Last Magician vs. WEA tape dd. 1985/01/11

THE place for your Sisters-related comments, questions and snippets of Sisters information. For those who do not know, The Sisters of Mercy are a rock'n'roll band. And a pop band. And an industrial groove machine. Or so they say. They make records. Lots of records, apparently. But not in your galaxy. They play concerts. Lots of concerts, actually. But you still cannot see them. So what's it all about, Alfie? This is one of the few tightly-moderated forums on Heartland, so please keep on-topic. All off-topic posts will either be moved or deleted. Chairman Bux is the editor and the editor's decision is final. Danke.
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robertzombie
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If anyone wants anything transferred I have a fairly competent needledropping set-up and a Nakamichi tape deck :)
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Gaijin
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Yeah - first person to send all 3 WEA tapes to robertzombie gets a fruitbasket, and an Omnibot.
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Gaijin
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Hey BigPhil, this .rar is massive. Any chance you could unzip it and upload to Google drive please.

:oops: I hate to put you out but I can't do 100mb files. :oops:
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davedecay
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BigPhil wrote:
Dan wrote:It was on Dark Circle Room (it's a dead link now).
http://darkcircleroom4.blogspot.co.uk/2 ... an-of.html
Alive Alive Oh... http://goo.gl/pMeeIT
Quite dead now, sir.
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BigPhil
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davedecay wrote:
BigPhil wrote:
Dan wrote:It was on Dark Circle Room (it's a dead link now).
http://darkcircleroom4.blogspot.co.uk/2 ... an-of.html
Alive Alive Oh... http://goo.gl/pMeeIT
Quite dead now, sir.
Back up fer a bit
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davedecay
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danke
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Gaijin
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Although this is quite hard to verify because of quality issues, am I right in concluding that the WEA tape dated 31/01/85 also has 2 Magician mixes on it? Those being F&L&A and NTTC.

They do sound very similar when aligned with each other...
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robertzombie
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This might help: http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
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Gaijin
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robertzombie wrote:This might help: http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
Ahh - no.

The wiki still calls 4 mixes on the first cassette 'Mack Mixes' and assumes that the tapes were made on the day that The Sisters did the mixes!

Finished mixes would have been saved to reels, those were perhaps even copied, and from those the cassettes would have been made at Copymasters - but only once WEA had taken possession of the reels. There is an implied time delay here. By referring to the cassette dates, the impression is that the mixes were made on those dates, which is an error in logic. Just the cassette was made then.

In the event that the cassettes were made in the recording studio on the day, they'd have the studio's details on them and not have any association with WEA or Copymasters. These would have been for the band's personal use, so their numbers would be fairly small and customised to the user, meaning they'd have handwriting on the index cards.

Also, there is no reason to assume that each cassette would have wholly unique mixes just because the first cassette had some unique mixes present. That too is an error of logic.

The 3rd & 4th tracks on the cassette seem to be the LP mixes which, on it's date of manufacture, would have made them unique, but as stated above, it seems 1&2 are duplications from the first cassette.

This might go some way to explain why there is no "limited edition bootleg" that features the tracks from the second WEA cassette. Meaning that, by the time it became available to a private person (bootlegger or collector), the mixes had been released...
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Dan
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Gaijin wrote:
robertzombie wrote:This might help: http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
Ahh - no.

The wiki still calls 4 mixes on the first cassette 'Mack Mixes' and assumes that the tapes were made on the day that The Sisters did the mixes!

Finished mixes would have been saved to reels, those were perhaps even copied, and from those the cassettes would have been made at Copymasters - but only once WEA had taken possession of the reels. There is an implied time delay here. By referring to the cassette dates, the impression is that the mixes were made on those dates, which is an error in logic. Just the cassette was made then.

In the event that the cassettes were made in the recording studio on the day, they'd have the studio's details on them and not have any association with WEA or Copymasters. These would have been for the band's personal use, so their numbers would be fairly small and customised to the user, meaning they'd have handwriting on the index cards.

Also, there is no reason to assume that each cassette would have wholly unique mixes just because the first cassette had some unique mixes present. That too is an error of logic.

The 3rd & 4th tracks on the cassette seem to be the LP mixes which, on it's date of manufacture, would have made them unique, but as stated above, it seems 1&2 are duplications from the first cassette.

This might go some way to explain why there is no "limited edition bootleg" that features the tracks from the second WEA cassette. Meaning that, by the time it became available to a private person (bootlegger or collector), the mixes had been released...
I was in the little downstairs shop in Leeds about 6 months before Palazzograssi released Last magician.
The guy who worked there (who was a friend of Palazzograssi) had 2 of those tapes - although memory tells me that each tape had 7 tracks on each and one of those has only 6. This means either a) Someone has held back 1 song for themselves, b) it was a different tape, c) incorrect memory.

Anyway, I hung around in the shop listening to the tapes, and 6 months later Palazzograssio released Last Magician. When I asked why they chose those particular 4 songs I was told they were the best ones, or the most different from the final versions. There was no word on if they planned on doing anything with the other tracks.

The tapes I saw didn't have those covers. I remember the inlays didn't have much text on them, only something mentioning WEA (possibly that bit was pre-printed), and the song titles (no timings or 2nd mix, 3rd mix, no mack mix etc), and finally the date. Those copymasters inlays might even be a bootleggers creation (they don't look very convincing). Mack mix is likely some half-assed way of indicating that those 4 mixes are the ones used on Last Magician, which can only have been added after the fact as the disc was released in 1988.
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Being645
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Gaijin wrote:
robertzombie wrote:This might help: http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
Ahh - no.

The wiki still calls 4 mixes on the first cassette 'Mack Mixes' and assumes that the tapes were made on the day that The Sisters did the mixes!
NOTE:
It's not the SistersWiki calling those mixes "Mack Mixes", but the bootleg CD presented in the SistersWiki.
http://sisterswiki.org/The_WEA_Mixes_1985

There is no word of "Mack Mixes here:
http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
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Gaijin
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I just wanted to know if Tape 2 has tracks on it that are available elsewhere. :?:

I'd not really consider the wiki page as empirical evidence of anything. Consider the points I made above, as well as those that @Dan made regarding his recollections.
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Gaijin
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Being645 wrote:
Gaijin wrote:
robertzombie wrote:This might help: http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
Ahh - no.

The wiki still calls 4 mixes on the first cassette 'Mack Mixes' and assumes that the tapes were made on the day that The Sisters did the mixes!
NOTE:
It's not the SistersWiki calling those mixes "Mack Mixes", but the bootleg CD presented in the SistersWiki.
http://sisterswiki.org/The_WEA_Mixes_1985

There is no word of "Mack Mixes here:
http://sisterswiki.org/WEA_In-House_Tapes_1985
Line 19
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Dan
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Gaijin wrote:Line 19
And on the Copymasters tape inlay.
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Gaijin
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Dan wrote:
Gaijin wrote:Line 19
And on the Copymasters tape inlay.
The more I look at those tape covers the more bogus they look.

In fact, it's hard to believe that their product wouldn't have their actual logo on it...

http://www.discogs.com/viewimages?label=Copymasters

an example of an actual Copymasters cassette.

http://www.discogs.com/Erasure-Star/release/1764937
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Being645
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Hhm, I'm surely the last to know the truth ... :wink: ...

There have been discussions on those Mack mixes already and the WEA tapes

https://www.myheartland.co.uk/viewtopic ... 9f1267f46e
https://www.myheartland.co.uk/viewtopic ... f10b21a905

* The missing copymasters logo is clearly in indicator, though... :?
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Gaijin
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Here's an example of a WEA promo cassette.

http://www.discogs.com/Seal-Crazy/release/2408452
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Gaijin
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I'm familiar with this torrent - didn't know it had originated with @waterisnat, though I see you're seeding it currently. :) A pity the tracks weren't speed corrected before being 'remastered'. I suppose it doesn't even occur to most people, they just think the songs are supposed to sound weird... :roll:
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Being645
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Gaijin wrote:
I'm familiar with this torrent - didn't know it had originated with @waterisnat, though I see you're seeding it currently. :) A pity the tracks weren't speed corrected before being 'remastered'. I suppose it doesn't even occur to most people, they just think the songs are supposed to sound weird... :roll:
:eek: :eek: :eek: :?: :?: :?: ... I don't understand a word ... and I'm quite astonished, either.


Btw, here's a slight adjustment to your current avatar ... :wink: ...

Image
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