In February ’95 Tony and I took an Amtrak train from Depew NY to LA with these two-inch tapes (pictured) in a duffel bag. We were headed to LA to mix the record with Joe Barresi. It was part of the culmination of three years work, developing our band/sound, by playing as many shows as we could, anywhere. Trap door basement gig down a ladder at the Naked Lunch on Queen W. in Toronto with the band Mundane is one of many that comes to mind.

 

Mixing the record with Joe brought together recordings we did with Rob Sanzo at his Signal to Noise studio on Dundas near Ossington. Two songs we recorded at Metalworks studio (we won a contest for the studio time). One recording was from Aztec studio in Winona—they had an EMU we used on the track. As well, there was a recording from the P9 basement by Gary “Wool” McMaster which channeled DIK MIK, whilst tweaking levels with record button engaged. Space is deep indeed!

Tony and I arrived at Union Station at 8:30 AM after two and a half days on the train in coach. Choppers were flying overhead covering the OJ trial down the street; we had arrived in Los Angeles. Our friend, Mark DiPietro, met us at the station and drove us to Mama Jo’s studio at 8321 North Lankershim, North Hollywood. We met Joe and the studio assistant, Tim, and started the mix down straight away. Back in Hamilton, Biff smoothed out a botched Western Union transfer to pay for the studio (fuck you Arvid!) saving the day big time.

Mark hung with us over the five days of mix downs. We dubbed cassettes to check mixes. His car became a second listening area. We realized that if the rear view mirror in his car vibrated on playback, we were very close on a final mix. Mark took us for a drive after a few days in the studio, where we happened upon John Lee Hooker putting his hands into concrete in front of the Guitar Centre downtown. I think I heard Fu Manchu’s “Trapeze Freak” for the first time in the backseat while driving down Sunset. WILD shit.

Joe was open to any ideas we had regarding a song/mix and we collaborated using multiple source formats, two inch tape, cassette, DAT, as well as 1/4 inch tape loops to achieve what we were hearing in our heads. Tony doubled some of his vocals on a few songs. I added the submarine guitar sound played through a Leslie and dialed in by Joe, on the song Diga. We worked from around 10/11am to 11pm or so daily. Tony and I had checked into a motel down the street from the studio and walked over each morning to get down to work.

All final mixes from these sessions were mixed to 1/4 inch tape. Joe cut and spliced tape to edit our album sequence together during the final hours we had in the studio, and that’s what is presented here: our original intended album sequence as it was then, remastered from the original tapes.

-D. Dunham/April 2024