BRAIN: BRAIN SURGEONS GIGs etc.

[Albert T Bouchard]

on March 29/96 Jerry asks:

>Wouldn't Europe be interesting to play? Any sales figures known from
>Europe?

Truthfully we probably haven't sold more than * CDs outside of the US. We
still don't have a foreign distribution deal. Major labels and even large
indies have these kind of arrangements hooked up already but Ripe & Ready
is a pretty small operation. We sold about * CDs to exporters - cash up
front - of Eponymous and we're about to make the same kind of deal for
Trepanation so it's still a small operation. As far as I know we haven't
sold a single CD in Spain (Spanish lyrics notwithstanding). When we get
some more exposure over there I'm sure we'll play there.

On a more positive note, last Sunday the band set up our stuff in New
York's City College recital hall and recorded the rest of the new album. We
did nine tracks in 12 hours. We did one over from the last session and one
song just for fun. That brings the total tracks for the new one up to 16.
The final piece will probably be 13 or 14 songs and around an hour but we
shall see what comes out best when we mix it. The tracks were once again
recorded by the incomparable Paul Special and this time we had our choice
of almost any piece of equipment, microphone etc. imaginable.

The City College facility is really quite beautiful with a newly
constructed amphitheater that holds about 120 people and is rather steep.
All the walls are bird's eye maple with an art deco lighting scheme that
utilizes faux-green-marble lights in the walls and gigantic umbrella style
chandlers, plus the regular pars with colored gels that all theaters have.
Sonically it was closest to the sound of studio A in the Record Plant (most
of Spectres) but crisper. Upstairs in the control room they have a state of
the art mixing desk with every effect and signal processing device known to
man. We watched each other via closed circuit monitors. This was quite a
step up from Pete's Garage!

There was a very good feeling in the hall and I think it's tangible on the
tapes. All the equipment worked flawlessly. We jammed for a couple hours at
the start while Paul got the sounds up and by the time we got down to
business we were all pretty loose. It's still a lot of fun for me because
at every stage of this project we are very confident that this CD will
sound the best of all the records.

Once again we've tackled some old BOC tunes that were recorded but never
released and I'm sure if they ever come out on some box set or something
that tBS versions will compare favorably.

I just thought I'd like to share some of my excitement with you. We still
have to do all the vocals over because there was quite a bit of noise in
the vocal booth due to the air conditioning ducts but vocals usually come
out better when we do them in my studio anyway. I have a couple weeks off
from my school job (Easter Vacation yea!) starting next week, so I'm
planning on getting most of the overdubs done then.

L8r,
Al

* a small amount - not really anybody's business