Album Notes

Our friend Heather asked Tom to help her put a band together so she could perform at her High School Talent & Variety Show. Tom called Mike and me. We had such a great time playing together, that we thought we should continue the fun and make a record.

Prior to our first rehearsal, I remember wondering, "What are we going to do now?" We didn't have a repertoire, although there was no shortage of Gould songs to sift through. Our first rehearsal went surprisingly well. As we began to play, the song selection became second nature.

It was meant to be a spin-off of the Bossa Nova Beatniks. We began to play Tom's songs in an uncharacteristically "Beatnik" fashion. We wrote several songs collectively. It was a blast. We came up with an oddly descriptive name for our 'side' project. The band made a conscious decision not to overdo the record with horns, keyboards, etc., although our friends had contributed so beautifully to past efforts. We wanted to put out a stripped down rock-n-roll trio recording.

As the project evolved, we found ourselves sounding more like us than we thought we would. We were the Bossa Nova Beatniks. When we realized that we were indeed us, we called on Tim and Tori, members of the most recent BNB ensemble, and Sparlha and Jerry, who performed on prior BNB efforts. This was the whipped cream on our pecan pie, so to speak.
After finishing the recording on a VS880 digital recorder in Tom's basement, we called on old friend John Tobacco to mix & master our efforts. As fate would have it John and his associate Bob Ball had been working on a new mastering technique that combines the clarity of digital with the beautiful noises that we associate with vintage analog recordings - remember vinyl? The application of their process to our basic tracks has produced a hybrid I like to call, "Medium Fidelity." Listen for the depth and resonance of the vocals, the slide pulling off the guitar neck, and the wood of the drums. Who says what is old can't be new again? George V