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"Travel Comes @live" is a tongue-in-cheek bit of rock mayhem recorded 12/16/2006 at a famous Dayton, Ohio club Canal Street Tavern. It was the birthplace of Guided By Voices, The Breeders, Brainiac, and, um, well, me. I've probably played there 100 times in various bands, but this was the first-ever time with TRAVEL. I suppose when you play only one show in the last 10 years, it's appropriate to release it as a live album. This is actually my 3rd "official" live album (not counting bootlegs.) First was the live disc from OO OO WA on the "Screen Kiss" anniversary edition; second was OO OO WA's more rock tour, "Fadeout 1994." Both are now out of print. "Travel Comes @live" is absolutely better than either of those records, and it really was a fluke that it came out at all. We didn't even really know the show was going to be recorded, but after the set a dude name Bryan tells us he's recorded the whole set on his MAC from a 16-channel feed from the board. "Here's a DVD of the WAVs, enjoy." To my surprise, when I got them home to my own studio, they were actually kinda magic. And by magic, I don't me, per se, good. There's nothing technically "good" about the show. We had way too little rehearsal and way too much of a noise ethic to consider this to be a polished performance. What it does have, though, in spades, is some sort of raw battle mode. It's like every song is trying to punch a hole through a wall. It is complete and true rock and roll which, as Pete Townshend famously declared, is not actually supposed to be any damn good. The whole record has the vibe of a bootleg. Even the packaging from Starfish feels like it was only psuedo serious, from the album title to the impromptu picture of Matt Hart in crash mode. The recording had many flaws and when I mixed the album over the last year, I decided to leave a lot of the stuff unfixed. The snare track was complete toast for some reason, so I had to pull a lot of the room mics, which give a whole "you are there" feeling that I just ended up digging. There weren't any overdubs -- everything is exactly as it was in the set. The only exception is we cut out all the between song chatter (for reasons Matt can explain on his blog.) One piece of chatter, though, sounded too cool, so I "nudged" it over the beginning of "Revelated." The rest is unadulterated. A de-facto "greatest hits," we plow through 9 little noise classics and one completely ruined cover song. "Crimson and Clover" came about because during the recording of "Anti-Social Butterfly" (coming soon) I had a Joan Jett's hits disc playing in my car stereo while we made a beer run. And, well, it was easier than remembering how we played one of our legit songs. Because TRAVEL tends to be all improv then messed with, it really is a miracle any of these songs sound at all like the records. God bless rock. By the way, "Arm The Guitarists" is definitely the most subversive moment in my entire live career. I loved it. Maybe can't say the same for the audience, though. For my money, it should have been noisier. Lastly, this show came about because of Eric Cassidy, ex-singer of KING DROOPY, whom I produced in 1997, and now in the excellent band SHRUG. We don't see much of each other living in different cities, but he's A-numba-one. Long-time TRAVEL fan celebrating his 30th, so put together this show in celebration ("all the bands I never thought I'd see.")
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