of vinyl lineage in this set here, and there certainly *are* tracks that some enterprising Warners exec could lift from this blog, as-is, and put on a box set release tomorrow. I'll leave it to the listener to discover the true audio-quality winners here in the set.

Please enjoy. Presented as lossless FLAC, wrapped up in zip files (if it doesn't unzip after download, just try the download again as my file host sometimes has hiccups). The link is way down at the bottom.

Below are the original liner notes I wrote up for the (aborted) original mastering of the mono transfer, so as to keep everything together in case this post gets linked elsewhere. And on that note, I'm happy with people linking or using the language on this site in their own articles/writeups; all I ask for is accreditation and a ping in the comments.


**** original liners begin here (some new info too!) ****

As mentioned on that other blog, the recent unearthing and bootlegging of a fantastic pack of Smiths studio demos/monitor mixes/early versions set the Smithsian world afire. And well it should, as the tracks give a fascinating peek into the compositional aspect of the Morrissey/Marr partnership.

...

I chose to reorder the tracks into their respective chronological place in the band's recording history, the best I was able using Simon Goddard's book as a reference. Rather than rewrite what I did for that other blog, I'll just post in its entirety the "liners" I did over there, only reordered to fit the new sequence. 

THE SMITHS
Demos & Outtakes
Original stereo LP transfer by Steve
January 2011 cleanup by The Power of Independent Trucking

01 Reel Around The Fountain (July 1983, Troy Tate final mix)
This song features some of the chimingest (is that a word) guitars I've ever heard Marr create. It's simply beautiful. Smiths authority Simon Goddard thinks this is the best recording of this track the band did, and I agree; the stereo version "unhides" some of Johnny's background chiming guitars to spectacular, beautiful effect that nearly all previous bootleg sources of this track completely obscured or hid behind walls of tape hiss. This version here? Can be released today, by Warners, lifted direct from this blog. It's *that* good of a transfer and mastering. All evidence (except for, err, a test pressing indicating otherwise) indicates this actual recording featured here was to be the Smiths' 2nd single, famously withdrawn at the last second once the band wrote "This Charming Man". See Extra Track for more details.

02 The Hand That Rocks The Cradle (October 1983, John Porter monitor mix)
Not much different from the final LP version, a monitor mix is a rough-and-ready mixdown done at the recording desk, mainly used by the band (and producer) to see what needs tightening/redoing (if anything) prior to the final mixdown. This completely lacks the gentle acoustic rhythm guitar track pervasive through the final LP version as well, though it does emphasize the lovely, simple, emotive Marr electric track. I think I prefer this to the final LP version; it's subtlety wins it for me.

03 This Night Has Opened My Eyes (June 1984, unreleased studio recording)
The only released version of this song was recorded in September 1983 for a Peel session, at the BBC. For whatever reason the band chose to record a full-blown studio version in June 1984 during the "William, It Was Really Nothing" sessions, but never did anything with it (it was meant to be a B-side along with the July '84 "Rusholme Ruffians" recording, backing a proposed-yet-binned "Nowhere Fast" single which also was recorded in June/July 1984). If anything, time gave Moz a chance to get a bit more confident with his vocal, but it's not significantly different overall besides being a bit faster. Still a nice find though...

04 Rusholme Ruffians (July 1984, John Porter first take)
Goddard says the band originally attempted this in July 1984, several months prior to the main Meat Is Murder sessions. The very first July 1984 take stretched to nearly 7 minutes long, was much more rough/ready, and much more skiffle/rockabilly than the final MIM track. Moz's vocal is really rough around the edges, it doesn't sound like he's fully worked out the melody or his phrasing, and the lyric itself isn't as tight as it would become. Based on this it can only be assumed the version here is the very same first take mentioned by Goddard. I absolutely adore Marr's unique electric guitar playing on this version; it's got a nice "crunch" that adds a lot to this track that is missing on all other attempts.

05 I Misses You (December 1984, instrumental)
The first truly unheard song on this bootleg, this was recorded during the final mixdown sessions for the Meat Is Murder LP. Goddard surmises that this may have even featured a Moz lyric at one point, but this is only supposition. A track that the band binned, honestly while interesting as any "new" Morrissey/Marr track might be, it would be moreso with a Moz lyric and is mostly forgettable. I hear strong echoes of "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" in Marr's melody and guitar phrasing; perhaps it was binned for being too similar to that song?

06 There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (September 1985, early take)
A very early run-through with a relatively-confident Moz vocal, though it does feature the subsequently-omitted defining lyric "there is a light in your eye and it never goes out" during the final refrain. Missing most of Marr's overdubs, musically it sounds like a rough monitor mix of the basic Marr/Rourke/Joyce instrumentation, with the added synthetic string bits on the Emulator. Am I the only one who finds myself humming (in my head) the missing orchestral bits that are on the final LP version, but conspicuously absent here? Doubtful... 

07 The Queen Is Dead (Fall 1985, original unedited version)
Well, if the subtitle doesn't nail it down... the final album mix had several instrumental sections edited out at the last minute by the band and Stephen Street, as they felt it went on a tad too long. This is the full-calorie version.

08 Frankly, Mr Shankly (November 1985, Stephen Street "trumpets" recording)
The story has it that when this song was recorded during the main sessions for the Queen Is Dead LP, with Street, there was a technical problem with the master reels for this track, necessitating an emergency call to John Porter to engineer an 11th hour re-recording in December 1985. What wasn't discovered (at least publicly), until Goddard dug it up, was that the "technical problem" was a bizarro trumpet part on the track. It does introduce an additional element of hilarity, but the final Porter recording nails it in my book (while I really do like the trumpet, I think the band as a unit just killed it with Porter as compared to this Street attempt).

09 Ask (9 June 1986, probable first-ever take)
A very early, if not the first if Goddard's correct, run-through of this track missing most of the chiming/jangly guitars. This is a basic rough-and-ready bash it out take recorded by John Porter, with Marr and Gannon going at it on the rhythm guitars and Joyce getting all frenetic on drums. Wisely, a lot was tightened up as the session progressed; alas, this isn't the hoped-for "pre-Steve Lillywhite mix" fans wanted (which sadly, according to Porter, doesn't exist because he never actually got the opportunity to mix it before Lillywhite got his hands on it and didn't understand the complex web of guitars Porter had built up). 

10 Is It Really So Strange? ( June 1986, original unreleased studio recording)
Another track which has its only released version being a BBC session version, the known-and-loved release variant was recorded in December 1986 for John Peel at the BBC. Interestingly though, they did have a fully-recorded, mixed, release-ready take in the can, recorded during the "Ask" sessions in June 1986. For whatever reason it remained binned, to the point when it came time to select B-sides for the "Sheila Take A Bow" single in spring 1987, the band went to the (admittedly superior) Peel recording rather than the June 1986 studio take. This version is a bit more shimmery than the common version, and Marr's guitar is a bit more rhythmically choppy than the BBC take. The song, good in the original mono leak, jumps to life in this stereo version. I love this!

11 Shoplifters Of The World Unite (December 1986, instrumental)
Goddard doesn't go into much detail into this track's session history, unfortunately. It's an instrumental, with some additional Marr-riffic guitars that are either obscured or wiped from the final recording, presumably due to Moz laying down his vocals on top. I do like Rourke's bass on this version however.

12 Sheila Take A Bow (January 1987, John Porter original version)
One of the more famous episodes in Smiths session history, this song was originally produced by John Porter, signed, sealed and delivered, ready to go. Then for whatever reason the band had a rethink, decamped to another studio with Stephen Street, and re-recorded the song (sampling some of Porter's guitar work in the process, to save time - which miffed Porter, understandably, since they never asked for permission). This original version is much more jangly, with Porter on emulated sitar, while the final Street take is all T.Rex'ed out. Honestly, I'd have to say I prefer the Street version, though that could be due to familiarity more than anything else (as I usually love Porter's stuff with Marr). That said... the stereo transfer here brings yet another track to life; Marr's zingy guitars are *all* over the stereo field and it's really a wonderful recording. It's almost as if Porter knew this was the last time he'd be working with the band (it was), so he had Marr lay down 30 times more guitars than normal as a parting gift. Sounds really spectacular in headphones.

13 Girlfriend In A Coma (January 1987, early take)
While in studio with Street in January 1987 re-recording "Sheila Take A Bow", the band took the time to lay down a couple takes of this track (prior to the main Strangeways, Here We Come LP sessions in April 1987). What sets this apart from the Strangeways version is the pronounced reggae-ness of the instrumentation (no, there aren't any steel drums). Goddard says the first two takes of this from the January '87 sessions featured this Jamaican interpretation, which we have here, and Moz's vocal is a bit rough around the edges (of course he'd tighten it up later on).

14 Death Of A Disco Dancer (April 1987, first take)
The find of the lot, in my book. This is markedly different from the final Strangeways LP version, in that you can a) hear the song actually being structurally formed as it progresses, and b) Moz is audibly excited at the suspense and greatness of the track, this being the band's first run-through of it in studio, as per Goddard. All the musicians are in perfect synch with each other, you can just feel the bond between the members, as the song plays out. It's for things like this that I love the behind-the-scenes aspect of the recording business. If this were the only track leaked, I'd be happy.

15 Paint A Vulgar Picture (April 1987, early take)
Goddard says that this track went through several run-throughs before the final Strangeways LP version, with entire Moz verses being chopped out. This doesn't feature the "missing Moz" verse which was compensated for by Marr's solo over that section on the final LP version, but it does feature some unheard Mozwork with the title itself part of the lyric. If I read Goddard right, this take we have here would have been one of the very earliest ones.

16 Heavy Track (April 1987, instrumental)
The second of the truly unreleased compositions on the set. Apparently this was recorded at the very beginning of the Strangeways sessions, before Moz turned up at the studio. It's the most musically different Smiths track of any of them, for all intents and purposes it sounds like Zeppelin (I can imagine Robert Plant wailing on top of it). Nothing shocking, nothing you'll kill yourself for not hearing over the past 23 years, it's still a nice one to have.

Enjoy! Lossless FLAC wrapped up into 5 zip files.

Leave a comment if you share this post elsewhere, if you could!

cleanup: The Smiths outtakes/unreleased 2xLP

UPDATE!!! A new possibly full stereo rip has surfaced. Will update with my findings soon.

UPDATE II: Just auditioned the new rip... FULL GLORIOUS STEREO. Removing the link below as it's now been superseded.  Watch this space for further updates. More info at Extra Track as well as other Smithy goodness.

------ original post follows ------

As mentioned on that other blog, the recent unearthing and bootlegging of a fantastic pack of Smiths studio demos/monitor mixes/early versions set the Smithsian world afire. And well it should, as the tracks give a fascinating peek into the compositional aspect of the Morrissey/Marr partnership.

I had mentioned I was attempting to determine if the bootleg itself was mono, because the interweb upload of it was. Unnamed sources have confirmed that the originating Warners CDs containing this material is glorious stereo, and I was hoping it was just a bad transfer by the uploader. Alas, it's been confirmed the actual bootleg vinyl is mono.

So as is my wont, and because I wanted to, I had a go at a cleanup of these. I eliminated virtually all evidence of vinyl sourcing, did some much-needed EQ on the tracks (some moreso than others), and fiddled with frequency separation within the perceived stereo field to give some semblance of ambience when listening in headphones. This will never be confused with a true stereo mix (all one has to do is compare "The Queen Is Dead" here with the actual LP version of the track), but it's pleasing, and gives a much better headphone experience than the raw leak did. Furthermore, as it's all frequency based, it collapses back to mono without any artifacting or evidence of fiddling (unlike some other techniques used to fake stereo from a mono source).

I also chose to reorder the tracks into their respective place in the band's recording history, the best I was able using Simon Goddard's book as a reference. Rather than rewrite what I did for that other blog, I'll just post in its entirety the "liners" I did over there, only reordered to fit the new sequence.

Oh - it's lossless too! So enjoy...

THE SMITHS
Outtakes and Unreleased
December 2010 cleanup by The Power of Independent Trucking

01 Reel Around The Fountain (final Troy Tate mix)
Pretty self explanatory, the main difference between that blog's version and the bootleg version is the subtle guitar intro. 

02 The Hand That Rocks The Cradle (John Porter monitor mix)
Not much different from the final LP version, a monitor mix is a rough-and-ready mixdown done at the recording desk, mainly used by the band (and producer) to see what needs tightening/redoing (if anything) prior to the final mixdown. This completely lacks the gentle acoustic rhythm guitar track pervasive through the final LP version as well. 

03 This Night Has Opened My Eyes (unreleased studio recording, June 1984)
The only released version of this song was recorded in September 1983 for a Peel session, at the BBC. For whatever reason the band chose to record a full-blown studio version in June 1984 during the "William, It Was Really Nothing" sessions, but never did anything with it (it was meant to be a B-side along with the July '84 "Rusholme Ruffians" recording, backing a proposed-yet-binned "Nowhere Fast" single which also was recorded in June/July 1984). If anything, time gave Moz a chance to get a bit more confident with his vocal, but it's not significantly different overall besides being a bit faster. Still a nice find though... 

04 Rusholme Ruffians (early electric version, July 1984)
Goddard says the band originally attempted this in July 1984, several months prior to the main Meat Is Murder sessions. The very first July 1984 take stretched to nearly 7 minutes long (ding!), was much more rough/ready, and much more skiffle/rockabilly (ding!) than the final MIM track. Moz's vocal is really rough around the edges, it doesn't sound like he's fully worked out the melody or his phrasing, and the lyric itself isn't as tight as it would become. Based on this it can only be assumed the version here is the very same first take mentioned by Goddard.

05 I Misses You (unreleased instrumental, edit, December 1984)
Recorded during the final mixdown sessions for the Meat Is Murder LP. Goddard surmises that this may have even featured a Moz lyric at one point, but this is only supposition. A track that the band binned, honestly while interesting as any "new" Morrissey/Marr track might be, it would be moreso with a Moz lyric and is mostly forgettable. I hear strong echoes of "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now" in Marr's melody and guitar phrasing; perhaps it was binned for being too similar to that song?

06 There Is A Light That Never Goes Out (early take, September 1985)
A very early run-through with a relatively-confident Moz vocal, though it does feature the subsequently-omitted defining lyric "there is a light in your eye and it never goes out" during the final refrain. Missing most of Marr's overdubs, musically it sounds like a rough monitor mix of the basic Marr/Rourke/Joyce instrumentation, with the added synthetic string bits on the Emulator. 

07 The Queen Is Dead (original full-length unedited version)
Well, if the subtitle doesn't nail it down... the final album mix had several instrumental sections edited out at the last minute by the band and Stephen Street, as they felt it went on a tad too long. This is the full-calorie version.

08 Frankly, Mr Shankly (unreleased Stephen Street "trumpets" recording, November 1985)
The story has it that when this song was recorded during the main sessions for the Queen Is Dead LP, with Street, there was a technical problem with the master reels for this track, necessitating an emergency call to John Porter to engineer an 11th hour re-recording in December 1985. What wasn't discovered (at least publicly), until Goddard dug it up, was that the "technical problem" was a bizarro trumpet part on the track. It does introduce an additional element of hilarity, but the final Porter recording nails it.

09 Ask (probable first-ever take, 9 June 1986)
A very early, if not the first if Goddard's correct, run-through of this track missing most of the chiming/jangly guitars. This is a basic rough-and-ready bash it out take recorded by John Porter, with Marr and Gannon going at it on the rhythm guitars and Joyce getting all frenetic on drums. Wisely, a lot was tightened up as the session progressed; alas, this isn't the hoped-for "pre-Steve Lillywhite mix" fans wanted (which sadly, according to Porter, doesn't exist because he never actually got the opportunity to mix it before Lillywhite got his hands on it and didn't understand the complex web of guitars Porter had built up). 

10 Is It Really So Strange? (unreleased studio take, June 1986)
Another track which has its only released version being a BBC session version, the known-and-loved release variant was recorded in December 1986 for John Peel at the BBC. Interestingly though, they did have a fully-recorded, mixed, release-ready take in the can, recorded during the "Ask" sessions in June 1986. For whatever reason it remained binned, to the point when it came time to select B-sides for the "Sheila Take A Bow" single in spring 1987, the band went to the (admittedly superior) Peel recording rather than the June 1986 studio take. This version is a bit more shimmery than the common version, and Marr's guitar is a bit more rhythmically choppy than the BBC take.

11 Shoplifters Of The World Unite (instrumental)
Goddard doesn't go into much detail into this track's session history, unfortunately. It's an instrumental, with some additional Marr-riffic guitars that are either obscured or wiped from the final recording, presumably due to Moz laying down his vocals on top. I do like Rourke's bass on this version however.

12 Sheila Take A Bow (original John Porter recording, January 1986)
One of the more famous episodes in Smiths session history, this song was originally produced by John Porter, signed, sealed and delivered, ready to go. Then for whatever reason the band had a rethink, decamped to another studio with Stephen Street, and re-recorded the song (sampling some of Porter's guitar work in the process, to save time - which miffed Porter, understandably, since they never asked for permission). This original version is much more jangly, with Porter on emulated sitar, while the final Street take is all T.Rex'ed out. Honestly, I'd have to say I prefer the Street version, though that could be due to familiarity more than anything else (as I usually love Porter's stuff with Marr).

13 Girlfriend In A Coma (early take, January 1987)
While in studio with Street in January 1987 re-recording "Sheila Take A Bow", the band took the time to lay down a couple takes of this track (prior to the main Strangeways, Here We Come LP sessions in April 1987). What sets this apart from the Strangeways version is the pronounced reggae-ness of the instrumentation (no, there aren't any steel drums). Goddard says the first two takes of this from the January '87 sessions featured this Jamaican interpretation, which we have here, and Moz's vocal is a bit rough around the edges (of course he'd tighten it up later on).

14 Death Of A Disco Dancer (first take, April 1987)
The find of the lot, in my book. This is markedly different from the final Strangeways LP version, in that you can a) hear the song actually being structurally formed as it progresses, and b) Moz is audibly excited at the suspense and greatness of the track, this being the band's first run-through of it in studio, as per Goddard. All the musicians are in perfect synch with each other, you can just feel the bond between the members, as the song plays out. It's for things like this that I love the behind-the-scenes aspect of the recording business. If this were the only track leaked, I'd be happy.

15 Paint A Vulgar Picture (early take, April 1987)
Goddard says that this track went through several run-throughs before the final Strangeways LP version, with entire Moz verses being chopped out. This doesn't feature the "missing Moz" verse which was compensated for by Marr's solo over that section on the final LP version, but it does feature some unheard Mozwork with the title itself part of the lyric. If I read Goddard right, this take we have here would have been one of the very earliest ones.

16 Heavy Track (unreleased instrumental, April 1987)
Apparently this was recorded at the very beginning of the Strangeways sessions, before Moz turned up at the studio. It's the most musically different Smiths track of any of them, for all intents and purposes it sounds like Zeppelin (I can imagine Robert Plant wailing on top of it). Nothing shocking, nothing you'll kill yourself for not hearing over the past 23 years, it's still a nice one to have.

Grab them here and enjoy!

Bedhead can do no wrong.

Or at least they couldn't, besides breaking up (sniff). WHY WHY WHY did it take me 10 years after their breakup to discover this superb band?

I've been spending the last couple days listening almost exclusively to their 2nd LP Beheaded, and...I can't stop.

Not that I want to, it's just delaying my continued GVB series, which admittedly I've lost a bit of the passion for. No worries, just get yourself a copy of this Bedhead LP and you'll understand why.

As much as I want to share this amazing record with the world, it's still available from Touch and Go, and well worth dropping dollar on - so no download links, sorry.

Carry on...

GBV detour 01: Back to Saturn X (unreleased LP)

I know I owe the world the next post in the GBV 5 Songs saga (scheduled: Bee Thousand), but I haven't felt the crushing desire to eliminate 4/5 of the album from contention yet - as I love nearly each and every track on that record.

So as to not completely spoil the GBV anticipation, here's their unreleased 1991 LP Back To Saturn X.

We only know the tracklist because the fellow behind their early-mid 90s label Scat received a copy of the album in preparation for the 1995 box set compiling the band's pre-1992 records. The band had this album recorded, sequenced and "mastered" in 1991, only for Bob Pollard to decide not to release it. The tracks were (somewhat) farmed out to other projects instead, and snippets of (some) of the tracks were jammed together to form the track "Back To Saturn X Radio Report" on 1992's Propeller LP.

It's really not a bad album! There are really only a few tracks that would fit in the "classic" canon of GBV works, but that said, it does make a good listen as a complete work.

The version posted here was compiled from the multitude of releases Bob farmed these tracks out to over the years. I have no idea if the *recordings* are what were to be used on the withdrawn LP, though I'm nearly certain they are. I've taken the liberty to add on two tracks to the end, which may have been recorded at the same time, but not on the final track list. Why? Because I can...

As this actual record only exists in the hands of Scat and Bob Pollard, no cover art (if it even got that far in the release process) is known to exist in the wild. So, I used one of my favorites from the following LP Propeller's set of 500 unique sleeves.

Enjoy!

GUIDED BY VOICES
Back To Saturn X
(unreleased 1991 LP)

01 Fantasy Creeps
02 Perch Warble
03 Dusty Bushworms
04 Squirmish Frontal Room
05 Scalding Creek
06 Melted Pat
07 Spring Tiger
08 Tractor Rape Chain (Clean It Up)
09 Crutch Came Slinking
10 Mallard Smoke
11 Sopor Joe
12 Chicken Blows
13 Tricyclic Looper
14 Scissors And The Clay Ox (In)
15 Damn Good Mr. Jam
----- bonus trax -----
16 Buzzards And Dreadful Crows
17 Mr. Japan

sources:
Box CD5: King Shit And The Golden Boys: 01, 03, 09, 11, 13
Suitcase: Failed Experiments And Trashed Aircraft: 02, 10, 14, 15, 16, 17
Get Out Of My Stations EP: 03, 05, 06, 07
Darla 100 - Sixth Year Anniversary Compilation CD: 08
Alien Lanes: 12

Grab it here!

GBV Classic Years #2: Vampire On Titus (1993)

And onward we march, we Marchers in Orange.

The dismal failure of Propeller in propelling the band into some kind of recognition nearly broke up Guided By Voices, leaving the band short a drummer and bassist. What remained kept recording in Toby's garage on his 4-track Portastudio, with Bob Pollard occasionally laying down his own drum lines for the tracks he felt needed drums. As a result of the band fractures, nearly half the tracks that ended up on Vampire On Titus are drumless. Bob, his brother Jim, and Toby Sprout handled guitars, with Toby also supplying basslines.

It was this fractured lineup that conceived and released perhaps the most low-fi record of this low-fi band's career. Vocals often sound like they're recorded through a transistor radio set to "distortion +", and then routed through a shitty guitar amp, itself located down the carpeted hall with a cheap wire mic hanging from the ceiling. The drums, or what passes for drums, are more often slurred thwacks than booms. Tape speeds stretch and skew (sometimes mid-song!), a cacophony of hiss predominates, older tracks bleed through, it's a mess. Yet behind all this are more of the best tracks of this band's career.

For such a terribly-recorded record, it was this album that began to get GBV wider notice. With no drummer and bassist, and sudden interest nationwide (when you only have 500 fans for 8 years, another 500 constitutes "sudden interest") thrust upon Pollard and co., they quickly get a band back together and start that slow crawl from basement legends on their city block to a critically-acclaimed indie rock powerhouse.

Cleveland, OH's Scat Records was the first label to give creedence to this band. A tiny label in and of itself, it at least reached beyond central Ohio, and with this record, began drumming the GBV rhythm.

As a brief aside, fans curious to get into GBV, but not familiar with their music, should probably wait until satisfied by their "classic" records Bee Thousand / Alien Lanes / etc. before trying this. Or rather, don't let this be your sole intro to the band: it's a great companion to the classics, and it IS a classic, but its raw nature makes it harder to appreciate without some grounding.

This record was easier at times, and then harder, to pin down 5 key/favorite tracks. It really depends on my mood. Do I want rockers? Do I want chaos? Do I want the more gentle acoustics? There is such a diversity of sound - backing out the seeming sameness the record carries solely due to recording circumstances - across these tracks you really have to pick your poison. As I'm now in a period of loving this record, there are no limitations, just my (current) five favorites. And I suspect these will remain basic canon pieces in my GBV songbook.

OK, so I lied. I've been iPodding this record all day, trying to cull out 5 tracks, and I can't be merciless. It's just un-possible.  There were three tracks that no matter how much culling I did, absolutely had to remain. That left two more spots - and 4 more critical songs. I tried. I cried. It just wasn't going to happen.

The problem is, so many of the roots of the key GBV sound lie in this album. And there are a few moments that sound completely unlike anything else in their catalog, moments - that for the sake of an overview - had to be included in any critical appraisal of this album. So, damn the torpedoes, as the Fading Captain might say, and let's roll with it.

GUIDED BY VOICES
Vampire On Titus
originally released in 1993 on Scat Records

1) Wished I Was A Giant
Horrible, horrible recording - of perhaps one of the top 5 songs in the band's entire gazillion-song catalog. I can't imagine a much worse recording released in any capacity on any label, except as a stylistic exercise, but it's what it is. Had this been a better recording, this song - already one giant melody blast - would be massive. I'm certain I'm being too harsh on the recording - it's really not THAT bad - but if you're looking for something even comparable to what we heard on Propeller, this isn't it.

2) Expecting Brainchild
A goofy song that has an even goofier intro. Well reminiscent of the Who, if you can imagine the Who as a garage band brought up on punk.

3) Dusted
If this were more of a classic 4-track sound, it would fit just swell-like on Bee Thousand. As it were, it's again one of their more hard rockers (not "hard rock"), marred only by the vocals-from-the-can-and-a-wire-mic recording.

4) Marchers In Orange
One of their key early sound collage songs. Not much in the way of musical melody from the toy synths building up the musical bed, though Bob lays down a terrific vocal line on top. Arguably one of only a couple true "classics" from this LP, "classics" in the sense that they remained in the GBV collective memory well past the record's shelf life.

5) Sot
See #2 and #3. Another in the same superbly melodic line, excellent guitars too.

6) Jar Of Cardinals
One of the best ballads in their catalog, just Bob and a guitar, with melody just dripping all over the place. 

7) Gleemer (The Deeds Of Fertile Jim)
The second classic Tobin Sprout ballad in their catalog to date. I might even rate this higher than Propeller's "14 Cheerleader Coldfront". Tobin channels some Sebadoh ("Brand New Love") with great effect, and I'd have to say this is probably in my all-time Top Ten GBV tracks.

8) Non-Absorbing
"Do you see me like I see you?" The first really true CLASSIC! CLASSIC! CLASSIC! track on this record, unmarred by shitty recording, a song that has no temporal fixation anywhere in their catalog. Home on this record, could be home on any of the following LPs, and with a proper studio recording, could have been home on any of their late 90s albums (and any way you shake it, a classic). I can't musically describe this track at all, it's just nearly perfect. Top Ten, nay, it's in my all-time Top 5 GBV set. It really was the perfect bridge to the near perfection of the following LP, Bee Thousand.

Get them all here.

Next up, perhaps the most difficult of all to cull out 5 tracks from, Bee Thousand. A classic album in every/any sense of the word.

GBV Classic Years #1: Propeller (1992)

As discussed earlier, I was (and maybe still am) on a big Guided By Voices kick a few weeks back. I've long been a fan, and still remember fondly their gig at Chicago's legendary Lounge Ax on my birthday in 1995, just two days after the release of their first "major league" LP Alien Lanes. Of course the phrase "Guided by Beer" was kicked around a few times, once by none other than Bob Pollard himself. Somewhere I used to have a tape of this show that I picked up years later; and the gig was as sloppily fun as I remembered it. I seem to recall that after 38 songs, they easily could have drunkenly stumbled through another 38.

My GBV journey began on a tip from none other than Bob Mould. Oh, I'd read about them, been intrigued, and in fact I may had even purchased a CD of theirs by the time I met Bob Mould at a Sugar gig in December 1994 (though I really think I didn't own anything until early '95, honestly). But what really got me into the band was Bob's enthusing about them to me and a couple other people while chatting with him for nearly an hour before the Sugar gig that night. At the time, Bob was still in the thick of the alternative scene, not yet having gone the dance route, so anything tipped by him was assumed to be golden. And of course they were.

So, on Bob Mould's tip and then being absorbed by the utter wonderfulness of GBV's (seventh full length LP!) Bee Thousand, I went back and picked up the then-available back catalog, which at the time consisted of probably 3 CDs: Vampire on Titus / Propeller (both albums on one CD), and maybe a couple 8-song, 12-minute-long EPs. I didn't really take to any of it bar the odd song or two on any of the pre-B1000 material, but I was head-over-heels in love with B1000. And I've always remained so, this record's songs are always ranked in the higher reaches of my most-played tracks in iTunes. Nevertheless, with me needing either smokes, beer, or both, and not being completely floored by the VoT / Propeller CD, it got sold back not long after purchase in 1995. And I never really heard it, or (m)any of its tracks, again.

So I can't come to explain why several weeks back I got my hands on both Vampire on Titus, and Propeller, again. It might have been the few tracks from it coming up on the Matador-era best-of CD that I have on my iPod, or it might have just been something I saw on a (shhhh) torrent site and said, well, why not?

I should never have sold the VoT / Propeller combo CD back. First of all, they now are two separate CDs, so you pay more. Second, the records are amazing. I don't know where my head was at, I don't know WHY I didn't like these albums, and while I can't regain those years lost, I can enjoy them now.

So we begin my GBV series of postings with my top 5 tracks from their 1992 LP Propeller, so named because after 4 LPs that barely sold out their 500 or 1000-run pressings in Dayton, OH, the band figured it would be the record that finally propelled them out of the middle of Ohio. Sadly, it didn't, but it's certainly not for the lack of quality songs. I think they needed a bigger label or distributor, with this same record, to make it out of the indie circuit minor league's minor league, which they didn't have for a couple more records.

Several of their all-time classic tracks come from this record, and it's absolutely essential any reasonable GBV fan must own this. It's really their first record featuring what became GBV trademarks, of a sort: massive singalong choruses, "anthems" even, walled guitars. An interesting factoid about this record is that its original vinyl-only release in 1992 was limited to 500 copies, each one hand-designed by a band member or friends. So each original copy is unique. Of course, I don't own one, but the folks behind GBVDB - Guided By Voices Database have done yeoman's work in cataloging a huge proportion of the 500 unique copies. For this blog post, I've chosen as cover art one of my favorites from the original LP run - an actual Natural Light 6-pack box shrinkwrapped into the record!

So without further ado, and with a LOT of playlist mucking-about, here's my Top Five selections from Propeller.

GUIDED BY VOICES
Propeller
originally released in 1992 on their own Rockathon Records

1) Over The Neptune/Mesh Gear Fox
Yes, this counts as one track, since it's tracked as one. It's a two-song suite that, in tandem with the following track "Weed King", sums up GBV pretty much in a nutshell. Neo-psychedelic, reaching beyond post-British Invasion (think the Who), garage rock, with 80s American college rock influences, it's all in these two (three?) songs. 

2) Weed King
See above. 

3) Quality Of Armor
The worst defense is intelligence, the best defense is belligerence. And oh yea, I'm to drive my car, go really far. 

4) Exit Flagger
One of their first garage 4-track Portastudio recordings that belies the recording methodology. It just sounds HUGE, and it's a song the band remained fond of (and well they should!) for years to come. Probably the first "classic" GBV track. It could have sat on any of their mid-90s records, easily, and had it been more widely available, it'd be even more well known. 

5) 14 Cheerleader Coldfront
The first classic Tobin Sprout (guitarist, and alternate songwriter/vocalist) track of many to come in later years. Gently acoustic, the recording sounds almost like it was recorded in a cardboard box - but don't let that fool you. It's a beautiful song that would sound even more amazing recorded in a proper studio.

Grab them all here.

Honorable mentions, or tracks that floated in and out of consideration for this post: "Unleashed! The Large-Hearted Boy" (though see a future post), "Metal Mothers" ("you find time to get laid, you find ways to get paid"), "Circus World".

Extra Track (and a tacky badge) is now LIVE!

Extra Track (and a tacky badge)

Have fun!

It's Like Soul Man: 5 days of GBV

I'm going to try something new with the blog for now. There are only so many out-of-print records I can go on about, 1) it gets tiring, and 2) I listen to more than just OOP material.

So in a noble experiment, well, not so noble or experimental, but challenging in that it will force me to get creative, I'm going to attempt to nail down my 5 favorite Guided By Voices tracks, one per day. Anybody with some slight knowledge of US indierock/"low-fi" knows how difficult of a challenge this may be, because in the time it's taken to read what I've written so far, Bob Pollard has probably written and recorded 10 songs.

To save my sanity, and make it a more reasonable challenge, I'm limiting myself to the "classic" GBV era (pre-Cobra Verde musicians, ending approximately with the 1996 LP Under The Bushes Under The Stars. No slight on the latter lineup, because the couple times I saw that lineup live they did bring it, but any GBV fan knows that the soul of the band died, or dimmed, when guitarist/foil Tobin Sprout left after the '96 LP.

I'll probably begin with the first-of-the-five in the next day or so (because, like the ultimate construction of their legendary Bee Thousand LP, the many lists I've made in preparation for this post are nearly completely different from each other), as I really need to nail down my absolute top 5 tracks. It's really fucking difficult with this band, even taking out the wilderness years 1985-1991 and concentrating on the Propeller/Vampire on Titus/a million EPs/Bee Thousand/another million EPs/Alien Lanes/more EPs/Under The Bushes Under The Stars sequence - there are, perhaps, close to 200 songs to choose from (and, of those, only a third don't really rate for this post).

So... without dwelling on it, what are my readers' top 5 "classic era" GBV songs? Interesting to see where everyone's head is at with this one. My posts will likely start in the next couple days.

the big reveal: POSTER CHILDREN Toreador Squat

With thanks to Josh D of The Wizard's Super-Special Rock and Roll Good Times Jamboree! for the actual cassette and transfer, I am excited to bring you a World First - or at least a Power of Independent Trucking first - as previously discussed: 

POSTER CHILDREN TOREADOR SQUAT
with exclusive liner notes from the band!



I have been on a semi-serious hunt for this record (tape) for twenty years, or, as long as I've known of its existence. We've previously blogged the Poster Children here, and I extended my plea to readers of my blog. Lo! #1 - faithful reader Josh D rose to meet the challenge, and went way over and above the call of duty in finally ending my two-decade quest by ripping his original 1988 copy of this cassette. Thanks Josh!

So... now that I have this record, let's do some reading about it on the Internets. Why not - a good way to kill time while soaking in the first-time listen to this wonderful burst of Midwest pop/postpunk.

But... where's the discussion? Why does nearly every website that even bothers to mention this record simply recycle the same verbiage every other site uses? Needless to say, there is virtually nothing written about this record beyond very uber-basic background info, and minimal at that.

So I took the bull by the horns and went direct to the source. I emailed the band and Lo! #2, they responded. And they love the blog! And after a very basic brief about what I was doing, they opened up the cooperation floodgates. I was amazed, impressed and eternally grateful. Thanks Rick and Rose!

To make a long, boring, technoweenie discussion short, this record (tape) was the band's first release, if you can call it that. Recorded in an attic in Champaign, IL in early 1988 on a Portastudio 4-track cassette recorder, these songs were the Poster Children's calling card in the very early days of their career. Selling the tapes locally at shows and indie record shops, the band quickly developed a following and, well, the rest is history.

Not a whole hell of a lot of these tapes were made. I honestly didn't think I'd get a response to my plea, knowing the age of the tape and the age bracket of those who would have bought or been given a copy back in 1988. That Josh D responded, and with an actual, original tape (and not some mp3's from a generated dub of a dub), still floors me.

Because of the complete dearth of information on the Internets, Rick Valentin (guitars/vocals) and Rose Marshack (bass) - the two original and primary Poster Children - agreed to 1) let the blog host lossless copies of this record, and 2) write the "liner notes"! Needless to say I was thrilled. It is so very rarely that a band is as personable, reachable, fan-friendly and just plain *nice* as these guys are. And they don't mind giving their music away! That is to say, Rick felt it wouldn't be appropriate to charge people for this record these days.

That said... as I did last time I blogged a PC record, I encourage all listeners to visit the band's "Hat" on their website and drop some cash in the hat via PayPal, whatever amount you feel necessary, if you like. By all means don't feel obligated to do so, but it's a nice gesture. I will be doing the same even though I've purchased every PC album released since this tape.

Enough appetizers. Let's get to the main course. And this being The Power of Independent Trucking, as is my wont, I cleaned up the tracks quite a bit, as the straight-off-the-highspeed-dub tracks did need some massaging. I indicated the same to the band when I initiated contact about this endeavor.

Rick's response to my initial hesitant query:

I think this is a great idea! I've been trying for years to get the original four-track master from the guy who recorded Toreador Squat and I don't think it's gonna happen, so having a cleaned up version of the cassette would be the next best thing...

I'd be fine with you hosting it on your blog and I'm sure we can dredge up some memories of the recording for liner notes...

And then after some back-and-forth, this:

As far as Toreador Squat goes, I definitely feel like these are bonus-type tracks, the kind of thing fans would like but not necessarily something I would feel right charging for.

Thanks for getting the ball rolling with this! Getting these tracks cleaned up and digitized was something I've had on my to do list forever but never got around to (and probably never would have!)

And then Rose emailed me indicating she loved my blog so much she shared it on Facebook ;)

So, shall we?



(notes by Rick Valentin except where noted)

The cover and title of the cassette came from a type of paper bag. Rose hand-drew the insert -- this was before we discovered Zipatone and before we had Photoshop. There are a bunch of [Thomas] Pynchon references in the credits (The Paranoids, a muted post horn, W.A.S.T.E.) -- we were really into The Crying of Lot 49 at the time (and really anti-Fountainhead, hence the Ayn Rand un-credit).

Trashcan Records was a cassette-only label run by Jim Slusarek and Chris Corpora which released a couple of compilations of Champaign music and put out individual “albums” by a few local bands. Jim set up his Portastudio and microphones in our attic rehearsal space and recorded us playing our instruments live, then we added vocals afterwards. Chris would make duplicates of the master on his tape deck and we’d package up the tapes and sell them at shows and in local record stores.

These recording sessions were in the spring of 1988, just a few months before we recorded the bulk of Flower Plower with Iain Burgess, so the a lot of the tracks are duplicated on FP but there are a few that never made it into the Iain sessions, I’m not sure why, probably because we ran out of time/money.

01 Hollywood USA 
 I think the original title for this song was "The Cowboy Song" and (in our minds) it was some kind of combination of rockabilly and Naked Raygun.

02 The Bump Bump Song
We always had a problem with new songs, we wanted to play them right away but they usually didn’t have finished lyrics so we’d have to name them by some musical characteristic rather than the subject. This song had “bumps” in the rhythm so it became the "Bump Bump Song".

03 Rain On Me
The one thing I notice on this track is the hi-hat (or lack thereof). During the Flower Plower sessions Shannon (drummer) was feeling left out of the overdub process so he added a hi-hat over his drum part, which I notice every time I hear the song - it’s kind of nice to hear the original drum part on the cassette version.

04 Detective Tracy 
 Rose’s dad (a jazz trumpeter) always liked this song because it had that goofy break where we did the walking bass and guitar parts. The lyrics came from a weird combination of classic Dick Tracy comic strips and dealing with religious zealots in college.

05 Carrie Look Ahead 
This is one of the songs that fell by the wayside by the time we recorded with Iain Burgess. I think it was because we had a newer “quiet” song ("She Walks" [ed: available on Flower Plower]) and didn’t want to record too many soft numbers with the man who had engineered [Naked Raygun's] All Rise and [Didjits'] Hey Judester.
ROSE: I've always wanted to re-record "Carrie Look Ahead", named after a type of digital logic adder! 

06 And So It Goes... (The Skanky Song)
[ed: Recorded live at Mabel's, Champaign IL 3 May 1988]
I wouldn’t have remembered this song if it wasn’t on tape. I’m not sure what the deal is with the vocals - it sounds like a Bob Mould impersonation that went horribly awry!

07 Jeremy Straight
This was our attempt at a Naked Raygun song, complete with "Oh-way-ohs".

08 White Noise (Black Light)
[ed: re-titled "Question" for Flower Plower]
In the early days of the band, I would bring in a song into practice that I’d written myself or worked on with Rose -- I think this is the first song we wrote together as a band and it seemed better than any of the songs I wrote myself so “jamming” became our predominant method of songwriting after this.

09 The Un-Reggae Song 
This one was a Joe Jackson-y ska-ish song with some David Byrne-isms thrown in. So we were about 15 years ahead of the New Wave revival! Or more likely about 5 years behind the times...

10 Carvers of New York City 
For some reason I always thought of this as our attempt at a Cheap Trick type of song but I’m not really sure why I thought that - maybe because I was singing at a higher pitch than normal? The lyrics came from randomly selecting words and phrases from an article in the Atlantic Monthly - there was a story about people carving fake African figures and masks.

11 State of Mind 
This was a song from the band Rose and I were in before PC, The Evidence. It has more of the Minutemen/Hüsker Dü thing we were into at the time.

12 The Weenie Song 
Another weenie song that didn’t make the Flower Plower cut as our songs got more aggressive overall.

13 Five Minutes
Another Evidence song, definitely of the attempted Hüsker Dü variety.

14 The Half-Time Song 
I don’t think this one had lyrics until the recording session. When we played live I would just jabber and hope that no one could hear. The center section is me talking to a baby kitten, Bob, that Chris had just adopted.

- - - - - -

Tracks 1-4, 7-9 were re-recorded with Iain Burgess later in 1988 and released on Flower Plower.

Track 10 was re-recorded with Steve Albini in 1990 and released on Daisychain Reaction.

Tracks 5-6, 11-14 were never re-visited or released beyond this cassette.

Original transfer from the 1988 cassette by Josh D, as mentioned above

Remastered (though it does bring out some of the flaws in the high-speed dubbing process) in September 2010 by the Analog Loyalist. HINT - it sounds much better in headphones ;)

Oh, you want the files? Lossless FLACs are here. 

See flac.sourceforge.net for a FLAC decoder or suggested players.

With the most sincere thanks to Rick, Rose, drummer Shannon and Josh, I bid you all to enjoy!

beat the (for profit) bootleggers!

What surprises me is it's taken so long for something like this to happen. Bastards.

Remember - you heard these tracks, these actual versions, here first!

Spread the word far and wide, all but the Moonlight tracks are available, FREE - and lossless, right here on this blog.

On to our regularly-scheduled programming....