Stars and Cougars

Today was interesting: as Jeff, Howard, and I went through the remaining tracks until we'd reached a consensus of what were the best songs/versions. And despite a few reports, we were not sorting through 150 songs but rather something more like 70-80 (which is still a lot). The number of 150 came from counting alternate versions, which in many cases are fairly different interpretations of a particular chord sequence/approach. So…

This culling got us down to 35 songs, which we considered strong enough for release, and then had another listen (this time in alphabetical order to separate ideas from the era they were documented in). Having a vote we ended up with 26 in the STAR category (an inside joke), and 9 in the COUGAR (an even more inside joke). So starting tomorrow we'll cut into a new round of demos, with an eye that everything from here on is essentially 'making' the record. This is very reminiscent of the way the SIamese, Mellon Collie, and Machina records were made; this kind of setting up demos as a way to discover sonic approaches while still writing/tweaking. Hence: 26 STAR demos in 10 days.

We'll be running fast.

-W.P.C.