It was mentioned by a Townsperson earlier today that Jimi Hendrix supposedly left the master mixes for side 1 of Axis: Bold of Love in a cab, making it necessary to quickly remix that side in time for the album’s release. Similarly there’s the story about the master tapes for Graham Parker & The Rumour‘s master tapes for Stick to Me being left somewhere, necessitating a quick re-recording of the entire album and the need to bring up that story whenever someone remarks on that album’s clearly subpar quality among Parker and the band’s first 4 albums. Finally, at the risk of using up rock’s only 3 examples of “the dog ate my homework” tales, there’s the story of Bono‘s stolen briefcase of lyrics that he’d intened to sing on the U2‘s sophomore album, October. What I didn’t know until researching this subject was that the briefcase was returned to him in 2004. Do any U2 fans know if the band has or plans to re-record the vocal tracks using the original lyrics?
There must be other dog eats homework tales in rock ‘n roll that we could add to the record. As always, limit yourself to one entry per post, to avoid “bogarting” the topic. Thanks!
Paul McCartney talks about getting mugged in Lagos during the recording of Band on the Run, thus losing all the demos he brought with him. He thinks they are resting on the jungle floor somewhere because whoever stole them thought they were crap.
TB
Not quite on topic, perhaps, but U2 famously had early Achtung Baby tapes stolen (and bootlegged). I did not know about a similar situation with Zooropa until now. http://www.u2diary.com/zooropa-was-stolen-too/33/
Green Day had an interesting turn of fate in 2003 when the masters for their upcoming album titled Cigarettes and Valentines were stolen or went missing. The band and their producer decided it wasn’t much of loss and abandoned those songs. They went for something more grandiose. The result was American Idiot. I’ll argue all day about that album being one of the top 5 albums in the last 10 years.
The band performs a few songs from Cigarettes and Valentines now and then for the live shows.
Eric Andersen’s album “Stages” was lost somehow by his record company, I think he ended up scrapping it and moving on. He blames it for ruining the traction he got from his first album. The tapes turned up in the early 90’s and it was released – can’t say I’ve heard it, though.
Steely Dan’s “The Second Arrangement” was erased by their engineer, and I remember hearing that most of “The Nightfly” was lost on crashed hard drives and had to be re-recorded (being a very early all-digital recording)
Gram Parsons recorded some songs with Terry Melcher (circa 1971) but they were evidently doing too many recreational drugs to finish what they started. Evidently, somebody — either Melcher or Gram — checked the session tapes out of the studio and they are still missing.
There’s the famous story about how Factory Records spent a huge bundle on the Happy Mondays recording their Yes, Please album in Barbados, only to have the drug-addled Shaun Ryder hold the master tapes hostage until Factory coughed up some more money. When Factory finally got the tapes, they found that there were no vocals. Factory went bankrupt not long after.
The Stones have several stories about the mix for Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby (Standing in the Shadow). Supposedly there’s this super fat, killer mix that’s the greatest thing that ever happened, and that was supposed to be the mix that was released. I’ve heard everything from Mick’s girlfriend dropped off the wrong one to the label, to they needed whatever they had right away for The Ed Sullivan Show. Needless to say, I’ve never heard that mix, and there’s more than one version floating around out there.
I had a chance to ask Gary Katz about that Steely Dan thing. He mostly said, “That was a very bad night.” The assistant was supposed to make a safety copy of the song, armed the wrong machine, hit record and oops. The stories that the assistant then put on his coat and left forever, knowing he had destroyed his career, are apparently not true. When these things happen, you just own up, what else can you do?
Nightfly was pre-hard-disc recording, I think. Most likely recorded to a early “DASH” machine, like those made by 3M, Sony or Mitsubishi. I’ve heard horror stories about the early versions of those machines, though. So could very well be something went very wrong.
2k, you’ve probably heard it, but didn’t realize you were listening to it, because it’s simply not that great. The truth never lives up to the myth, but it’s usually more interesting.
You know what’s amazing about that mix that was released? It sounds ALL wrong, like you’re hearing it come up from the basement while you’re upstairs, in the bathroom…but in a great way.
yes…and that’s probably where the myths about some other *most mind blowing mix* come from.
clearly, it’s one of those recordings where there was little margin for error when it came to putting it all together.
I have a couple alternative versions of “Mother” – this may be the “cleaner” version people are referring to. It’s clearer and crisper but it also lacks the murky, thundering energy of the released version.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daCOlJ3hr1g&feature=player_embedded#at=85
note how quickly we’ve gone from “super fat killer mix” (myth) to “clearer, crisper, but lacking thundering energy.” (reality)
Also, here’s a mono version of the released song.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWYWVBBsBLs&feature=related
I think it’s that echo-y thundering that makes the released version so great. It sounds overloaded and barely controlled, like it’s about to fly apart into little pieces.
couldn’t have said it better, tone (if I may).
hmmm…there’s also the story of how page went to L.A. to mix Zeppelin IV on “state of the art monitors” and got **thee killer mix (“maaaan!”).** But then, just when it seemed that Page and co. they were on the verge of punching a hole in the space-time conitnuum with their superhyped out mix, Page returned home with the mixes only to find that the mixes sounded like they were underwater.
Either those monitors in LA weren’t so great, or the two-track tapes containing the final mixes had been de-magnetized while going through customs.
“Oh….to [hear] what they [heard] that day in L.A.”, I think to myself, wistfully.
Substitute any verb you’d like in those brackets.
http://www.goldminemag.com/article/engineer-andy-johns-discusses-the-making-of-the-rolling-stones-exile-on-main-street
You had been in Sunset Sound in Hollywood before and worked on some early Led Zeppelin albums:
Andy Johns: Yes. I had been in Sunset Sound and was very enamored of the tapes that I would get from Sunset Sound. I really liked the way “Let It Bleed” sounded that was mixed at Sunset Sound. And I really liked some other stuff that my brother had mixed at Sunset. That’s why when I took Led Zeppelin there and they changed the room, and I mixed all of Zeppelin IV and it sounded like shit when I got it home. But I still knew that had to be me and not the place.
nice work, cher!
Let it Bleed sure does sound nice, doesn’t it?
I wish I had my copy of Hammer of the Gods in front of me (never thought I’d be saying *that* again). The version of the story I related above, I’m sure, came to me from having read that book. I’m also sure my memory’s not so good…but I’d be interested to see how far off I am.
Surely there were drugs involved in both the Led Zep and Stones mix stories. “It sounded great when were were on the green acid, man…”
I remember an audio engineer I worked with in NY once going on and on about how some of the early Elvis recordings were lost forever due to some major fuck-ups at Sun. Or maybe he was just trying to impress me … or he could have been the hugest Elvis fan alive. Any truth Elvis fans?