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Volume 4

Posts 76-100
Friday, November 2, 2007
to
Thursday, November 29, 2007
F R I D AY , N O V E M BE R 2 , 2 0 0 7

Video File #1: Muffin Loaf "Crazy Train"

The first installment of the new Video File feature is a treat from the Metal XOR
vaults. The band Muffin Loaf burst onto the music scene in 2003 with a warehouse
show. They held one rehearsal and then the show. A video was put together using
low-res pictures from the rehearsal and show and it is set to the song "Crazy Train"
as it was recorded during the rehearsal session.

Click here for the YouTube post.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 7:52 AM 0 comments


Labels: Video File
SU N D A Y , N O V E M B E R 4 , 2 0 0 7

Album of the Week #11: Lambskin Temple

Project name: Isthmus


Album name: Lambskin Temple
Release date: November 19, 1996
Release format: cassette
Studio name: Metal XOR Studio

Tracks:
1. Pin Needles in the Eye of the Beholder
2. Fly in the Garden
3. Last Summer (Train to Chicago)
4. I Never Knew (This Is Earth)
5. Heritage
6. Sunny Days
7. Didn't See It Coming
8. Burst
9. Used to Be Like
10. Hey, Mama!
11. I Wish I Was Born in the UK
12. I Wanna
13. Angel Breaths
14. Born to Be Wild
15. I'm On Stage
16. The Sound a Tree Makes . . .
17. Wicked Game (Autumn version)
18. notEworthy
19. Harry's Symbol (w/solo + junk)

This album came from a jam session that Harry, Jason, and Jimmy had on
Saturday, September 21, 1996 in Jason's driveway. This was unofficially known as
"Isthmus Jam 2".

This time they did not use the 4-track recorder but a standard boom box set in the
center of the trio. And this time they had a drummer, Jimmy. Jason played bass
and sang some of the songs while Harry played guitar and sang the rest of the
songs.

They filled two 90-minute cassettes during this jam. Most of the songs were
originals created in the typical Isthmus fashion . . . "start playing and make
everything up as you go along!" There were a few covers recorded and two of them
ended up on the album, including "Wicked Game" which has appeared on every
Isthmus album.

It was a few weeks later in October that the tapes were logged out. Then in
November Jason put together a play list for the album. And since this was not
recorded on the 4-track recorder there was no way to add instruments or parts to
the songs, so what was recorded that day was the final take of each song. The
album was completed within days of the final play list being established and was
released.

On one of Jason's notes about this album, a suggestion for the album title was Bull
Dozer but they went with Lambskin Temple instead when Harry mentioned that
was the name of a building he saw in St. Louis.

This album was also the first to use colored paper for the album cover. All previous
tape covers were printed on white paper.

Next week's Album of the Week: New Mexico Igloo by Isthmus from 1996.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:40 AM 0 comments
Labels: Album of the Week
M O N D AY , N O V E M BE R 5 , 2 0 0 7

Lyric Booklet #4: ...Libra 971

The fourth album to include lyrics was NueroMud's 1994 album ...Libra 971. The
booklet was titled "Anonymous Reality Tales" and was only eight pages long.

This was the second of what was to be a new series of "mini" lyric booklets (there
ended up only two in the series). It measured 4"x5.5". The print was very small so
2-3 songs could fit on each page. There was no table of contents or epilogue to
this booklet, just lyrics to every song on the album.

This booklet was released on August 27, 1996, almost two years after the album
was released. The first "mini" booklet made was for Mune Mud's 1996 album
Equation of Time, then the Studio went back to create booklets for older albums,
starting with NueroMud's ...Libra 971.

The title of the booklet came from the title of unused lyrics that Jason had written
in the late 1980's. The subtitle "From the Dusk Channel" is taken from the title of
track #5, "Dusk Channel", on the album but the reason why that song was chosen
has long been forgotten.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:51 AM 0 comments


Labels: Lyric Booklet
T U E SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 6 , 2 0 0 7

Studio News: New ORC Project

Plans for a new ORC album were officially announced yesterday.

Metal XOR Studio (Jason) and Attic Works Studio (Jimmy) will soon be working
together on a new ORC album. This will be the first release since ORC's 1999 debut
album Purging the Great Abyss. The current plans are for each studio to start
songs independent of the other one, then exchange each song for the other studio
to change (add/remove parts, write lyrics, etc). The music will bounce back and
forth between studios until each song is finished. The recording is set to begin
January 1, 2008, and end on February 29, 2008. There may be additional post-
production in March, but the album should be out by the end of March.

The next two months will be spent getting equipment set up and updated at each
studio. Test tracks will be recorded to ensure the compatibility of the two studios.
At least one test song has been recorded at Attic Works Studio and three test songs
have been recorded at Metal XOR. In addition, lyrics have already been written for
a song titled "Clunky the Fisherman". So as the ORC machine slowly gets up to full
speed, keep checking this blog for further updates.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 7:52 AM 0 comments


Labels: Studio News
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Project Spotlight #11: Who are the Traveling Deengelburys?

In the late 1980's there was a band called The Traveling Wilburys. The band had an
all-star line-up: George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, and Bob
Dylan. So what did a small southern Illinois town in 1989 need? Their own all-star
band. Enter the Traveling Deengelburys!!!

It started in the fall of 1988. Jason and Harry had a Spanish teacher who played
guitar and bass. He would occasionally get his acoustic guitar out and play for the
class. At the time, Jason and Harry had been tinkering at home with their own
instruments. So for Christmas of 1988, Jason, Harry, and their Spanish teacher
played a few songs in class for what seemed like half the school.

Early the next year, the school was having a 50's & 60's dance to raise money for a
needy child. The music at school dances always came from tapes and new-fangled
CD's, but this dance would be different. Jason, Harry, and their teacher recruited
a few other musically inclined students to form a band to play at the dance. Half
the members of the band were heavy into the Traveling Wilburys, so when it came
time to name the band they modified the name into something more appropriate
and called themselves the Traveling Deengelburys.

The Deengelburys were Mark (lead guitar), Mark (the Spanish teacher, bass), Harry
(keyboards), Jason (rhythm guitar), Darrin (saxophone), Jay (vocals), and Brad
(drums). They also had two background vocalists during the show, Jody and David.
The unofficial Deengelburys included Jeremy and Joe.
Friday, March 31, 1989, the day of the dance, the band played one song at each of
the two lunch hours to raise the hype of the "live performance" at that year's
dance. And that evening, sandwiched between music from tapes and CD's, they
performed their 6-song set with a 1-song encore. The crowd went nuts. And then
the dance was over. They have not performed together since.

A few of the members of the band wanted to get back together in 1999 for a ten-
year reunion jam but that did not happen.

There were Traveling Deengelbury t-shirts made for the show to raise additional
money for the fund raiser. As far as additional memorabilia there was the concert
poster that hung in the school and the large banner the band painted and had on
the wall behind them during the show.

There has never been an official release of any of the recordings. Their first
rehearsal was recorded on cassette. The dress rehearsal practice on the stage the
night before the dance was video taped. Both of their two lunch time
performances were video taped. Their final rehearsal was video taped. And the
show at the dance was videotaped. There may be a compilation CD released some
day. . .

A detailed account was written several years ago of the whole Deengelbury
experience. Metal XOR Studio is trying to get the rights to that story so the whole
world can read what it was like to be a Deenglebury.

Next week: What is Pheonix?

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:48 AM 0 comments


Labels: Project Spotlight
T H U R SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 8 , 2 0 0 7

Listen Online!

The fifth installment of this feature features the band The Traveling Deengelburys.
They were a 50's & 60's band that played at a high school dance in March of 1989.

"Heartbreak Hotel" was the 5th song they played at the show. On this track you can
hear the waves of teenage fans swooning and pushing towards the stage as the
band performed. After seven songs the show was over and history had been made.

Click here to listen to the song.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:26 AM 2 comments


Labels: Listen Online
F R I D AY , N O V E M BE R 9 , 2 0 0 7

Collector's Corner #17

The Traveling Deengelburys performed at a high school 50's & 60's dance on Friday,
March 31, 1989. The local newspaper was there and this is the picture that was
taken.

A few observations about the picture . . .

The caption says "The Traveling Deengelburts". There are two hypothesis on
this misspelling. The first is that the newspaper did not want to publish the
word Deengelbury, even though that is not how the word is really spelled.
And the second is that is was just a typo.
Only six of the seven official Deengelburys can be seen. The drummer,
Brad, is hidden behind the lead singer, Jay. Brad's drums can be seen
though.
A few of the Deengelburys hand-painted a large banner with the
Deengelbury logo. That banner can be seen behind the drummer.

This is the only group photo of the Traveling Deengelburys that the Studio has, so
it is enshrined in the Kodak Moments Wing of the Metal XOR Studio Museum.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 12:36 AM 0 comments


Labels: Collector's Corner
SA T U R D A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 0 , 2 0 0 7

Studio News: New Website

As Traveling Deengelbury Week nears its end, Metal XOR Studio is proud to
announce a new website dedicated to the 50's & 60's band that invaded a small
southern Illinois town in March of 1989.

It is the Official Traveling Deengelburys website. It provides audio files you can
listen to, the history of the band, members of the band, and various Deengelbury
memorabilia that was produced. It is the most comprehensive Deengelbury website
on the Internet.

Please visit the new site and show your support.


Posted by - Mune Mud - at 8:04 AM 0 comments
Labels: Studio News
SU N D A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 1 , 2 0 0 7

Album of the Week #12: New Mexico Igloo

Project name: Isthmus


Album name: New Mexico Igloo
Release date: December 17, 1996
Release format: cassette
Studio name: Metal XOR Studio

Tracks:
1. Run, Run Rudolph
2. A Homeless World
3. The Holiday Song
4. Jingle Bells
5. Patricia Corrigan
6. Silent Night
7. My Toy
8. Merry Christmas, Baby
9. Oh, Isthmus Tree
10. Baby, Please Come Home
11. Oh, Holy Night Blues
12. Speech Impediment Wino
13. The Christmas Song
14. Speech Impediment Wino Returns
This album came from a jam session that Harry, Jason, and Jimmy had on Tuesday,
December 10, 1996. This was the third Isthmus jam. There were two things
different about this jam than any other previous Isthmus jam: there was another
person playing on the album and they recorded the album in a church.

Jason played guitar. Harry played bass, then guitar, then keyboards. Jimmy was
bass and then drums. And Tim was the guest musician who played drums, then
bass, then lead vocals. There was also another person, Erik, who showed up and
played guitar but most of that was not recorded.

It was recorded in the church Harry attended. They decided to record there for the
acoustics of the sanctuary. But the acoustics did not help, this album is considered
to be the biggest flop in the Isthmus catalog. The mix was bad for the recording,
the songs they played were nothing special, and it just did not have the "Isthmus
spirit" that the other albums had.

As far as recording equipment, they ran all the mics and instruments into a mixer
and from the mixer into a standard cassette recorder. So it wasn't quiet as
primitively recorded as their previous album, Lambskin Temple, but they needed
to work on their live mixing.

They had set out to create a Christmas album. So many of the songs they recorded
that evening were traditional Christmas song, some were their version of Christmas
songs, and then the rest was original material. The majority of side B is a track
called "The Christmas Song" and is basically a twenty-minute free form jam with
hints of Christmas thrown in.

The image on the album cover is a molecule of salt. They thought that was
appropriate since salt is what you put on the road or sidewalk to melt the ice and
snow. So in an Isthmus sort of way the molecule of salt represents Christmas.

An alternate title for the album was An Isthmus Christmas, but that was dropped
for New Mexico Igloo. And what is a New Mexico Igloo? Harry and Jimmy's dog,
Jake, had an enclosed dog bed that had a southwestern pattern all over it. So one
day Harry mentioned that the dog bed looked like a New Mexico Igloo. They had
their album title!

Next week's Album of the Week: Ideas by Isthmus from 1997.


Posted by - Mune Mud - at 8:33 AM 0 comments
Labels: Album of the Week
M O N D AY , N O V E M BE R 1 2 , 2 0 0 7

Collector's Corner #18

What was the stylish new fad for the summer of '89? The Traveling Deengelburys t-
shirt!!!

The front of the tee sported the Deengelbury logo: a Traveling Deengelburys
banner draped around the world which hid a golden eagle clutching a guitar in its
left claw. No one knows what all that means, but it was cool to look at!

The back of the shirt advertised their 1989 Lost in Time World Tour. Inside the
circle was printed "The Brothers D" which was the collective nickname for the
band. Each band member also had their own Deengelbury nickname. These
nicknames were hand-written by each member around the outside of the circle.
And buried behind everything is a list of towns on their tour. Unfortunately, for
reasons unknown, the tour was canceled after the first stop.

There were fifty-three T-shirts printed for the show. They sold for $8 each and
sold out! There were also six jerseys made but those went to members of the band
and not available to the public. Each shirt also came with its own Certificate of
Authenticity signed by Wally Deengelbury.

Today the Studio has one T-shirt and one jersey packed away in protective
storage. Who knows what happened to the other shirts? Keep checking e-Bay, you
may one day get your chance to own one of these apparel pieces of history!
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 11:24 AM 0 comments
Labels: Collector's Corner
W E D N E SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 4 , 2 0 0 7

Project Spotlight #12: What is Pheonix?

Today we travel back in time to Harry and Jason's first band. . . Pheonix. There
were a couple of incarnations of the band in the late 1980's, but the core members
were Harry, Jason, and Brad. And yes, Pheonix was misspelled (except in the
album cover concept art below drawn by Jason).

Pheonix originally began around the year 1986. It consisted of Harry on


synthesizer, Mark on guitar, and Brad on drums. They got together a few times and
played songs from Genesis, Black Sabbath, Boston, and other popular groups of the
time. It wasn't long until Jason had his own keyboard and started jamming with
them. The jam sessions were very unorganized, usually with more than one song
being played at a time, and not much musical progress was made. Only a few
recordings from this time exist.
Then Jim Bob joined them with his bass for a session or two. They created a track
list of original titles for their first album but only two of the songs were ever
pursued, "Princess" and "Changing Man." So their Wrath of Pheonix album and their
1989 Circus Tour were never fully realized. In fact, by 1988 the band had dissolved
and the only members left were Harry, Jason, and Brad. After that they went on to
create other musical projects.

Will Pheonix some day rise from the ashes to finally record their Wrath album?
Don't hold your breath!

Next week: Who are the Two-Tones?

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:50 AM 0 comments


Labels: Project Spotlight
T H U R SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 5 , 2 0 0 7

A Look Back...

Local legend has it that an albino boy was playing on some railroad tracks and was
killed by a train. So now when you park your car on the road that crosses the
tracks, your car rolls uphill towards the tracks. They say it's the ghost of Albino Boy
pushing your car towards the tracks.

On October 20, 1994, Jason, Harry, and Darrin ventured to investigate this urban
legend. With camcorder in hand, they parked the car and sure enough the car
rolled towards the tracks. But skeptics Jason and Harry were conducting an
experiment to prove the road sloped downwards towards the tracks and that the
road sloping downwards away from the tracks was an optical illusion when a car
pulled up to them, the back door opened, and a cranky old Irish man stepped out
and said to them "The best thing you guys can do is get your [donkey] out of here!"
Jason and Harry made their wise guy responses and it soon turned into a heated
conversation. Finally the conflict came to a head when it nearly came to fisticuffs
between the Irish fellow and Jason. The best part was all of this was on video!

The video was shown to most of their friends and family and was an instant classic.
Jason sent the audio of the incident from the video tape to the morning show on a
local radio station who had mentioned the Albino Boy urban legend. The station
enjoyed the audio so much they played it on air with their commentary. It wasn't
long after that Jason recorded the "Albino Boy" song using sound bites taken from
the video tape. Below is the advertisement he faxed to the radio station the day
before he dropped off the tape of the song.
Unfortunately the song was never played on the radio. More than a year later he
recorded another version called "Albino Boy (Dance Mix)" which was more
techno/dance than the original song.

To this day the Albino Boy incident is talked about and often re-enacted where
Jason and Harry work. The incident and both songs will probably live forever.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:45 AM 2 comments
Labels: A Look Back
F R I D AY , N O V E M BE R 1 6 , 2 0 0 7

Listen Online!

The sixth installment of this feature isn't a song from a band. It's a song that was
put together by Jason following a real-life incident that became known as the
Albino Boy incident!

Using sound clips from the video tape of the Albino Boy incident, Jason composed
a song on November 4, 1994, called "Albino Boy Song". It was an instant success
where he worked and among friends and family.

It was more than a year later, on December 18, 1995, when he revisited the song.
Using his computer this time he spiced up the original song and created "Albino Boy
Song (Dance Mix)". This version was even more popular than the first.

Click here to listen to the original song.


Click here to listen to the dance mix of the song.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:38 AM 2 comments


Labels: Listen Online
SA T U R D A Y , N O V E M B E R 1 7 , 2 0 0 7

Collector's Corner #19

"Etesian Wind" was a popular song on Mune Mud's 1991 album Olympus. There are
more versions of this song than any other song Metal XOR Studio has recorded. Yet
the same question came up time after time for years after the song came out:
what is Etesian Wind?

Jason's not even sure where the term came from. He had heard it somewhere,
liked how it sounded, so used it for the music he had just recorded. Then he
started looking for its meaning. This was years before the advent of the Internet,
so research was done at libraries and by talking to various people he knew. No
matter how hard he searched, he could find no references to Etesian Wind.

Steve, Jason's co-worker, brought a philosophy book to work on Wednesday, August


21, 1996. The name of the book was "An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science."
It did not seem of much interest to Jason until Steve turned to page 27. There, in
black and white, was the answer that Jason had been searching for for years. A
reference to Etesian Wind...
The last paragraph on the page reads:

"...if the Etesian Winds produced the effect, the other rivers which flow in a
direction opposite to those winds ought to present the same phenomenon as the
Nile, and the more so as they are all smaller streams and have a weaker current.
But those rivers, of which there are many both in Syria and Libya, are entirely
unlike the Nile in this respect."

It still wasn't real clear, but Jason finally had some idea what the Etesian Winds
were. For further reading on Etesian Winds, you can click here for a Google result
that will tell you more than you will ever want to know about the subject.

Today these photocopies of that philosophy book are locked away in the Solved
Mysteries Wing of the Metal XOR Studio Museum.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 6:17 AM 0 comments
Labels: Collector's Corner
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Album of the Week #13: Ideas

Project name: Isthmus


Album name: Ideas
Release date: May 6, 1997
Release format: cassette
Studio name: Metal XOR Studio

Tracks:
1. King of Pain
2. ? [drum.guitar]
3. Tim Song
4. Wicked Game [slow version]
5. Lithium
6. Bang a Gong
7. Free [version 1]
8. ? [bass.guitar]
9. ? [bass.guitar fast]
10. Basket Case
11. Your Jacket Is Red
12. Here Comes the Sun
13. Walrus
14. I Wanna Hold Your Hand
15. Love Me Do [w/Lovely Rita ending]
16. We Can Work It Out
17. Dead Phone
18. ? [bass.guitar riff]
19. ? [drums.guitar]
20. ? [drums.bass.guitar]
21. [sequence]
22. Farmer's Anguish [studio version]
23. Rap

Was this really an album? Sort of. This was a collection of unused material from
the first Isthmus jam on February 5, 1995, the session that resulted in their first
album, Electric Field Donut.

This was more for Jason and Harry's enjoyment. In fact, they are the only two that
have copies of the album. Almost half the songs on this album were under one
minute long, many of the others were under two minutes. And some of the tracks
weren't even named, just listed as "?" followed by the instruments used to create
them.

The tape also had some cover songs that were not good enough to be on Electric
Field Donut. It also had a few originals that were not included on the first album.

Next week's Album of the Week: One Way by X-Selsior from 1990.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 6:00 AM 0 comments
Labels: Album of the Week
M O N D AY , N O V E M BE R 1 9 , 2 0 0 7

This Day in Studio History

Eleven years ago...

It was November 19, 1996, when the second Isthmus album, Lambskin Temple, was
released.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:45 AM 0 comments
Labels: This Day in History
W E D N E SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 1 , 2 0 0 7

Project Spotlight #13: Who are the Two-Tones?

Harry, Jason, and Brad had been playing together for a while as the band Pheonix.
In early 1988, Brad (the drummer) was replaced by Harry's Casio drum machine and
Jason borrowed a friend's guitar. What resulted was Harry and Jason having their
own jam sessions, often with their friend Jeremy as their singer. They had become
the Two-Tones.

Where did the name come from? One possibility is the uniforms Jason and Jeremy
had to wear for their 1988 summer job at Dairy Queen. The pants were a dark
brown and the shirts were beige. They often made fun of their two-tone brown
uniforms so that may be what inspired the name. Another possibility is a two-tone
brown van that used to drive around their town. They made fun of it every time
they saw it.

The band consisted of Harry on keyboards and drum machine, Jason on guitar, and
Jeremy singing. On occasion their friend Darrin or Joe would join them. Their
sessions usually consisted of them sitting around a cassette recorder playing their
songs only one or two times before recording them. All three took turns at writing
lyrics, usually inspired by things or people from high school.

On May 24, 1988, the Two-Tones recorded their most popular song, "Hog". It was
inspired by their English teacher. Their frustration with her had been building up
all school year so at the end of their junior year they wrote and recorded a song
about her. They played it for many of their friends and family. People often said it
sounded like the Beastie Boys song "Fight for Your Right (to Party)", which it
unintentionally did.

For the next year they recorded many songs together. In June of 1989, Jeremy left
for West Point. It was the summer of 1989 that Jason put together the Two-Tones
album called Heimlich Maneuver, along with a lyric booklet for the album. It was
then officially released on December 5, 1989. Not many people heard that album.
Having graduated from high school, a lot of their friends were moving away or
getting jobs, the care-free high school days were gone.
In the fall of 1989, Harry and Jason asked their friend Joe to replace Jeremy as the
third official member of the Two-Tones. They got together for a few recording
sessions over the next several months. Below are some pictures of the "new" Two-
Tones.

(above, l-r: Jason, Joe, Harry)

May 22, 1990, was their last recording session. They recorded the first take on a
song called "Midnight High" using an old mixer Jason got from work. The song
needed more work and even though suggestions were made on how to improve it,
the Two-Tones never played again.
By now Jason was busy with his solo music career. He had been recording his own
keyboard songs for a while and in June of 1990 he would record what would
become one of the earliest Mune Mud songs, "Plutonic". Harry was busy with
another band that played at parties and clubs. And Joe gave up the band life and
became a radio DJ.

In 2000, a detailed account of the Two-Tones was written. Metal XOR Studio is
trying to acquire the rights to that story. When they do it will be updated and
published for all to read.

Next week: What is X-Selsior?


Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:45 AM 0 comments
Labels: Project Spotlight
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Just For Fun #3

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

From all of us at Metal XOR Studio


Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:54 AM 0 comments
Labels: Just for Fun
F R I D AY , N O V E M BE R 2 3 , 2 0 0 7

Collector's Corner #20

Jason and Nikki have written and recorded a few songs together. A few of them
were for church. Below is the March 14, 1999, bulletin that lists Nicole Meyer
(prior to being married to Mune Mud) as singing the Message in Song.

A hand-written note by Jason says "He Lifts Me Up". That was the song Nikki sang
that day at church.

This bulletin remains in the Holy Relic Wing of the Metal XOR Studio Museum.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:56 AM 0 comments
Labels: Collector's Corner
SA T U R D A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 4 , 2 0 0 7

Listen Online!

The seventh installment of Listen Online features Nikki singing at church.

She and Jason have written a couple of songs in the last few years that she sang at
church. This song was called "He Lifts Me Up". It was originally a song Jason had
written and recorded for Nikki called "Fallen Star Wish" which appeared on their
2001 EP Love Songs. The music remained the same but they wrote new lyrics for it.
Jason videotaped her singing it at church and pulled the audio from the tape for
the "live" version of the song.

Click here to listen to the live version of the song.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 2:40 AM 0 comments


Labels: Listen Online
SU N D A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 5 , 2 0 0 7

Album of the Week #14: One Way

Project name: X-Selsior


Album name: One Way
Release date: unreleased (recorded in 1988-1989)
Release format: cassette
Studio name: none

Tracks:
1. The Fly in Your Eye
2. Summertime
3. F-14
4. Jungle Fever
5. You Are the Bread of My Bologna Sandwich
6. Any Day Now
7. Trop Tard Pour Au Revoir
8. Time

Records of Jason's solo career were not kept very well from 1987-1991. There is an
occasional date on a lyric sheet or some other document, but recordings usually
were not dated. So that makes it tough to piece together this part of the Studio's
history (before the Studio was a studio).
Harry and Jason had finished with their earliest music career (ad-libbed singing to
instrumental music on the radio) by 1988 or so. In fact, their band Pheonix had
been put together and they were busy with that. But at home Jason continued the
radio singing. But now he was recording the music off the radio, writing lyrics to
the songs, and then recording himself singing his lyrics to the music he had
recorded off the radio. The solo career was evolving.

This was a short album compiling the songs he had recorded this way. It was
probably finished in 1988 or 1989. No one has heard this album and possibly never
will.

The album title undoubtedly came from a road sign Jason saw somewhere. X-
Selsior, with the strange spelling (which he was prone to do in the earlier Studio
years), is the name he gave his first solo project. And this was the first time he
had compiled songs to make an "album", complete with hand-drawn album cover.

There is only one copy of this album in the world and there are no plans to re-issue
it on CD. It is just an embarrassing part of the Studio's early history.

Next week's Album of the Week: Parabolic Dish Festival Volume 1 by Isthmus from
1998.
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:17 PM 0 comments
Labels: Album of the Week
M O N D AY , N O V E M BE R 2 6 , 2 0 0 7

Lyric Booklet #5: Equation of Time

The fifth album to include lyrics was Mune Mud's 1996 album Equation of Time.
The booklet was titled "A Japanese Lullaby" and was only eight pages long. It was
the first lyric booklet created on a computer.

This was the first of what was to be a new series of "mini" lyric booklets (there
ended up only two in the series). It measured 4"x5.5". The print was very small so
2-3 songs could fit on each page. There was no table of contents or epilogue to
this booklet, just lyrics to every song on the album.

This booklet was released on August 20, 1996, one week after the album was
released. After this "mini" booklet was made, the Studio went back to create
booklets for older albums, starting with NueroMud's 1994 album ...Libra 971. But
the project ended after the second booklet was released.

The title came from an anagram that was printed on the inside of the Equation of
Time tape sleeve. The phrase came from an old black & white spy movie Jason
watched at work one day. The anagram of 'Japanese Lullaby' was added to the
tape sleeve and no one was able to figure it out. Funnier yet, no one realized the
answer was right under their nose when the lyric booklet was handed out.

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 6:14 PM 0 comments


Labels: Lyric Booklet
T U E SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 7 , 2 0 0 7

This Day in Studio History

It was November 27, 1997, when Jason and Jimmy recorded themselves having an
acoustic guitar jam session as the band ORC in Jason's garage. The session was
recorded on a microcasette recorder and became known as the Theater of Pain
jam session. The significance of that session was that demos for a few of the songs
that made it on their 1999 Purging the Great Abyss album were recorded that
night. There were many other demos recorded that have not been polished... yet.

That decade went by fast!

Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:45 AM 0 comments


Labels: This Day in History
W E D N E SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 8 , 2 0 0 7

Project Spotlight #14: What is X-Selsior?

Records of Jason's solo career were not kept very well from 1987-1991. There is an
occasional date on a lyric sheet or some other document, but recordings usually
were not dated. So that makes it tough to piece together this part of the Studio's
history (before the Studio was a studio).

Harry and Jason had finished with their earliest music career (ad-libbed singing to
instrumental music on the radio) by 1988 or so. In fact, their band Pheonix had
been put together and they were busy with that. But at home Jason continued the
radio singing. But now he was recording the music off the radio, writing lyrics to
the songs, and then recording himself singing his lyrics to the music he had
recorded off the radio. The solo career was evolving. He called it X-Selsior.

There was only one album released as X-Selsior. It was titled One Way. It was a
short album compiling the songs he had recorded this way on his own. It was
probably finished in 1988 or 1989. There are no plans to re-issue this album on CD.

Next week: What is Parvo?


Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:12 AM 0 comments
Labels: Project Spotlight
T H U R SD A Y , N O V E M B E R 2 9 , 2 0 0 7

Blog News: 100th Post

This is post #100!!!

It is safe to say the surface has been scratched on the amount of information that
the Studio wants to share with the world. What began as an idea for a weekly post
has exploded into a flow of content much larger and faster than I ever dreamed.
Even an attempt to slow down the frequency of the posts failed. So I give up. I will
continue to post whenever I feel a post is needed, which is usually daily.

It is interesting to see how much online change there has been for the Studio since
the blog began. I have always wanted a way to organize all my Studio information,
this is it. I now have this blog site as well as four other websites:

The Metal XOR Studio Information Source


The Traveling Deengelburys website
Albino Boy website
The ORC blog (which will become more active after January 1)

Let's see how much more the Studio grows online in the coming months. See you at
150. . .
Posted by - Mune Mud - at 5:23 AM 0 comments
Labels: Blog News

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