Boston Wasn't A Real Band!?

In 1976, Boston hit the charts with More Than A Feeling. What nobody knew, Boston wasn't a band at all, according to a broadcast aired by PBS. It was the brainchild of Tom Scholz who had set out to record demos for his songs.

Tom had a mult-track studio in the basement of his Boston home. He played all the instruments himself. He called his friend,

Brad Delp, to see if he would sing the vocals and he said “yes”.

When the demo was completed and presented to Epic Records they thought it was an actual band and wanted to release it. Scholz then had to put a band together, naming them Boston, to be able to perform the songs live and tour.

The label never knew these facts until later.

Runout Groove HIdden Messages

Runout Groove Hidden Messages

The first hidden message in the runout groove of a record I discovered was The Beach Boys Endless Summer double album released on Capitol Records in 1974. The message was, “We Love You Brian”.

The runout groove is the groove that runs from the last track to the label. Since then I check the runout grooves for these messages and have come to find out they are more common than you may think.

Here are some other examples:

Led Zeppelin – III (Atlantic)

Side A: “So Mote Be It.”

Side B: “Do what thou wilt.”

Eagles – "One of These Nights" (Asylum)

Side A: “don't worry - - -”

Side B: -” - - nothing will be ok!”

Foreigner – 4 (Atlantic)

Side A: "Welcome Christopher"

Side B: "'Up to the Sky 'Roman"

Genesis – Genesis (Atlantic)

Side A: “Renee, I love ya.”

Side B: blank

You may not see these messages on every copy unless they are engraved on the master. If done on the stamper, which is only good for so many pressings, they may not be on each release and would vary from pressing plant to pressing plant.

Sgt. Pepper - Mono vs Stereo

It's a known fact that The Beatles “Sgt. Pepper's” album was Mono and Stereo but did you know that technically, the original Mono release is considered the bible?

According to Richard Lush, one of the 2nd engineers, the album was intended to be a Mono release only but due to EMI's insistence, near the completion, it had to be mixed as Stereo, also.

This presented a problem for producer George Martin and the engineers who had to go back and remix the album for Stereo. As a result, some effects were left out or not done exactly as intended on the Mono version (i.e. flanging on some of John Lennon's vocals). Some of these effects were overlooked in the remix because they were being rushed to mix the Stereo version.

In all actuality, according to Rush, the Mono and Stereo releases are TWO DIFFERENT ALBUMS and the true album is the Mono version.

BBC