More lost Baby Opaque music
So, Michael Buck, who is fast becoming my official historian, sent me a CD of Baby Opaque’s last show, July 4th, 1985. It’s a tape off the board, and pretty good. (Though since it’s a board tape and I used a big bass amp there’s not a lot of bass guitar in the mix.)
Baby Opaque was Michael W. Dean (me - on vocals, lyrics, bass, keyboard), Todd Wilson (guitar, lyrics), and Professor Michael Bérubé (drums).
I did some fluffing and folding on this recording in SoundForge: lowered the pitch by one semitone plus 7 cents (a cent is a hundredth of a semitone.) I had to do this because the tape recorder that Trax had recorded fast. Then I did a bit of EQ, raised the low bass and mid treble a little. Other than that, it’s pretty much as it sounded that day: great performance, and small happy crowd, and inane banner from me. (It wasn’t until I formed Bomb that I figured out it’s better to “Shut up and play my guitar.”
Here’s an MP3 of three lost songs that were never on a record, “Springtime”, “I’m Uncomfortable” and “The Armless Child.” All three of them are a lot more pop-punk than most of what we put on the records.
Here’s an MP3 of the whole show (These MP3s encoded at 160 k for better sound.)
Looking back, this was a pretty troubled time in my life, but I sure got a lot done (I always do). One year to the day before this show, I was meeting Peggy Tully in DC (at the Rock Against Reagen show on the Capital Mall.) In that year I started a band with her, wrote a set (while homeless), recorded a tape, we broke up. I moved to Charlottesville, formed Baby Opaque, wrote a set, recorded an EP and an LP, played gigs, and broke up.
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Here’s a couple photos DJ took of me mastering this recording:
And here, for no good reason, is me in my dorky new glasses. Picked ‘em up today. I haven’t worn glasses since 1996. It’s quite an adjustment, but I need ‘em. Gettin’ old.
August 27th, 2008 at 9:47 am
I’ve got to get glasses, too, and that’s the style I had picked out. You’re channeling William Holden in “The Towering Inferno”.
WE’VE GOT TO GET THESE PEOPLE OUT OF HERE!!!
August 27th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
Daddy, you’re not gettin’ old, you’re gettin’ better.
I think your new glasses are sexy!
August 27th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
>You’re channeling William Holden in “The Towering Inferno”.
I thought I was channeling Holden Caulfield in “The Catcher in the Rye”!
MWD
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:06 pm
I found this site linked to from a discussion elsewhere about Bomb. I probably owe Bomb’s drummer some portion of my (nonexistent) royalties over the years for all of the parts I stole from the ‘Hate Fed Love’ record. This is particularly true of my work with this band.
Then, scanning your site, I see that you played music with Michael Berube(!!), who happens to have been a favorite blogger of mine, as well as sometimes compatriot from my days as a lefty blogger.
Small world.