This year has finally seen the release of Neil Young’s Hitchhiker, PP Arnold’s The Turning Tide and Bill Evans Trio’s Another Time, plus the rerelease of the very rare Bright Phoebus by Lal & Mike Waterson. All inhabit their unique, strange little worlds and have added to the sum of human gladness in mine, more so than many new albums.
These days, it seems almost everything ever recorded is available somewhere, legally or not. Is there any other buried treasure left that is yet to see the light of day?
Tom Tom Club’s second album, Close To The Bone, only got a brief CD issue tacked on as a two-for the debut. I think that deserves its day in the sun. I suspect there are plenty of Prince’s albums in the pipeline, maybe a definitive Dream Factory. I’d love to hear Springsteen’s electric, full band version of Nebraska. Is Black Gold by Jimi Hendrix simply a myth and is it all noodle? Would Marvin Gaye’s Love Man bear scrutiny? Was Paul McCartney right to shelve Cold Cuts?
Most of all, however, I’m still waiting for the official release of David Bowie’s Toy.
Vulpes Vulpes says
“Close to The Bone” is included in the first album’s Deluxe Edition double CD, tiggs, and it’s still available.
Tiggerlion says
Yes. But, only just. 😉
Colin H says
Almost all of Big Pete Deuchar/Duker’s recorded catalogue is unavailable digitally or on physical reissue – of five singles (on Fontana, Columbia and Melodisc 1963-66) and an album (in a duo with ace sessioneers backing as the Moonshiners, 1967) , only two songs are/have been available in the modern era, both on various artists compilations. (And yes, I have a Record Collector feature on the great man coming up soon!)
Tiggerlion says
Never heard of him!
Colin H says
Here’s his big number (the only one of the singles on YouTube)… the Nashville Teens were directly inspired to cover their hit version from Big Pete’s…
Moose the Mooche says
I’ve got his Cold Turkey* in my iTunes…. God knows how. Splendid it is.
*not that one
Colin H says
Really? You must be thinking of someone else – Big Boy Pete, maybe? That’s not among the BPD titles I’m aware of, and I’ve researched his released recordings thoroughly.
Moose the Mooche says
Yes, I was thinking of Big Boy Pete.
I think in a very real sense I’m always thinking of Big Boy Pete.
Chrisf says
I have this on the shelf waiting to be read…..
“The Greatest Music Never Sold” by Dan Leroy, which covers the Bowie, Prince, Chicago, Mick Jagger amongst others.
Mr H says
Just purchased at a bizarre £1:76!
Pessoa says
The Desperate Bicycles ( various singles and a 1979 album ‘ Remorse Code’) remain the great ‘lost’ punk/postpunk group, mentioned in many books but missing from every recent anthology because, if I recall correctly, the band members refuse on principle to have any of their material officially reissued.
Tiggerlion says
They sound like a sixties garage band to me.
Kaisfatdad says
Can I be cheeky and expand the question to books and movies that have not seen the light of day?
I don’t doubt that some are real stinkers in the vaults but the studios saw fit to release Geostorm and The Snowman, both of which are naffisimo, so I don’t really believe that every unreleased film was awful.
There is the strange case of the movie based on Richard Neville’s autobiography Hippie hippie shake. Filmed, with a rather strong cast, but never released.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1024652/trivia?ref_=tt_trv_trv
According to IMDB
“After the box office failure of Green Zone (2010), Working Title’s parent company, Universal Pictures, wrote off this film in an attempt to partially offset that film’s loss of over $100 million. The insurers reportedly stipulated that the original camera negative be destroyed. ”
I wonder how many other movies or albums suffered this kind of bizarre fate: the victim of corporate wheeling and dealing.
Sniffity says
Back in 1994 an elcheapo production of Marvel’s The Fantastic Four was filmed, purely in order to hang on to the rights. It was never supposed to have been released, and officially never has been, but it’s available for viewing if you look around the net – ironically, given what FF films have been released, it’s not too bad.
Kaisfatdad says
Wow! You really know some fascinating stuff, Sniff.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fantastic_Four_(unreleased_film)
Nor surprised to see Corman was involved: The King of Low Budget.
Arch Stanton says
There’s a documentary about the FF film on Amazon prime that’s quite interesting.
I wonder now that Jerry Lewis has passed we might finally get to see his infamous Holocaust comedy ‘the day the clown cried’.
Moose the Mooche says
Wowser! The strapline is
Part Muscle. Part Elastic. Part Fire. Part Invisible.
Together, It’s Clobberin’ Time!
Sniffity says
Not so much never released as never finished….in fact, barely begun. In 1937, a production of Robert Graves’s I, Claudius began shooting, with Charles Laughton starring. An unfortunate series of incidents meant the whole thing was closed down only a few weeks after filming, and in 1965, a documentary – The Epic That Never Was – was made about the ill-fated film, with Dirk Bogarde providing narration.
If you’re interested in the British film industry, film in general, or Charles Laughton, it’s worth a peek.
H.P. Saucecraft says
Three post-mortem Hendrix albums, Crash Landing, Midnight Lightning, and Voodoo Soup, all remain currently unavailable, thanks to the “Experience Hendrix” people (calling them the “Hendrix estate” is a bad joke) never approaching Alan Douglas in his lifetime. Full story at deadhendrix.blogspot.com
Tiggerlion says
I have all those CDs already. Have I obtained them from dodgy merchants? They could do with a good polish, that’s for sure.
I agree absolutely with everything on your blogspot. Do you have any insight on Black Gold? How does Mitchell *forget* he has an album worth of Jimi tapes in his loft? Was he always off his tits? Is it really just a bunch of random instrumental jams, bar the odd actual song?
H.P. Saucecraft says
Black Gold just is not, and never was, an album, just one of Hendrix’s many ideas-for-an-album/band that never got completed. There are no unheard Hendrix songs as far as anyone knows. Mitchell was a chronic alcoholic, and physically unable to do the drum parts needed for Voodoo Soup, although he was invited to do so and turned up at the studio before admitting he wasn’t up to the gig. Poor bloke.
NigelT says
Well, Voodoo Soup was a compilation from 1995 and most of it (9 out of 14) are on the later First Rays Of The New Rising Sun, and I assume the other 5 are on other releases. Voodoo Soup, as with all the releases at that time, are considered better sonically than the later ‘Estate’ ones….worth getting if you see it!
H.P. Saucecraft says
Yes … and no.
Tiggerlion says
You should read Saucey’s blogspot, Nigel. 😉
H.P. Saucecraft says
I’m going to test him on it later. Seriously though, it’s the most impeccably researched and astutely argued piece of writing on a subject nobody much cares about on the whole internet. Last time I looked it was nudging the 200,000 views mark. That means at least twenty people have read the thing.
deramdaze says
I’m rather more trusting of the “non” Douglas than the Douglas.
Adding instrumental parts to the post-Jimi mix … post-Golden Age?
A good thing?
I’m going, “bad.”
Might as well mention it … any news on “Rolling Stones No. 2” getting a reasonably-priced CD release before its 100th Anniversary?
NigelT says
The Hendrix blogspot is indeed splendid…confirms my view that Cry of Love and Rainbow Bridge (which I do have on vinyl) are magnificent. Thanks!
Bargepole says
On 9 March 2018, Experience Hendrix and Legacy Recordings, the catalogue division of Sony Music Entertainment, proudly release Both Sides of the Sky, a dynamic new Jimi Hendrix album featuring 13 studio recordings made between 1968 and 1970—10 of which have never before been released.
1) Mannish Boy*
2) Lover Man*
3) Hear My Train A Comin’*
4) Stepping Stone*
5) $20 Fine*+
6) Power Of Soul^
7) Jungle*
8) Things I Used to Do#
9) Georgia Blues++
10) Sweet Angel*
11) Woodstock*+
12) Send My Love To Linda*
13) Cherokee Mist*
*Previously unreleased
^ Previously unavailable extended version
+Featuring Stephen Stills
#Featuring Johnny Winter
++Featuring Lonnie Youngblood
Tiggerlion says
I really don’t know how I feel about this but I’ll definitely buy it.
dai says
Wasn’t Toy made kind of semi officially available about 5 years ago as a download? I certainly have it in excellent quality. It’s ok.
H.P. Saucecraft says
It’s a very common unofficial release, probably better-known than some of his official catalogue. I think it’s much more than ok, too!
Tiggerlion says
Where did you get your excellent quality download, please, dai?
dai says
I don’t remember but here is the article that got me searching for it (from 2011)
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2011/mar/23/david-bowie-toy-album-leak
dai says
Check your email @Tiggerlion
Tiggerlion says
Thank you.
NigelT says
There must be tons of Stones stuff from the 60s. I can’t quite get why ABCKO and/or the Stones themselves don’t get that out. Anyone know why?
count jim moriarty says
You’d have to ask ABCKO. AFAIK the Stones themselves have absolutely no say in what happens to their pre-Sticky Fingers material.
dai says
And Abko are not allowed to put out any studio outtakes without Mick’s permission I believe.
fentonsteve says
I have a Rough Guide book called The Best Music You’ve Never Heard – Musical Adventures Off The Beaten Track which is rather good. It was published in 2008, so some of the material has since been released (e.g. Dennis Wilson’s Pacific Ocean Blue).
I have a big box of vinyl which has never been released. Over on the Travesties Of Justice thread, @Uncle-Wheaty posted a Private Lives video, their album is a great example of blue-eyed soul but remains in EMI’s vaults. Cherry Red won’t go near it as it wasn’t popular enough at the time. Then there’s the first album by The Immaculate Fools. I could go on and on…
Tiggerlion says
Well, do go on and on…. but, most of all, tell us where and how you obtained that big box of vinyl?
minibreakfast says
And what’s in it?
fentonsteve says
It’s all stuff I bought up to the CD years (about 1993 for me, as I was a penniless student until 1991, then bought up lots of vinyl afterwards when shops were discounting it).
I have a couple of 12x12x12 flight cases where the not-on-CD vinyl is kept. To list it all would be a chore for me to type and tedious for you to read – expect it some time soon, then.
Rigid Digit says
Bring on the tedium!
(Does Tedium appear in the Periodic Table – it sounds like it should)
Mike_H says
Now there’s an AWTS slogan for the 2nd decade of the 21st century..
(The bit in brackets.)
minibreakfast says
I know the perfect soundtrack to tedious computer-based tasks. 😃
Carl says
I thought you might be looking for this – Billy Childs’s Map to the treasure:reimagining Laura Nyro
Tiggerlion says
I wasn’t but thanks anyway. I’ll play that this afternoon.
ip33 says
They are out there (but v expensive) but some nice remastered releases or a super-duper box set of the Pete Atkin/Clive James albums would be good.
Neela says
How about this? Very enjoyable and the sort of thing the internet was really created for.
http://albumsthatneverwere.blogspot.se
Rigid Digit says
Nice site – one could easily lose most of Sunday evening down that particular rabbit-hole.
I’m going in …
Kaisfatdad says
Wait for me, Rigid! It looks well worth a look.
H.P. Saucecraft says
There’s also this one: http://jiggy22.blogspot.com
Freddy Steady says
Um, I’d really like to hear the High’s follow up album to their debut. It was called Hype and they’d gone rock I believe. I’d just like to hear it.
Colin H says
As a general rule of thumb, reissue labels regard certain small original labels as tricky – being unsure who has the rights at this point. The Page One label is a classic case – very little bar the Troggs has ever been reissued for this reason. There are similar problems with some of the Marmalade catalogue, I believe. Sometimes giants like Universal are uncertain if some items originally recorded by artists in the 60s-70s on labels it has bought – such as the first two De Danaan albums on Decca, mid 70s – are their property or not (hence, able to be licensed or reissued) as paperwork may be missing and production deals were not uncommon (eg. artist or management effectively records albums and then license them to a label for X years). The Planxty albums, for instance, were recorded/funded under a production deal with svengali-writers Bill Martin & Phil Coulter, who eventually sold them on after band members declined to buy them (this was pre CD era) – a decision regretted by band members thereafter. Similarly, Sandy Roberton managed a number of British folk acts (mostly) in the early 70s and used production deals with some of them. The Liverpool Scene were one such. 10 years or so back Andy Roberts had to haggle with Sony about ownership of the masters to one LS album in Sony’s possession – they couldn’t find paperwork proving they owned it but nor could they find any proving they didn’t and the band did. Andy got Sandy Roberton involved and eventually he found a smoking gun piece of paper, and the masters were delivered to the band c/o Andy – and a 2CD anthology created shortly after.