This is the year I've decided to post online a selection songs I've written and recorded that have yet to see the light of day. Most people haven't heard these songs, as they would be laid down to tape only to be forgotten about or stored away with no real plans for release. I play all the instruments myself and they range from sketchy, rough demos to quite polished mixes. Some of these recordings are quite old, dating back to when I was in college. They were all originally recorded on cassettes, either on my 4-track or 8-track portastudios, and there were hundreds of songs to chose from.
I bought my first 4-track recorder in the early 90's and, with the help of my Tascam Portastudio and little more than a shure microphone, I would hole myself away in my bedroom or basement, recording any song idea or sound I could come up with. Thus began my life as a home recording enthusiast. I was inspired by all the low-fi releases popular at the time in the indie music circuit. I wrote many songs in those early years and I loved hearing them come to life, one overdub at a time, on the little blank cassette tapes I bought in bulk. Now all those cassettes sit in storage, under my bed actually, collecting dust, half-forgotten.
I somewhat recently decided to blow the dust off of those old tapes and digitally archive the songs I felt were worth preserving. While doing these transfers I found some of them were actually pretty good and felt if a shame no one else has heard them, so I decided to make a compilation of the choicest recordings and post them online.
There was a lot of material to choose from, and it took me years to edit down the tracks to a manageable number and figure out a way to organize them. I've decided to group them into 4 separate collections, chronologically divided into the different places I've lived: Volume 1 is Washington DC, Vol. 2 is Philadelphia, Vol. 3 is Manhattan and Vol. 4 is Brooklyn. Each volume gets about 9 or 10 songs. So far I've just posted Volume 1, but the other 3 volumes will quickly follow, about one posted a month. Most of the songs are remixed and improved sonically from the original hissy and muffled mixes (although there's still plenty of hiss to be heard on the early recordings).
I bought my first 4-track recorder in the early 90's and, with the help of my Tascam Portastudio and little more than a shure microphone, I would hole myself away in my bedroom or basement, recording any song idea or sound I could come up with. Thus began my life as a home recording enthusiast. I was inspired by all the low-fi releases popular at the time in the indie music circuit. I wrote many songs in those early years and I loved hearing them come to life, one overdub at a time, on the little blank cassette tapes I bought in bulk. Now all those cassettes sit in storage, under my bed actually, collecting dust, half-forgotten.
I somewhat recently decided to blow the dust off of those old tapes and digitally archive the songs I felt were worth preserving. While doing these transfers I found some of them were actually pretty good and felt if a shame no one else has heard them, so I decided to make a compilation of the choicest recordings and post them online.
There was a lot of material to choose from, and it took me years to edit down the tracks to a manageable number and figure out a way to organize them. I've decided to group them into 4 separate collections, chronologically divided into the different places I've lived: Volume 1 is Washington DC, Vol. 2 is Philadelphia, Vol. 3 is Manhattan and Vol. 4 is Brooklyn. Each volume gets about 9 or 10 songs. So far I've just posted Volume 1, but the other 3 volumes will quickly follow, about one posted a month. Most of the songs are remixed and improved sonically from the original hissy and muffled mixes (although there's still plenty of hiss to be heard on the early recordings).
I've mostly put this online collection together for myself, since I don't know too many people out there who would even be interested in this stuff. But I hope there are at least a few people who listen to and hopefully even enjoy the songs. They're really a part of me and a part of my life and I'm glad they're finally emerging from under my bed to see the light of day. Enjoy.
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