It’s a long long story. The short of it is that the Portland version of Meat Cigars recorded a bunch of songs at Rainbow Studios in 1987. These were 16 track recordings, but they turned out meh. We were inexperienced in the studio and I didn’t speak up enough. I leaned on Dave Meyer because he recorded Evolutionary Dance and early pre-Meat Cigars jams in his home in Eugene. Turns out no one took charge of the sessions and they sound weak and watery instead of robust and rock and roll. The lesson I learned from those sessions was that a plan must be drawn up before entering the studio. The Egg Studios sound more like us than the Portland sessions ever did.
Dave heard that Fred and Toodie of Tombstone Music in Clackamas and two-thirds of Dead Moon were starting a DYI label called Tombstone Records. The band decided on a 7” EP with five songs (probably because it was cheaper and we couldn’t pick just two for a 45 rpm 7” single). The two track master tape was given to Fred who EQ’d the output and created an acetate on the same machine used to create "Louie Louie” by The Kingsmen’s acetate (by the way, all Tombstone Music vinyl is in mono). Years later, Doyle wanted to archive our old tapes because they were flaking (magnetic media stops sticking to the cellophane backing over the years). The tapes were baked to get the adhesive to stick to the backing and all the material was ingested to ProTools and output on ADAT tapes. This was around 2000 so the bitrates, file sizes, formats, and storage media was limited.
During the transfer session the master mix of “Surrogate Sex” was missing, likely lost during the mastering for the EP at Tombstone. It was nowhere to be found. At a later time the WAV files, including individual tracks (called stems), were transferred onto CDs. “Surrogate Sex” stems existed, but the bass guitar was on the same track as the keyboard and background vocals. I’m not sure if this was from the transfer or happened during the original recording session.
I no longer have the stems for any of our sessions so remixing the songs is moot. However, I decided to record an $80 Guitar version and release that. It’s slow going. My fibromyalgia slows me down and when I sit in front of the computer typing or mixing my carpal tunnel, lower spine, and neck pain increase.
Here’s a rough mix of my new version of “Surrogate Sex”.
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