It's easy enough to go to the store and buy most people the albums they want.
I'm going to be a little pickier this year and ask only for records that were
promised to the public but never released. Here's my wish
list . . .
My Bloody Valentine's new album. Loveless (Warner Bros., 1991)
broke all kinds of new ground for guitar music, and the ultra-intense studio
wizards decided to follow it up by building their own studio. That turned into
a years-long, money-burning disaster; they actually did complete an album, one
said to be drum 'n' bass-influenced, but leader Kevin Shields decided
he didn't like it and shelved it. The new issue of Tape Op reports that
Shields is still working on another new record; in the meantime, he's done half
a dozen remixes of other people's songs in the last few years, most of them
spectacular, and played with Primal Scream and E.A.R., but it's not the same.
The Jungle Brothers' Crazy Wisdom Masters. Back in 1992, the Jungle
Brothers were riding high as hip-hop/dance crossover kings thanks to their hit
"I'll House You" and their association with the Native Tongues crew. They
turned in their third album to Warner Bros. -- a completely berserk sound
collage/free association featuring a crazed new member, Torture. Warners
rejected it and sent them back to the studio for the far blander J. Beez wit
the Remedy. A few fantastic tracks eventually snuck out (including several
on a 1999 indie-label EP credited to Crazy Wisdom Masters), and Torture now
records as Sensational.
The soundtrack to The Holy Mountain. The late trumpeter Don
Cherry composed an amazing drone/raga/jazz soundtrack for Alejandro
Jodorowsky's insane, grotesque, philosophical film epic; it was supposed to
come out back in 1973 but never surfaced, and now even the movie is available
only as a bootleg.
The Rolling Stones' "Cocksucker Blues" single. In 1970, the Stones owed
Decca/London Records one more single, and they really wanted out of their
contract. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards devised this thoroughly unreleasable
acoustic blues (chorus: "Oh, where do I get my cock sucked? Where do I get my
ass fucked?"), turned it in, and that was that. It's been a bootleggers'
favorite ever since, and Robert Frank named his 1972 Stones documentary after
it.
Kraftwerk's Technopop. The electronic godfathers' 1982
"Tour de France" was a worldwide hit, and allegedly the first single from an
album to be called Technopop, which got as far as ads being designed.
But, as then-member Karl Bartos put it, "we got a little bit lost in
technology, to be honest." Kraftwerk eventually abandoned the album, reworking
parts of it for 1986's Electric Café (Elektra). Demos for a
couple of Technopop songs have surfaced on bootlegs, but never the
finished product.
Sly and the Family Stone's boxed set. Despite rumors every few years
that he's really cleaned up his act this time, honest, Sly hasn't gotten it
together to make an album since 1982. A few years ago, though, there was a more
promising rumor to the effect that a three-disc retrospective of the funk-rock
legend's shamefully neglected career would be out by Christmas. Nothing but a
lump of coal appeared.
Aphex Twin's The Caustic Window Album. Richard James is
legendarily perverse about what he does and doesn't release. The Caustic
Window Album -- a 1995 double LP named after an occasional pseudonym of his
-- even has a catalogue number for his label Rephlex, but only four test
pressings were ever made. (They're in the possession of James, Mike Paradinas
a/k/a u-Ziq, Chris Jeffs a/k/a Cylob, and Rephlex co-owner Grant Claridge.
Lucky bastards.)
Neil Young's Archives. Every six months or so, some major music
magazine runs a little announcement to the effect that Neil Young's
retrospective eight-CD boxed set, Archives, is going to be coming out
real soon now, probably in time for the holidays. Well, it's not going to be
these holidays. But maybe there's still hope given that the almost
equally long-promised box by Young's old band Buffalo Springfield actually made
it out this year.
The Beach Boys' Smile. It's the mother of all
never-quite-released albums, the record that was supposed to have established
their pop primacy once and for all. Domenic Priore's remarkable book Look!
Listen! Vibrate! Smile! tells the story of the frenzy leading up to its
non-appearance -- Capitol Records even printed up sleeves for it back in 1967.
The sad truth seems to be, though, that it never came close to being completed
-- what there was of it has surfaced on bootlegs and official releases over the
years, and what there wasn't will probably never even exist.
Issue Date: December 13 - 19, 2001
