Source: Studio -> Promo Cassette -> CDR (0) -> EAC
-> Mastering -> Wave -> Flac8
Line up:
Chris Goss: Vocals, Guitars, keys
Googe: Bass Guitar
Victor Indrizzo: Drums
Lily Hadyn: Violin on Tr. 5 (Cello on Tr. 4 ?)
Andy Kaulkin: Electric Piano on Tr. 6
Recorded in 1994 by Brian Jenkins at A&M Studio's
Produced by Chris Goss
Mastered for CDR by Prof. Stoned during 2003.
Note: About half the tracks are offically released by now but none of them have appeared in these orginal mixes before.
Sound: A
Complete: yes
1) The voice and the vision
2) Bela alef rose
3) Dollar Bill
4) Baby Mae
5) The ballad of Jody Frosty
6) Brownhouse on the green road
7) The true song
8) Swingeroo Joe
9) Pussy pie
10) Alder smoke blues
11) Still on the hill
Notes from www.roadburn.com & www.mastersofreality.co.uk:
Voice And The Vision / Bela Alef Rose / Dollar Bill / Baby Mae / The Ballad of Jody Frosty /
Brown House On The Green Road / The True Song / Swingeroo Joe / Pussy Pie /
Alder Smoke Blues* / Still On The Hill *has also been referred to as 'Pussy Pie Blues'
The third Masters of Reality album, originally scheduled for release by Epic in Spring 1995. In an interview Chris Goss commented, "The Ballad Of Jody Frosty !? The record company just refused to put it out... I'm glad that they showed their stupidity before the record came out...
I mean... I look at it as a fine record... But... I think that the versions of the songs on the live record beat the versions of the studio record... All in all the public got the best versions of songs like 'Alder Smoke Blues'... I just want to put my best foot forward all the time, and the way the songs ended up on the live album are the best ones."
Some of the original recordings have since surfaced. 'Baby Mae' appeared on the album Welcome To The Western Lodge, while 'The Ballad of Jody Frosty', 'Voice And The Vision', 'Bela Alef Rose', 'Brown House on the Green Road' and 'Still On The Hill' can all be found on Give Us Barabbas.
Prof Stoned says:
This is a truly great album.
It may not have Ginger Baker on drums or Rick Rubin behind the knobs but it was the first MOR album that made clear that Chris Goss and Co. did not need such credentials to maintain the fine quality of their records.
Also, this album was a brave step in a different musical direction, deserting the bluesrock in favour of a more refined -almost singer/songwriter- kind of music, but yet maintaining the bluesy 70's rock touch that was (and will be) their trademark.
Chris Goss/Masters of reality have continued to write rock history every since, even though rock history doesn't fully realise it yet....
About the mastering:
Because it was more than two years ago, the memory of how exactly I mastered this is a bit blurry. However, I do remember that I spent quite a few days on this one.
The tape source from which this was obtained did not sound mastered at all. Because the recording was originally not mastered, the dynamic range was extremely wide but not in a good way.
I carefully applied multiband compression, but that only was not enough to get it dynamically "correct' to my ears.
Some passages obviously needed to be louder, while others needed to be more subtle. This was a painstakingly handjob that took a lot of patience and many hours. I did use the Steinberg Clean 4.0 suite to ONLY reduce the noise of the very quite parts. As stated, I needed to boost some quiet passages, and not applying NR would have meant they would have become extremely hissy.
I'm not a fan of noise reduction in general, but in this case I felt it helped improving the overall result a bit. I don't think it will ever sound this good, unless it gets an official release (which it won't). Enjoy!
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