***Audio Files NSFW ***
When I was younger I had a friend that had this tape filled with hilarious rants of from famous people, studio banter and other weirdness. We crudely edited on a dual tape deck(remember those) to make tapes to crank call people with. This was of course before the days of *69. It never really worked. The sequence got screwed up and I am sure you could here the tape recorders buttons being pressed plus the horrible sound quality. We did not know what the hell a sampler was or been able to afford one mind you. I thought the tape was great anyway. I can't be sure but it could have been Al Kooper's Kapusta Kristmas Album. It at least contained some of the same stuff. That I learn about a few years ago. Here is a overview of the from the HoustonPress, Phoenix NewTimes and probably those other western city free weekly's in that media family:
For several years back in the 1980s and '90s, rock 'n' roll keyboard legend Al Kooper had a very cool Yuletide custom. Kooper was (and is) an avid collector of prank calls, celebrity (and some non-celebrity) bloopers, weird songs, hilarious answering-machine messages and studio banter, and each December, he would press up a few of the best of them on vinyl and send the albums to the lucky few dozen people on his Xmas list.
These were called Al Kooper's Kapusta Kristmas albums, and they now cost a fortune on eBay. Because of their limited circulation and very high appeal, back in the day most people heard them on second-, third- and fourth-generation cassettes, and so most people just called them "Al Kooper tapes." The Kooper tapes not only revealed the darker side of stars like Barry White, Buddy Rich, Casey Kasem, and Orson Welles, they also made a few of their own, such as the bluesy and quite probably boozy preacher Prophet Omega, and the whacked-out and quite possibly cracked-out music business wannabe proprietor of J&H Productions.
I forgot about the tape for sometime until years later heard so of the clips on Howard Stern's show. And the flood of memories came back. Where the tape came from this tape I'll never know. It probably is long gone by know. It was worn out then. It was a copy of a copy of a copy.
I was vaguely aware of tape trading culture at the time. There was a few bootlegs around. People trade tapes of underground punk music. But it was not a lot. It was not like I knew a bunch of studio engineers that had a collection hilarious audio outakes. Hippies always seem to be all involved when is comes to bartering but to Hippies were stinky people that sold bad drugs not people you trade tapes of Grateful Dead shows and Doors bootlegs with. I wasn't even aware of the reel-to-reel tape scene until much later.
It was a urban wasteland. There was not much of a strong black market of anything let alone tapes of fuuny outakes. Back then how did you find tape traders. Even when traveling out of the suburban wasteland how do you find a tape trader in a new place. Maybe you could track down some pot but what do you climb a statue in the town square and, "Yell, who got the tapes." Oh, those pre-Internet days. It was a about word of mouth and the people around you. Apparently all the people around me weren't that cool. They did not have anything good except that one tape. We made your own mix tapes from songs off the radio and other tapes we may have had. It was hard on us kids too poor and/or lacking transportation to a real record store to find cool music. If you you weren't into bad pop or hair metal it was hard. I remember listening to the late Sunday radio show that was mostly trash metal on the radio with my finger on the record button. Mixed in with the second rate shredders like Overkill they might play a single by Fear, Black Flag, Suicidal Tendencies or Minor Threat or something like that. Maybe you would get some industrial Ministry or Front 242 song. I would be please with anything form Germany because it was always fucked up. Maybe you listen for 2 hours and just get one shitty D.R.I. song that lasted 35 seconds. It could take months to make one tape.
I stayed up to watch a 120 minutes. This was a long time ago because Mtv still played music. It was the only source for music like that. Stuff like that just wasn't on the radio. I would make VHS mix tape. This also could be a painful process. My memory could be a little off but I am pretty sure every other song was Morrissey or The Church's Under the Milkyway Tonight. And ok song but damn every other song? With out fail something I really wanted like Camper Von Beethoven-Take the Skinheads Bowling would come on right as I ran out of tape. Bummers.
This was the old from of file sharing. The pain in the ass form. We make copies or lend out the tapes. Most of the time we never knew what the hell we were listening too. It was OK. All my tapes were destroyed one spring day on a desert highway. But I still have fond memories of those tapes. I still think I can remember the play order of some of the tapes.
Still that tape with all the weirdness was the best. It was stuff that you weren't supposed to hear. This was a time before the Internet was painted with Brittany's Vag and before video cameras were everywhere catching famous people acting the fool. Before people lived there life based on the idea the there is no such thing as bad publicity. What we saw of the famous was mostly what a publicist would want us to see. And anything else was a unsubstantiated rumor. What happened off stage, off camera or between takes was an unknown. To get a glimpse of it priceless.
Below are some links to some of the famous tapes that escaped from recording engineers and were collected and traded through out the years. A lot of the are else where on the Internets but I could all not find one place. If you have more let me know and I can post them.
You also should check out:
UbuWeb 365 Days Project has 730 entries of audio weirdness.
WFMU has an absolute enormous collection of strange audio.
Casey Kasem
The voice of the top 40 goes to super pissed with a bullet.
Orson Welles
The boy genius grow up and bitter as hell at the squander genius. Voice over work seem to annoy him just a bit.
William Shanter
Captain Kirk messing with the engineer at a voice over gig. Not quite Orson Wells but still don't fuck with the captain.
Buddy Rich
One of the greatest drummer ever. But did not always feel like his band was that great.
J & H Productions
This is the absolute gold standard. Spawned Remixes, a fan page, a short film(below), a story in The Onion. You can even be J&H Productions friend on MySpace.