›

EAST OF UNDERGROUND ALBUM ON WAX POETICS RECORDS

davidwingatedavidwingate 748 Posts
edited August 2007 in Announcements
Hey, How many have heard the record and waht do ya'll think of the packaging?Thanks,Amir

  Comments

  • 99Problems99Problems 1,541 Posts

    12-pager
  • 99Problems99Problems 1,541 Posts

    Hey Amir, got the OG? Headz need to know.
  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts
    Hey Amir -

    I think the notes left a bit to be desired. I suppose more could've been invested in the jacket too but overall it's very good.
  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    Hey Amir -

    I think the notes left a bit to be desired. I suppose more could've been invested in the jacket too but overall it's very good.

    Cosign. It's great that they did this reissue, no question. I would have liked - if it was at all possible - more about the actual musicians. I'd assume at least some of them are still alive and given that there'd be military records one could turn to, tracking at least a few of them down would have seemed in the realm of possibility.

    But man...the music is superb. I love that they cover The Fuzz and that James Brown/Santana medley is

    Just curious: how did this end up so uber-obscure compared to the Black Seeds LP? Did EoU come out first and therefore, was more limited in copies made?
  • NateBizzoNateBizzo 2,328 Posts
    I WANT A SOAP REISSUE!




  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts

    Hey Amir, got the OG? Headz need to know.

    Since we're asking for stories - the liner notes seemed to suggest that our very own Dante C. first discovered the LP. True? If so, where and when?
  • ariel_calmerariel_calmer 3,762 Posts

    Hey Amir, got the OG? Headz need to know.

    Since we're asking for stories - the liner notes seemed to suggest that our very own Dante C. first discovered the LP. True? If so, where and when?

    I don't know for sure, but D has publicly alluded to having owned several.
  • davidwingatedavidwingate 748 Posts
    Well, I feel you but unfortunately the Army doesn't have records on the group. That is why we say in the notes that if anyone knows anything about the guys in the group please speak up and contact us. they (the army) have said to us that they have no records left of the guys. As matter of fact, they cannot tell us anything about the guys. In terms of the jacket artwork, we did the jackets at one of the best printing plants in the country and the stock of the jacket is top-notch. The Army didn't have the masters for the record and they only had one copy of the actual vinyl record in a vault..no lie. I think people need to understand that this record has VERY little known about it even from the US Dept. of Army.

    amir
  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    Well, I feel you but unfortunately the Army doesn't have records on the group. That is why we say in the notes that if anyone knows anything about the guys in the group please speak up and contact us. they (the army) have said to us that they have no records left of the guys. As matter of fact, they cannot tell us anything about the guys. In terms of the jacket artwork, we did the jackets at one of the best printing plants in the country and the stock of the jacket is top-notch. The Army didn't have the masters for the record and they only had one copy of the actual vinyl record in a vault..no lie. I think people need to understand that this record has VERY little known about it even from the US Dept. of Army.

    amir

    Ah...well, that explains it. Ya'll should have put Dori on it
  • Dj_Coma_ToastDj_Coma_Toast 874 Posts
    definitely feeling the reissue, thanks!
  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts
    In terms of the jacket artwork, we did the jackets at one of the best printing plants in the country and the stock of the jacket is top-notch.

    amir

    Yeah you know, after looking at it I gotta say it is pretty nice. Retract that comment, my only criticism is about the notes.
  • davidwingatedavidwingate 748 Posts
    trust me, the notes issue is a serious one...the Dept. of Army lost alot on these dudes...so seriously they are a mystery. but do people think about the music?

    amir
  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts
    trust me, the notes issue is a serious one...the Dept. of Army lost alot on these dudes...so seriously they are a mystery. but do people think about the music?

    amir

    Sounds amazing, actually have it on in the shop right now.

    My issue with the notes was more about the quality of the writing than the lack of information... although didn't the band actually finish second?
  • ageage 1,131 Posts
    Really clean and supringly excellent that they mastered it from they vinyl(even though that it seems pretty common nowadays)
    Yeah, I'd be nice to know more about the people that recorded it and a bummer that the reels are gone(be nice to know if there were anything else recorded by those cats.
    All in all,It's nice to hear a clean copy of it.
    I've only heard really bad dubs of it.(till this point).
    Anyone else?
  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts
    I really think this should be on the main page, not the announcements section.

  • holmesholmes 3,532 Posts
    I really think this should be on the main page, not the announcements section.

    I agree
  • ageage 1,131 Posts
    I agree due to the amount of posts in regards to it...

    But then again:

    "EAST OF UNDERGROUND ALBUM ON WAX POETICS RECORDS"

    It is an annoucment
  • spelunkspelunk 3,400 Posts
    Change the title and put it on the front page moderhaters. Very different record, that's what's so amazing, is that a few guys in the Army could end up making an album that covers popular songs but make them sound so different and amazing, and then pretty much disappear.

    Really the album is worth reissuing simply so that hopefully one of the musicians gets in touch with WaxPo.
  • DCarfagnaDCarfagna 983 Posts
    Myself and several other people good at this sort of thing tried for at least four years to find the musicians in the band to no avail.
    The Army holds the rights to the album, so the license is 100% legitimate.
    It seemed that regardless of the scant biography, the record was in need of a reissue.
    So WP reissued it.
    It's pretty much a one-to-one reissue, as WP used the inside gatefold pics to make a new back cover and turn it into a single album.
    I did not write the notes and I don't understand why people are taking such issue with them.
    The remastered sound is a vast improvement over even the cleanest originals I have had in the past.
  • Jonny_PaycheckJonny_Paycheck 17,825 Posts

    I did not write the notes and I don't understand why people are taking such issue with them.

    Just being bitchy.

    They are kinda poorly written, but everyone's a critic. and so on.

    I played this shit nonstop today. It's tight as hell.
  • jamesjames chicago 1,863 Posts
    I did not write the notes and I don't understand why people are taking such issue with them.

    Two things, one relevant, the other perhaps less so:

    First, as I've made clear elsewhere, I'm definitely among those who take issue with the notes. But just for the record: My main problem is not with the lack of new information--I believe y'all when you say it's mostly dead ends. My main problem is with the old information that seems to have been passed over and/or willfully obscured. There is, for example, no mention of the fact that it was originally a double lp, no mention of the fact that East of Underground didn't actually win the talent show that gave rise to the record (even more noxious, there seems to be an attempt made by the writer to make it seem as though they did win), and no explanation as to whether the slightly jacked tracklisting ("Getting Over" is listed as the last track on the first side, but appears as the first track on the second side) was extant on the original. I'm not at all asking you to answer for any of this, Dante, it's just that for an album that's the flagship reissue for the label, and that clearly represents so much labor on behalf of so many, the fact that this kind of basic, known shit got left out is puzzling, and makes the notes' repeated invocation of "mystery" kinda insufferable.

    Don't let this smoke obscure the fire, though: As I've also made clear elsewhere, I think the record is special as hell; it was in dire need of a reissue, and now that it has been, I encourage everyone who isn't on some bullshit to buy it and support the endeavor. It contains a truly remarkable sound, and I don't just mean in terms of quality.


    Second, during the much-ballyhooed "unmasking" of Alhambra a couple years back, I thought it was weird that there was all this delving into particular models of athletic shoes and cross-referencing pictures of sneakered record dudes and photo cropping and photo magnification and photo lightening and all that. It seems like a lot of time and effort could have been saved by asking: "Okay, it's 2005--who are all the people who possess East of Underground in triplicate?"
  • hcrinkhcrink 8,729 Posts
    Second, during the much-ballyhooed "unmasking" of Alhambra a couple years back, I thought it was weird that there was all this delving into particular models of athletic shoes and cross-referencing pictures of sneakered record dudes and photo cropping and photo magnification and photo lightening and all that. It seems like a lot of time and effort could have been saved by asking: "Okay, it's 2005--who are all the people who possess East of Underground in triplicate?"

  • mannybolonemannybolone Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
    I'm still hoping someone can answer how it is that EoU ended up crazy uber obscure whereas the Black Seeds/Sound Trek album turns up more often (and for decidedly far, far, far less money) even though there's only a year between them?

    Actually, two more questions to ask:

    1) EoU didn't win the talent contest? Soap did? I'm hella confused.

    2) EoU was the first annual talent contest, Black Seeds won the 2nd...as there a third in 1973 with an album somewhere out there by the Special Services Agency?

    Headz wanna know.

    And I think James' critiques were all spot on.
Sign In or Register to comment.