If It's Friday, It Must Be the Pre-Christmas "Floor Your Love" Update!

Well, lots of interesting stuff to report since last I posted.

1. Courtesy of CD Baby, I just got the Floor Models first ever royalty check, in the amount of $53.76 cents, for albums downloaded (at Amazon, iTunes, and the aforementioned CD Baby). This may not sound like much, but let me tell you -- if you know that you have $53.76 coming in every month, you can budget out your year pretty good.

Seriously, some of those downloads were from people unknown to me, which is really gratifying.

2. The physical CDs are done, and I'm now in the process of shipping them out to various friends, press contacts, etc. I'm also sending a bunch to the now twice aforementioned CD Baby, so that other people unknown to me may order physical CDs in the future.

No vinyl, sorry.

Heh.

3. Dig this five-star review that a person named Wallace -- unknown to me -- posted about the album at CD Baby (you've heard of them by now, right?).

What a pleasant surprise to find this. A million years ago I was an NYU student and caught these guys regularly at The Other End (club is better known since as The Bitter End). They had a great sound, very 1960s inspired, a mashup of Beatles, Byrds, Monkees, Buffalo Springfield, Searchers, and other groups in that style. I didn't realize at the time how much of the material was original, I just assumed they had identified great but obscure tracks. They were 180 degrees opposite the prevailing pop sound of the time (Human League etc) but it's amazing how fresh and relevant The Floor Models sound on this collection.

If anybody out there knows who this Wallace guy is, please tell him that a coveted Floor Models No-Prize™ is his for the asking. Seriously -- he must have been a friend of somebody we knew back then; help me out here, people!

4. And finally, if you didn't see these two comments on the post downstairs, which are self-explanatory, all I can say about them is -- words fail me.

Hi I'm Enrique from Barcelona, Spain (we have a Blog Power Pop Action!, And there I learned of the existence of this great record).

The songs are wonderful, I love this great album in physical format, vinyl hopefully but of course also in CD format.
I repeat again, Great!!!!!!!
Enrique


Hi friends,

I'm Pedro from Madrid (Spain) and, as my friend Enrique, from Power Pop Action!
too.

I have listen the samples of your record and I have enjoyed it very much, every song are GREAT, perfect guitars and choruses with marvelous melodies with hooks.

Thanks for your music

Pedro

Naturally, I dispatched CDs of the album to these guys pronto.

I should add that they weren't kidding about Power Pop Action! -- it's an actual Spanish language power pop blog, from Spain and everything, and you can -- and should -- access it over here. Incidentally, if anybody reading this is fluent in Spanish, please go over there and let us know what Enrique and Pedro are carrying on about. Could be a hot one!

Thanks.

More developments as they unfold...

A Cold Wind in Hades (Freezing Temperatures Reported)

Okay, folks. It's finally happened.

To wit: Floor Your Love -- a/k/a The Album We Never Made© -- is now available for digital download over at Amazon. And iTunes (momentarily).

Actual CDs with sure to be award winning graphics are being pressed sometime next week -- a long story, but a boring one -- and they'll be available (gratis) for friends and press as soon as they're off the presses. And assuming that more than 100 people are nuts enough to want one, we'll run off another batch.

In any case, compiling and producing this album this has been an almost two year process, and it's really kind of amazing to me that we've finally reached this point.

To paraphrase Jeff Bridges in Heroes of Rock and Roll back in 1979:

"The Floor Models. Whew."

The Album We Never Made©: Project Update

Okay, the short version.

We're still tweaking the cover art, which means the actual physical copies of the CD won't be done for another two or three weeks. However -- the digital album will be out (via CD Baby) over at Amazon and iTunes by the end of next week.

I'm weak in the knees just thinking about it.

In any case, here's a track that didn't make the final album -- Gerry's "Fade into Grey," as heard on a sort of live recording done at WBAI-FM circa 1984 or '85.

The song itself was one of the first things we got together when the band was woodshedding, and a -- to my ears -- much more exciting home demo version will appear on the finished album. This one, with that big attempted Police-ish dramatic mid-section, was a staple of our live act toward the end, and it worked quite well on stage, but I still prefer the original, and SINCE I'M THE FRICKING ALBUM COMPILER I GET TO MAKE THE CALLS!!!!

Hmm. Apparently Absolut Vodka corrupts absolutely.

Outtakes of the Gods (An Occasional Series)

Okay -- album art and mastered CD music have all been finalized, and we're on schedule to get The Album We Never Made© actually ready in physical form and on Amazon and iTunes by mid-August, if not sooner.

But in the meantime, here's a track that didn't make the cut but which I dig the most anyway.

Circa 1982, here's what may have been our very first home four-track demo -- an amusingly primitive early version of Andy's chilling ode to urban paranoia, the fabulous "What's Wrong With This Picture?"

A far more exciting and accomplished live version of this is one of my favorite things on the forthcoming album, but I think this one has a certain charm on its own. In any case, it's an interesting window into our creative process as we were getting the band together. If I may be so pretentious.

The Masses Are Clamoring For the Floor Models!

Okay, we're getting really close to the production date for this thing.

Here's the back of the CD front cover; it may be tweaked a tad before we go to press, but essentially this is what it will look like. Including the track listing.

And here's track 14 -- a very cool live version of Andy and Gerry's "Thin Air."

The last thing you bastards will get for free, I might add.

AN UPDATE BY THE COMPILER:

You may have noticed that the opening song on the CD --"Spin Cycle" -- features personnel other than the classic Flo Mos lineup. In point of fact, although the song was written and performed (often) during the Floor Models original run, no recording of the song from that period has survived. However, given that three of the people playing and singing the late 80s version included here were, in fact, Floor Models (Gerry, Glen and me on keyboards) I've decided that it's a de facto Floor Models track despite the absence of Andy. In more or less in the same way that "The Ballad of John and Yoko" is a Beatles track despite the absence of George and Ringo.

Manny Kellem Lives!!!

The finalized CD label for The Album We Never Made™

Sans one of those big CD holes in the middle, obviously.

Hey, We're Not Kidding Around -- This CD Really is Happening!

And it's gonna be a doozy. Here's the almost finished front and back cover and the CD label.

There's gonna be a credits/liner notes page with the front cover, and there's still a little tweaking to be done with the above, but basically I'm totally stoked with how this is shaking out.

Peter Lemongello, Eat Your Heart Out!

Oh for heaven's sake...I simply cannot believe this has survived.

The smart-ass flyer I cobbled together to announce our ultra-secret, first-ever, strictly for our friends, live performance in 1981.

Every ten years, a group of musicians emerge who fundamentally alter the way we listen to both rock and roll.

In the Fifties...it was Elvis, Chuck Berry and Tommy Sands...

In the Sixties...the Beatles, Bob Dylan and Staff Sgt. Barry Sadler...

In the Seventies...Bruce Springsteen, Barry Manilow and Lydia Lunch...

Ladies and Gentlemen, we are proud to present

In Concert

Sept. 19, 1981 Rocket Studios (Studio B) 265 West 37th Street 944-2699 9:30-12:30 BYO

will be performing selections from their forthcoming album "We Can Get It For You At Our New Jersey Store." Be there or be square!

THE CRITICS RAVE!!!!

"A study in terror!" -- Lester Bangs, Village Voice

"I emerged shaken...a merciless dissection of the palsied heart of darkness that is contemporary American culture." -- Rona Barrett, Today

"A stinking heap of dead cod." -- John Lydon, PiL

"Sounds like an unholy schtup between Tom Verlaine and Boyce & Hart" -- Greil Marcus, Rolling Stone

"My favorite band." -- Steve Simels, Stereo Review

And I'll have you know that in the days before photoshop, this was a serious hassle to put together.

I should add that I totally ripped this off from a full page spread Paramount Pictures ran in the New York Times a few months earlier to advertise a theatrical re-issue of Ed Wood's immortal Glen or Glenda.

[h/t Susan Brewster]

Bonus Tracks of the Gods (An Occasional Series)

The Album We Never Made™ is done. Swear to Jeebus.

Seriously. The track listing is etched in stone, and the 19 selections your humble scribe has opted for -- a mix of studio, home demo and live performances -- have been painstakingly restored, edited, and refurbished from the best possible original sources by my genius pal Steve Schwartz. Who I'm taking to dinner on Thursday in lieu of payment.

In any case, here's something that didn't make the official cut, but still is pretty cool -- Gerry's "Sittin' Tight," from the sessions we did at WBAI-FM, engineered by super talented nice guy Edward Haber. Who had far more luck working with Richard Thompson on a couple of projects.

As soon as we finalize the cover art and get the rest of the production details taken care of -- which should be a couple of weeks tops -- we'll have an official release date to announce.

And here's the coolest part -- you'll be able to download the thing via iTunes and Amazon.

Ain't technology grand?

Let Us Now Praise Famous Crappy Demo Tapes!!!

A Floor Your Love update.

I'm mastering the final selections for the album on Thursday of this week -- depending on various technical issues, the album will have between 17 to 19 tracks. From live, studio, and home demo sources. All of which sound much better than they should, thanks to brilliant audio restoration by my chum Steve Schwartz.

Here's a fabulous track that didn't make the cut -- Andy, on WBAI, with a solo twelve-string and vocal version of our classic "You'll Come Around."

In any event, the album is now a definite lock for June release. And the digital downloads will be available on iTunes and Amazon.

How fricking cool is that?

Yes, We're Still Here!!!

A couple of updates, for those playing at home.

For starters, that threatened Floor Models CD is actually making progress; cover art (front and back) is going to be finalized in the next couple of days. Audio mastering will follow shortly thereafter.

And here's a sneak peak of the cover (unfinished in this version, obviously). And yes, you're allowed to go "heh."



And with that out of the way...

Some of you may know that I've been making loud noises with my now geriatric high school garage band buddies of late.

Here's an almost finished version of one of the songs we've been working on. That's me on all the electric guitar stuff, and frankly I'm pleased as punch with how the whole thing sounds.



Fun fact: All of the above was recorded in a cramped attic, using a couple of microphones, an outboard processor or two, and a laptop.

Which means that -- regardless of your opinion of the aural results -- it was accomplished with a more sophisticated technological setup than The Beatles had when they recorded Sgt. Pepper.