Wow!

Andy

Honorary Member
I've just had a major wow moment!

Back story: I used to earn my living as a bottom feeder session (live & recording) drummer way back in the late 70's, early 80's. I gave up for many reasons around 1985/6. Wind forward to 1996. I was living in a rented accommodation provided for my family by my employer of the time. The house was broken into, & all my 1/2" masters + CD's were stolen - never recovered. Essentially 7 years worth of sessions, etc. All my musical memories, both good & bad, gone.

Wind forward to 30 minutes ago, I get a call from a very old friend of mine. A significant industry engineer back in the day. He had a water leak in his loft space, & had to move some crap to gain access. In one box was a 1/4" stereo 10" reel of a song I co wrote back in 1979. It was recorded in a budget 8 track studio of the day, but was good enough to attract the attention of Mike Jarret from EMI Abbey Road. It was re-recorded there, but never released, & no record of the Abbey Road recording can be found. That introduction lead to the work I subsequently did in London for some years afterwards, so it's a pivotal recording in my life. Would be great to find the superior recording, but I'll be super happy if the original demo recording has survived. Steve (my friend) says the tape looks ok, but will likely have degraded over the last 34 years. We're both searching for someone who has a 10" tape machine right now.

If it can be salvaged, I'll post it up here. It might be rough, but for me to have just one memory piece from back in the day is massive. Updates as/if they happen :)
 
Excellent news ! Old recordings have great value for several reasons.

Last week I was listening to a recording of my band from 1966. I tried to recreate the drum part. I can't figure out exactly how I was playing the groove on the recording. I guess can't play drums as good as I used to.... LOL


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I guess can't play drums as good as I used to.... LOL


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Oh, tell me about it!!! :( That said, this track was composed as a pop song, & from distant memory, very simple groove stuff. Just the possibility of one of my "in groove" fills making an appearance though. Interestingly, I can't remember if I recorded this with my Ludwig or Slingerland set of the day. If I'm lucky, & the recording is reasonably intact, I'll be able to tell which set instantly. I do remember the kit was only recorded with 3 mic's (damn those 8 track demo recording restrictions when there was no time to bounce).
 
Here's hoping you find a machine Andy.I had ,in some ways, the same thing happen to me.I had some studio masters and live stuff on 10" reel to reel on a Teac X10 machine.

My buddy and former bass player, asked if he could borrow the tapes and machine as he wanted to convert the tapes to CD.A week later,he calls me up to say the machine and tapes were stolen out of his car.All that history is now gone forever.

I'm still mad at him,but I forgave him for leaving anything of value in a car.

Anyway.Have you considered buying a machine?They go for between 350 to 1000 US on ebay these days for a Teac x10.Just a thought mate.

Here's wishing you the best in your search.Cheers

Steve B
 
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That is really exciting. I love discovering long-lost things. But this is more than your average novelty, it's obviously something very special to you, so even more important.

Do keep us posted, Andy.
 
Great find! Over the years we collect recordings from our past and you never know how significant one of those recordings could be to someone who was involved.

Fingers crossed on retrieval, Andy. Some of my 30 year old cassettes had degraded but held up surprisingly well by the time they were transferred to digital. The biggest danger as far as I can tell is that the tape was in a loft and might have been exposed to high temps which degrade magnetic tape, but things might not be the same in the cool and damp of the UK ...
 
Andy, don't play a tape that old until it's been properly restored, i.e. baked.

PS But not in Snackmaster Pro. That's just too weird.
 
And on the same day they have anounced the missing Matisse and Picasso paintings turning up... More than just a coincidence I feel. *scratches chin whilst dusting off deerstalker*
 
Thanks for all the good wishes guys. Even if this recording is recoverable, I'm sure the reality will be far less satisfying than my memory of the session result. Frankly, that doesn't matter to me.

Andy, don't play a tape that old until it's been properly restored, i.e. baked.

PS But not in Snackmaster Pro. That's just too weird.
Yes, good advice, & something I've heard before. I'll keep you posted on the results Jay :)
 
I love hearing these stories of the past. My past was not so elegant and have no photos or recordings i am aware of. Will wait with bated breath for some playback.
 
I used to earn my living as a bottom feeder session (live & recording) drummer
You mean to say that you are not still feeding on the bottom now? Boutique Drum Manufacturer... Hmmmm...
Just messing with your mind Andy, Great story :)
 
This is a great story unfolding. When you say you cowrote, did you do it from the drum perspective, arrangement, or perhaps another instrument?

I have come across a few, but not many of the things I have tracked. Those I did, I migrated to digital from cassettes that took a mess of abuse. Fond memories of some of them.

Keep us posted for sure.
 
That's good news! I'm sure finding the machine to play won't be all that hard. There are so many of them around just not being used anymore, right? Good luck on your quest!

It would be cool to hear some early Andy ;)
 
Congrats Andy!

I have some stuff (recordings, photos) that got stolen at one point. Granted, I have more than I lost, but it would still be nice to have the lost stuff too.
 
It might be worth hunting down a professional archivist. Who knows how to dry out the tape, align a machine to it, and transfer to something else. I read about people doing this on GearSlutz, you might want to pop over there and see if there's someone in your neighborhood.
 
Thanks again guys :) The fact that I have absolutely nothing from those days makes this "discovery" a real gem for me. Even my old photo's were taken, & some of those were from events that turned out to be R&R events of some note, but mostly just silly old personal memories.

As most of you old farts already know, even taking photo's was fairly unusual back in the day, & certainly, ad hoc recordings were unheard of. Now, everyone walks around with a camera & shoots away merrily without thoughts of film & developing costs. Similarly, any recording you could actually listen to was something you prepared for, not something done on the fly.
 
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