This CD mixtape of sorts really came about because my sister asked for a CD of all the bands I used to be in. I tried to record all the cassette tapes to a CD several years ago, but always ran into some technical issue that I could never get past, and didn’t want to send them off to some service, so just packed everything back away. But then when I started finishing out my home recording studio last year, I realized I could just plug a tape player into my recording equipment, track it into a DAW, adjust some of the basic EQ, and have everything recorded into individual mp3’s.
I ended up being able to record each song from each cassette from DFL, Stone Dresden and Black Moses into individual tracks. I even found some demo tracks we never truly finished for Black Moses that were in good enough condition to throw on here too. Some other tapes or recordings with Mushmouth and 420 Love just had degraded too much.
One thing I didn’t have was our original DFL cassette, but a high school friend had a copy and I was able to track that into 4 15-minute recordings. Although, I didn’t put that on this CD, these are all on my Bandcamp page at this link.
What amazed me the most listening to all of this was how damn good most of this was…and I don’t think we ever truly realized it…especially the 8 DFL Movement songs (as punk high school kids) and then later Black Moses with such an original sound. Coulda shoulda woulda…but didn’t quite happen. I think of everyone from these bands, Joel Ross was the only who truly stayed in music after this time period, most notably with Lopez.
For DFL, I put all of our songs from our second tape, Movement. I have such a love affair which each of these. Joel talks about how much Jack Endino loves Caffeine Addict and that we recorded at Reciprocal between sessions for Nirvana’s Bleach and Soundgarden…all as we were just trying to get through those awkward high school years. The whole band was tight and committed to a purpose, however short lived it ended up being.
Stone Dresden definitely is the hardest for me to listen back to due to my overplaying on everything and my time randomly sucking (from trying to do too much). Nothing ever was played to a click in those days. These songs could have been so much better if I just simplified and kept time. Thankfully Chad and Shawn kill it to pull me along. I just put Gemini and Wishing Well on the CD. Just can’t bear to hear my playing on Circus Man. The sound quality is pretty muffled…I think it was like that originally…just not the greatest recording all the way around.
Finally for Black Moses, I put all 3 songs from our only demo tape…one of which was also put out on a Rodell Records Compilation CD. All three of these songs rock so hard. And Carl Smith really poured his heart and soul out into all these lyrics. I also found our rough Words recording, which was going to be on our next demo. The recording of Ghetto Child on here I think might have been live and/or recorded ourselves.
You can purchase your own piece of this Eastside & Seattle history from my Bandcamp page at this link. Listen, download or have this 45-minute CD, pictured at the top of this blog mailed right to you!
Hope you all enjoy listening to these…