Songs that you wish were properly recorded but only exist as demos/live recordings

Beach Boys/Brian/Dennis stuff:

SMiLE of course
Big Sur
It's Over Now
Still I Dream Of It
Sherry She Needs Me
HELP Is On The Way
(Wouldn't It be Nice To) Live Again
Ecology

― kurt schwitterz

"guess i'm dumb" with brian vox

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7btG7ySJYU

^no vox for Corgaphobes

i think they are more accessible now because of deluxe editions/youtube/prince dying

― kurt schwitterz

yeah i mean it took me like ten years to track down those plant/page sessions in india after i heard about it. today it seems like every day "unreleased tracks" from bands are popping up, frequently from the bands themselves. the long tail is _really_ fucking long these days, and that applies to unreleased recordings as much as it does to anything else.

I meant more modern and young bands. Maybe because they know the internet, they'll be more protective of demos?

Mac DeMarco has put out the demos for all his albums shortly after their release. lots of young bands post demos to soundcloud, youtube, etc

i know this isn't "rock music" per se, but lin-manuel miranda put a bunch of his "hamilton" demos up on soundcloud. for today's bands... i don't know, i feel like they tend to use "demo tapes" for their original purpose - to get people to listen to them! who are the big young-ish artists today? kendrick lamar? his last release was basically demo recordings. frank ocean? he put out "memrise".

Prince's version of his "Love...Thy Will Be Done"

the incomparable tim smith, and his incomparable dream dress

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBdJDG0abUY

bonus track: i really, really, really wish lapsus linguae would release their great lost album

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF30125KJTU

Black Walls by Pavement

― kornrulez6969, Wednesday, February 15, 2017 7:18 AM (eleven hours ago)

"Black Walls" is just "Spizzle Trunk" slowed down.

The five unreleased Nick Drake originals on the Family Tree album: They're Leaving Me Behind, Blossom, Bird Flew By, Rain, Come Into the Garden. Although the tape hiss and limited range does give them a particular distanced mystery.

https://youtu.be/jVokN8kq8dQ

That's the demo of "Peking Spring" by Mission of Burma.

Also, "Mayfair" by Nick Drake - the version by Millie (of "My Boy Lollipop" fame) is interesting - arranged by Robert Kirby!

Cary Grant's Wedding by the Fall, though the live one is just fine

Ferdinand the Imposter - The Band

and more Dylan - Minstrel Boy - exists only as a particularly ropey basement tape recording which hints at great possibilities for the song that the dull Isle of Wight live performance doesn't fulfil.

"Guess I'm Falling In Love" gets all the press, but I really love the Velvets song "Ride Into the Sun". That acetate with Lou's vox on the Australian box set is heaven, but even then I miss the modulation into the long "It's hard to live in the city" outro from the live versions. (That section is also present on Lou's solo version, but God that version is shit.)

Yeah, was gonna say that one. The acetate is clearly a studio version, clearly the original tape is long lost.

Search out MoeJadKateBarry for a version of "Guess I'm falling in love", as near as dammit what a VU studio version would have sounded like. Apart from its Jad Fair singing, but hey..

"Ariel" (Home Demo) from the Robert Smith solo album that never happened.

I Know (We Could Be So Happy Baby) (If We Wanted To be) (or however the brackets go) by Jeff Buckley.

Radiohead's True Love Waits per the 1998 live version with Johnny playing the swirling keyboards. Just heartbreaking.

The Live Recordings 2001 version is just ok and the Moon Shaped Pool version is way too slow and moribund.

^ Yup. I think they ruined it.

"Guess I'm Falling In Love" gets all the press, but I really love the Velvets song "Ride Into the Sun". That acetate with Lou's vox on the Australian box set is heaven, but even then I miss the modulation into the long "It's hard to live in the city" outro from the live versions. (That section is also present on Lou's solo version, but God that version is shit.)

The version with Doug Yule singing is nice, has the same structure as the Lou solo version, but drumless and keyboard based.

yeah that is a good version, though i miss the chiming guitars from the acetate version. and as much as i hate "hey jude" endings, the live version where they just jam on "it's hard to live in the city" for like ten minutes is tops!

The whole "From Pink They Fell Into Blue" EP by Melody's Echo Chamber (all demos).

i love threads like this!

Feminine Complex - Hold Me

r.e.m.'s "bad day" was a good answer until they finally released it which they probably shouldn't have

Look Blue Go Purple - Ralta

Joni Mitchell - Hunter

Stina Nordenstam - 'And the Winner Is...' Give Me More of Everything, and Common Miracle (she recorded the first two during the sessions for The World Is Saved sessions, but they didn't make it onto that album, though they were included in a documentary prior to its release)

Jackie DeShannon - Jackie DeShannon - Something in your Blood (she recorded several albums' worth of publisher demos, some of which were successfully peddled to other artists and some of which were left to rot)

Aztec Camera - Green Jacket Grey

Marshall Crenshaw - My Favourite Waste of Time

Nina Nastasia - the four Run to Ruin outtakes that make up her May 3, 2002 Peel Session

Paul Westerburg - Men Without Ties

This

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPEhIoKeTg0

Jon Brion - "Citgo Sign"

His acoustic live versions promise power-pop rapture, but the demo did not deliver those particular goods.

A lot of Spiritalized songs were amazing in early live versions but we're completely rearranged on the albums (and not for the better). "Take Good Care of It" and "Goodnight Goodnight / Funeral Home" are the first two that come to mind.

Did "Solicitor in Studio" ever get a studio version?

Its not a lost Fall classic as such, but hey.

Canned Heat - "Pulling Hair Blues"

The live version was at least released on an album and a best-of, but oh, for a studio version of Polyrock - Warm & Dry

Pavement -- For Sale, The Preston School of Industry