DISCOVERING UNRECORDED GEMS

As I go through recently found videos and cassettes and digitize them before they are unwatchable and unlistenable, I am coming upon some songs that Love Riot never recorded. Honestly, I think they would have been forgotten if not for this archiving effort. Back then, no one thought about recording in a home studio, so the whole endeavor was much more expensive than the DIY resources musicians have now. Because of this, many of our later songs weren’t recorded in a studio. The live versions are all we have.

Some of these songs are just okay. But others, like “It Happens Every time,” still sound contemporary. Even my 25 year old daughter loves it and that in itself is personally gratifying. She asked me to record a new version for her birthday, which is today, so that’s not going to happen. But I pulled an mp3 off the live video recording from a show at Harborplace in 1997 for her. It’s noisy, with people yelling here and there. But watching and listening brings this song, and others right back to me.