Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Pretty self-explanatory
Dr. Luther
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Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by Dr. Luther »

As per elviscostello.com :
http://www.elviscostello.com/#/lies-inventions
July 16th 1977

Elvis Costello and the Attractions re-record "My Aim Is True" in one day at a small studio in Cornwall.

The intention is for Stiff Records to substitute the recording by the new group for the original takes after the initial pressing is sold out.
March 1978

The "substitute" version of "My Aim Is True", recorded with the Attractions, erroneously pressed and issued in Uruguay and Argentina by Columbia Records.

The album is quickly withdrawn, when it becomes clear that rights only extend to "North America".


This is the first I've ever heard of this.
Anybody have any further details?

I'd imagine that there's a fair chance that the 4 tracks used for the 1st John Peel segment were taken from these (supposed) sessions, but that's merely speculation on my part.
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Lester Burnham
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by Lester Burnham »

I have a feeling this is Elvis being cheeky and playing up to the "Lies and Inventions" title of that section. Certainly if this had happened, we would have heard about this by now, or he would have capitalized on it and released it as a CD.
Dr. Luther
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by Dr. Luther »

Yeah -- that sounds a bit more realistic.
It would have seen the "light of day" in some fashion, official or otherwise, you'd think.
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wardo68
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by wardo68 »

Those snippets weren't there when the Lies & Inventions section first appeared. Comparing with my original data grab I see he's added some other tidbits of questionable statistics, like unrecorded songs from the KOA sessions and the cancelled release of "The Gwendolyn Letters" due to Warners' refusal of the original cover.
Dr. Luther
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by Dr. Luther »

wardo68 wrote:Those snippets weren't there when the Lies & Inventions section first appeared.
:oops:

I feel used.
Cheap.
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thepopeofpop
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by thepopeofpop »

EC and the Attractions did record tracks in Cornwall on that day - but only because they were rehearsing stuff for their live gigs. If you've heard the recordings you'll know that they were not really quite good enough to be released, so for sure EC is having a laugh.
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thepopeofpop
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by thepopeofpop »

Another likely fictional detail is listed for 2002 ... these song titles are alleged to be unreleased songs written for T-Bone Burnett and Elvis Costello's proposed television show about a girl-band comprised of supermodel superheroes:

"Bad Wig", "Clockface", "Why Isn't Everything Free?", "Ruby Keeler Meets Ivan The Terrible" and "Whine, Whine, Whine".

I imagine that these fictional details have been added not only for fun, but also to catch would-be biographers out. I mean, imagine my embarrassment if I'd added these "facts" to my EC bio on the EC WIki!
--Paul--
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by Dr. Luther »

:lol:

One can only guess at the degree of humiliation.
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thepopeofpop
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by thepopeofpop »

Dr. Luther wrote::lol:

One can only guess at the degree of humiliation.
I'd have to resign as Pope! :wink:
--Paul--
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bronxapostle
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by bronxapostle »

now, now: as you know, the papalcy allows only ONE WAY OUT of the job, so forget that letter of resignation. you're a lifer; stick it out Pope! apostle says so.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by johnfoyle »

The MAIT rerecording in July 1977 may have happened after all.


https://ianduryauthor.wordpress.com/201 ... ecordings/


Mystery of Costello’s Cornish studio solved

by Richard Balls

19 SEPTEMBER 2015

Image

Roche's Studio1
Roche’s Studio in 1976 (http://www.kernowbeat.co.uk)



It was a small, converted farmhouse in the Cornish countryside near St Austell, used mainly by local bands. But in the summer of 1977, its recording desk was busy capturing the oncoming new wave – and now the mystery location can be revealed.

Stiff Records had sent Elvis Costello, its red-hot property, on a mission: to rehearse and bond with his newly-assembled group and perform some low-key gigs. A friend of co-label-owner Jake Riviera’s offered to put them up in Camelford and permission was acquired for them to practice at the parish hall in nearby Davidstow [see previous blog]. The foursome would also perform two shows. On Thursday 14 July they supported US trash punk band Wayne County & The Electric Chairs at The Gardens in Penzance, and the following night they played at Woods Leisure Centre in Plymouth, described by one journalist who was there as a “bizarre meat market of a club”.

Costello’s sojourn to Cornwall only weeks after giving up his job as a computer operator at the Elizabeth Arden “vanity factory” has been well documented. One or two journalists witnessed the shows and their reviews provide a fascinating insight into these nascent appearances by the band. Original adverts for the shows have also survived. However, little or nothing is known about the recording session that also took place that week – including the location of the studio. Until now.

The studio in question was Roche’s at Bawdens Far, Tremodrett, near St Austell. Gerry Gill, a DJ, MC and songwriter who had been a face on the underground scene in London in the late Sixties, established it in early 1975 and, very quickly, bands from Devon and Cornwall flocked to it.


Image
Roche's Studio, Cornwall
Inside Roche’s Studio (http://www.kernowbeat.co.uk)


By 1977, Gill had expanded the facilities and through his connections with Hawkwind, whose lightshow he had run, he brought in band member Martin Griffin to help run things. As Griffin own contacts in London included Jake Riviera, it was for that reason that Stiff’s great white hope was booked in to record at this most rustic of studios.

“Jake had sent us down a copy of the first EP with Alison on it,” says Griffin. “My mate Simon Fraser was very impressed by the songs and knew this guy could write good songs.”

Costello’s official website states that on 16 July – the day after the gig in Plymouth – they went into a small studio to “re-record My Aim Is True”. Dave Robinson and Jake Riviera’s plan was to substitute the Attractions’ fresh recording of the album once copies of the original Costello had made with American bar band Clover had sold out. The record was never officially released, although at the time a British paper reported it was due to be issued in America.

Griffin doesn’t recall what songs were recorded, but he well remembers that summer session taking place. An advance party which was sent to the studio had a “strong Graham Parker factor” and it transpired that the band had “had some aggro with the locals, so they were slightly less keen on Cornwall than when they came down first.”

As for the session, he was not only impressed with Costello’s songs, but the technical abilities of his group. “Pete Thomas was an engineer’s dream,” says Griffin. “His drums are so perfectly in tune with each other. Bruce [Thomas] had been in Quiver.”

Many of the recording sessions made at Roche’s were later buried in the ground after they became water-damaged. However, he says the tapes containing the Costello session were never kept by the studio and instead “went back to Jake”.

Bassist Bruce Thomas cannot precisely what tracks were recorded that day, although he believes Crawling To The USA might have been one of them. Entertainingly, he did recall something of the the local trouble the band had during their stay.

Thomas says: “I think there was a bit of a run-in with a guy who worked at a chicken farm. The guy had spent so long slitting the throats of chickens he compensated by walking around with a peculiar pecking movement of the head. It was hard not to take the piss.”

So the question remains, has this historic studio recording of Elvis Costello & The Attractions survived and will it ever be released? Costello fans around the world would surely love to hear it.

You can read more about Roche’s Studio at http://www.kernowbeat.co.uk/roche.html

My thanks to Martin Griffin and Bruce Thomas for their assistance.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by pabenny »

The 'lies and inventions' story has just enough connection with the truth to be plausible. But given the breakneck speed that Elvis was moving at the time, it seems highly unlikely that a replacement issue of Aim would be contemplated.

As for tapes from those days... the barrel has been well and truly scraped for archive material. If good quality recordings exist - and I doubt that - they would have seen the light of day long ago when there was still money to be made from selling physical music.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by cwr »

As for tapes from those days... the barrel has been well and truly scraped for archive material. If good quality recordings exist - and I doubt that - they would have seen the light of day long ago when there was still money to be made from selling physical music.
I doubt THIS! I think there are still plenty of examples of things EC could've released and hasn't. For all his many trips to the archives, I think he's still left a lot of stuff in the vaults...

Here's a little quote from the forthcoming book, talking about a day in 1975 when Costello went into Dave Robinson's studio at the Hope and Anchor public house in Islington:
"I cut every song that I'd written that year, about twenty-five of them in total. Not one of them ever saw the light of day."
Question: would any of these tracks have been bootleged, or is he truly talking about 25 early EC demos songs that We Have Not Heard Before??
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And No Coffee Table
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by And No Coffee Table »

Most of the Flip City demos were recorded at the Hope and Anchor. Is he clearly talking about solo demos in the book? "I Can't Turn It Off" could be from that batch.

Here's Dave Robinson's version of that story: "I had about 36 of his songs. I recorded him one evening after a gig. I merely said to him, Have you got any songs? — after which I didn't get sleep for about a day and a half I eventually sent them to him for his birthday and they became his first five or six records. The great thing about Elvis was that he could cannibalise his own stuff— he had so much of it."
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by sulky lad »

Thinking aBout this, couldn't it have been the case that The Attractions versions were cut early in their career and didn't quite cut the mustard ? The early recording such as Rafters, Manchester 1977 don't hint at the powerhouse band that emerged by the end of the first U.S.tour at the end of 1977 - just a thought !
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by cwr »

Most of the Flip City demos were recorded at the Hope and Anchor. Is he clearly talking about solo demos in the book? "I Can't Turn It Off" could be from that batch.
Yeah, he specifies "he offered me the chance to come in and make some solo recordings while he twiddled the dials. I would get a demo reel out of the deal."

He then mentions that Robinson "hatched a scheme to record Flip City for a one-off single of "Third Rate Romance," a song I'd learned from a Jesse Winchester record, but the plan ran out of money and time, as the band disintegrated when we found that we couldn't play like the Hodges Brothers."
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by erey »

cwr wrote:
Yeah, he specifies "he offered me the chance to come in and make some solo recordings while he twiddled the dials. I would get a demo reel out of the deal."

He then mentions that Robinson "hatched a scheme to record Flip City for a one-off single of "Third Rate Romance," a song I'd learned from a Jesse Winchester record, but the plan ran out of money and time, as the band disintegrated when we found that we couldn't play like the Hodges Brothers."
This is sort of newsy itself. The Flip City demos have been widely bootlegged and G. Thomson's book mentioned the plan to release "Third Rate Romance" as a one-off single, but I think this is the first were heard of extensive solo demos that pre-date the Honky Tonk demos. Thomson's main sources were the other Flip City guys. It seems EC may have been perusing a solo career in parallel in those day, to an extent the rest of the band weren't aware of or in any case didn't remember 30 years later.

I have to sort of agree with the Kirkus review of the book in that the best part, narratively, of a famous person's biography is usually their struggling, pre-success days. We haven't heard much about that with EC and what we have heard has been from people on the periphery. So far.

But back to the Attractions...

I had to look up the Hodges brothers ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hi_Rhythm_Section). EC also mentioned them as a band he admired in that audio excerpt of the book that came and went. Turns out the were an R&B/soul outfit with a line up of drums, bass, one guitar, and keyboards. Not hard to connect the dots there.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by thepopeofpop »

I've never doubted that tracks were recorded in Cornwall that day, but I've always doubted than an album was seriously intended. It sounds like one of Jake's crazy promotional gimmicks, but I doubt that EC would have ever gone along with the idea (unless by some miracle the performances were absolutely mindblowing).

As soon as MAIT became a hit and was getting 5 star reviews in the press - well, any notion of pulling it from the stores and replacing it would have become even more unlikely. Bear in mind that I don't think that Nick Lowe was present at this Cornwall session. I know the Attractions were a brilliant band, but the notion of a band going into a studio without their producer and just casually knocking out a classic in a day seems like the stuff of fairy tales. Even the Beatles' first album (recorded in a day) was done with a proper producer (George Martin) at Abbey Road.

I think it more likely that EC and the Attractions went into the studio just to see what would happen - and to hear what they sounded like on tape. If something really good had happened at the sessions, then surely something would have surfaced by now!

I agree that there's undoubtedly a fair amount of unreleased material in "the vaults". Solo demos, tracks with the Attractions, etc.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by sulky lad »

John Foyle and I will get together soon and make the trek both to Davidstowe and to the Roche studios to do some detecting - sadly my cousin who was a local journalist for the Cornish And Devon Post has recently passed away but had contacts throughout East Cornwall and may have known the Davidstowe village folk personally.
As we're now looking back fondly at over 40 years ago, I guess I can make this vain plea for the release of material that would be of interest to maybe only a few hundred of us but would nonetheless generate renewed interest for those not regular subscribers to this forum. A resident of these pages not a million miles away is uploading all the live recordings of independent origin on the 40th anniversary of their original performance and would be grateful for any unissued/unavailable concerts to be released to join this labour of love.I'm sure there must be professional recordings of the Live Stiffs tour especially when you consider that the Norwich show liberated I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself and Miracle Man on the Live Stiffs LP must have come from one of those gigs, though almost certainly not from Leicester as has been suggested.
So come on , Elvis, Pete, Steve, Bruce, Jake and Dave(Robinson) lets have some juicy quality momentoes from this period to revitalise the myth and legend of this amazing musical period !( and not just a video of Humphrey Ocean's dancing !) :wink:
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by supplydavid »

It seemed as the Universal deal fell apart that the vaults were closed. I was looking forward to the RAH orchestral shows in particular.

Bowie is getting a decent set of the older material seeing light of day even if they fill up the box sets with some questionable remixes. The EDSEL/Demon releases of "classic albums" has also generated some great new material. Maybe that is the route we need particularly with the old Elvis connections? https://www.demonmusicgroup.co.uk/catal ... els/edsel/

David
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by sulky lad »

supplydavid wrote
Bowie is getting a decent set of the older material seeing light of day even if they fill up the box sets with some questionable remixes
It just seems tragic that the artist has to die before rare material surfaces :(
On a slightly different note, I'm really concerned about the new material Elvis seems to be involved in that just isn't seeing the light of day
A Face In the Crowd musical
Painted From Memory musical
Another Bacharrach collaboration on a musical ( the Austin Powers musical)

this all leaves a bitter taste in my mouth
How come one of the best 3 songwriters to come out of the UK in the last 40 years can't get any form of record deal to be able to release material ?
Have we really sunk to an all time musical low where manufactured "pop bands" and rappers/hip-hop artistes pretending to be hard now have more relevance than articulate, intelligent music ? I despair at the dumbing down of our national and world wide culture !
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supplydavid
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by supplydavid »

Unfortunately it does seem a sign of the times, however some like Lloyd Cole for instance seems to manage to work with the "big guys" on his back catalog , fan funded releases and touring. However not an easy time for any artists at this time.
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by bronxapostle »

sulky lad wrote: How come one of the best 3 songwriters to come out of the UK in the last 40 years can't get any form of record deal to be able to release material ?

Who are the other two...PAUL WELLER and....?
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by bronxapostle »

bronxapostle wrote:
sulky lad wrote: How come one of the best 3 songwriters to come out of the UK in the last 40 years can't get any form of record deal to be able to release material ?

Who are the other two: PAUL WELLER and....?
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Re: Alternate "My Aim is True" w/ Attractions ?

Post by sulky lad »

Obviously - Cheryl Cole, BA !!! :wink:
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