Phil here. Long time no talky talk. There were a few important developments that we here at the TWE never really talked about when they first happened, and there's been a new development, and there will be some upcoming developments, and this is the part of this horribly constructed sentence where I again write the word 'development.'
Tantric Scrimshaw 2012
First of all, we re-released our 10-plus-year-old album Tantric Scrimshaw! Damn it, yes. This was the reason we got the TWE rolling again: Mike, Allen and I all felt that TWE TS was a great album, but there were issues with the execution of the record, from guitar sounds and levels to my lame drumming on the opening track to times where maybe the vocals where a bit overbearing towards the rest of the instrumentation. Both Mike and myself really wanted this record to live on 'forever' on the interwebs, so people could appreciate it whenever they wanted to, from wherever in the world they wanted, and so that maybe kids in 2059 can find our album and decide it was the greatest rock record ever made and construct a series of statues, buildings, and parks (a city, really) dedicated to the memory of the patron saints of the spirit of rock and roll, the Troy Westfield Experience.
What I'm trying to get at is, we remixed, remastered, and sometimes even re-recorded the album, and it sounds freakin' awesome. Seriously. The guitars now sound big and beefy, real rock style. The drum sounds are huge, like a giant broke out his drum set in the grand canyon and we managed to get it onto tape. The vocals have been moved around to make room for a lot of the instrumentation. Trust me, its better.
And some songs have been downright fixed. The puzzle of how to make a complex and unique tune like "Obsessed with the 5 of Hearts" work has been solved, and that tune now really stands out as a dramatically improved, XTC-meets-Jimi Hendrix-style-power-pop-psychedelic-barn-burner.
Here, check it out for yourself:
Let me give you another example. Our lead-off song on the album, Alyssa Gordon, had become somewhat an iconic tune for the band (in our own tiny circle). It was the tune people first heard from the band, since we performed it for a month straight during a theatrical run in a theater on 42nd street back in the beginning of 2001. People who liked us knew that song, and liked that song. But on the album, there were problems with the tune. Specifically, my crappy drumming. In the studio, I couldn't consistently pull off the beat necessary to make that song work -- my time just wasn't tight enough. So the main drum part for the verses turned into a drum loop. The sounds of the drums on this tune were also sort of tiny, lets just say. Combine that with a sort of ordinary bass line, and you have a clever tune that doesn't quite meet its potential leading off our collection of 13 originals. Personally, I would usually skip over that song whenever I happened to listen to the original version of Tantric Scrimshaw.
Fast forward to 2010-12. We bulk up the drum sounds, we fix a few drum fills, we bring the guitars more to the forefront, and Allen re-records the bass line so that it now sounds akin to the amazing playing of Colin Moulding from the XTC song "Mayor of Simpleton." Check it out:
Sounds better, right? I love it. Now this song sounds complete, full, and kick ass.
Why do I bring all this up? Obsessed and Alyssa are 2 of 13 reasons why you might want to get your hands on this album. Every tune has been looked into, poured over, and perfected. This is the record we wanted you to hear over ten years ago. We are proud of it, and we think you will totally enjoy this moment in time when Mike and I were in the zone and writing the record we always wanted to make. Its also a testament to Allen Towbin's amazing abilities as a producer at Maze Studios, and how he's really at the top of his game now.
There's a few ways you can get your hands on The Troy Westfield Experience's Tantric Scrimshaw 2012:
1. Go to our website, www.thetwex.com. Right there on the bottom of the front page is the new version of the record, in its entirety. You can stream the whole thing right there, for free. If you dig it, and want to own it, you can buy it right off of the player, or you can go to http://vibedeck.com/thetroywestfieldexperience
and purchase it straight from the Vibedeck website.
What's more, this is a pay want you want offer, so you could potentially get this 13 track album for a penny. We hope you like the record enough to offer more than a penny, but more than anything, we want you to have a copy of this remixed record as part of your music library because we are so damn proud of it, and we think you will really enjoy multiple listens of our classic.
2. You can buy the Compact Disc of the album straight from our website. All thirteen tracks, surrounded by the original cover art, on a disc for your delectation. Just follow this link to the TWE store: http://www.thetwex.com/-twe-store.html
Mike and I were pretty psyched to finally make this album materialize in the physical world, and we offer it forth as an artifact of a time when people actually went to record stores and flipped through the CDs in hopes of finding a masterpiece to throw into their players and stimulate the ears. You're welcome.
As a special note: if you were ever curious about the lyrics to Tantric Scrimshaw, you can now go to
http://www.thetwex.com/twe-lyrics.html and see the original lyric book I made in 2001 that was intended to be released with the first version of the album but never saw the light of day until I understood the true power of the interwebs. Read along while you are listening to the album, or download the lyric book and print out your own cool little copy, for free. Go for it!More NASA and new news coming up very very soon. Some of it will actually be about NASA. Stay tuned....
No comments:
Post a Comment