We are currently recording our next album. Although Kevin and Jer have played with the band on and off for years, this is the first album we’ve written together. We’re enjoying the power-trio format, we’ve been playing together for a few years now and we’re very excited to be back in the studio.
It’s been a few years and I am very busy with work (and my motivation has been low) so instead of finishing the 2 (and a half) albums that we recorded in Denver, I found the early masters of our albums F***ed Up and Very Rough Mix. I decided to re-convert them to (higher quality) mp3 and ogg formats and make the full albums available for free.
F***ed Up was recorded in 1999 and released in 2000… we were listening to lots of crazy music at the time so it’s kind of an eclectic batch of songs. These masters are off the reel-to-reel and not cleaned up and tweaked (and normalized) like the actual albums were, but I think it’s worth a listen. If you like them I can probably dig up a copy of the release version of the albums and get you a copy (for a small fee).
Very rough Mix was our first real album (we had a demo album entitled Rough Mix, but it’s out of print at this point) and we had a lot of fun recording it.
I used to work in a digital studio and the lo-fi style is intentional, I was growing tired of the loudness war going on and I prefer the way things were recorded in the late 60’s and early 70’s and was really into bands like Pussy Galore , Boss Hog, 20 Miles, and Honeymoon Killers, so I went for a certain sound that some will like… other’s will not.
I converted them as HQ VBR mp3 and ogg, so they are a bit bigger than a lot of low bitrate mp3’s that you may be used to, but the frequencies are all there… =)
OK, here is the early (pre-release analog) version of the album F***ed Up from 2000 by The Beckament Band.
1. Y_Ung (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik, drums: Terry, lyrics: Chris and Crystal
2. TomTom (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik, lyrics: Crystal and Chris, drums: Terry
3. F# (mp3 - ogg) - music: Erik and Chris, lyrics: Chris and Crystal, drums: Chris
4. Highschool (mp3 - ogg) - spoken word: Jaffi Galac, vocals: Chris, Music Chris, drums: Terry
5. Great Escape (mp3 - ogg / video: avi [9.0MB] - mpg [28.7MB]) - percussion: Chris and Erik, vocals: Chris and Crystal, bass and guitar: Chris
6. Blue (mp3 - ogg) - music and lyrics: Chris
7. HS2 (mp3 - ogg) - spoken word: Jaffi Galac - vocals and music: Chris, drums: Terry
8. Crazy (mp3 - ogg) - vocals: Crystal, music: Chris
9. Ummmmmm (mp3 - ogg) - guitar: Chris, baritone: Erik, drums: Chris, vocals: Chris and Crystal
10. Hodering (mp3 - ogg) - music: Erik and Chris, vocals: Crystal and Erik, drums: Nate
11. Quick5 (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik, vocals: Crystal and Erik, drums: Nate
12. Slow (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik (keyboards)
13. Longwalk (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik (keyboards)
Bonus Tracks:
14. Melon (mp3 - ogg) - vocals: C. Barber, Music: Chris and Erik Dreher
15. White Trash/Blues (mp3 - ogg) - vocals: C. Barber, Music: Chris and Erik
16. Trailer (mp3 - ogg) - vocals: C. Barber, Music: Chris and Erik
- The music and all artistic content is Copyrighted. Please refer to our Legal Page for information about distribution, streaming, sharing, fair use, and Copyright information. The site’s TOS is also explained there. Our contact information is also available there.
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here is an old video we made for our song Great Escape… Erik did most of the work. The footage is in the public domain, so don’t bother sending me a DMCA notice… lol
It’s the version of the song that appears on our album F***ed Up. It’s available here if you want to watch it.
Great Escape Video (avi [9.0MB] - mpg [28.7MB]).
I found the early masters of our albums F***ed Up and Very Rough Mix. I decided to re-convert them to (higher quality) mp3 and ogg formats and make the full albums available for free. This is not the final (released) version, it is just a nice snapshot of a work in progress… If I recall correctly this master is right after dumping the tracks off my old Teac 1600 reel-to-reel deck.
These masters are not cleaned up and tweaked (and normalized) like the actual albums were, but I think it’s worth a listen. If you like them I can probably dig up a copy of the release version of the album and get you a copy (for a small fee), the production values on the final versions were a bit higher.
Very Rough Mix was kind of our second demo album (we had a demo album entitled Rough Mix, but it’s out of print at this point) and we had a good time writing the songs on this one… Lots of late nights and early mornings. Many of the songs were written ‘on-the-spot’ and it’s a pretty good representation of our improvisational side.
We had many different friends help us out, we used to have jams in the studio every weekend (we worked in a large musical instrument store at the time) and it kind of set the basis of our rotating lineup (Kevin and Jer who later joined the band used to come over and jam with us all the time back then).
I used to work in a digital studio and the lo-fi style is intentional, I was growing tired of the loudness war going on and I prefer the way things were recorded in the late 60’s and early 70’s and was really into bands like Pussy Galore , Boss Hog, 20 Miles, and Honeymoon Killers, so I went for a certain sound that some will like… others will not.
I converted them as HQ VBR mp3 and ogg, so they are a bit bigger than a lot of low bitrate mp3’s that you may be used to, but the frequencies are all there… =)
OK, here is the early (pre-release analog) version of the album Very Rough Mix from 1999 by The Beckament Band.
1. Crazy (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris. Original instrumental ‘demo’ version… You might like the version on the F***ed Up album better.
2. ASoda (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris, percussion: Chris and/or Erik (I don’t really remember). I called in sick from work to record this.. It is really just an intro for the song Blue.
3. Blue (mp3 - ogg) - music and lyrics: Chris. Original ‘demo’ version… You might like the version on the F***ed Up album better.
4. Tomtom (mp3 - ogg) - music: Chris and Erik, vocals: Chris, drums: Terry. This is the ‘demo’ version before Crystal joined the band (I like this version, but think that Crystal made it a lot better on the next album).
5. Great Escape (mp3 - ogg) - percussion: Chris and Erik, vocals: Chris, bass and guitar: Chris. Our drummer took his drums home and we really felt like writing a song so we slapped some microphones on a street sign (resting on a keyboard stand) and did the percussion ourselves (fortunately Nate left his drumsticks at the studio). Another song that was greatly improved when Crystal joined the band.
6. HighSchool (mp3 - ogg) - spoken word: Jaffi Galac, vocals: Chris, music: Chris, drums: Terry. Jaffi (from KAOM) called me on the phone and I recorded the conversation, he can really write some interesting stuff…
7. Juice (mp3 - ogg) - guitar: Chris and Erik, drums: Brandy. Brandy was more of a percussionist (she just got her kit a few weeks before recording this one, but she has a good understanding of timing and rhythms. I consider this song ‘incomplete’ (this was our demo album after all) and plan to finish it up some day. I believe she left the band to go the Berkley school of Music (I recorded her solo composition for her application so maybe I helped her in some small way).
8. ASlow (mp3 - ogg) - Erik gets credit of this one… He wrote most all of this song, I just added some incidental stuff and helped arrange it. It’s worth noting that there is no bass on this song, just me playing the guitar… -Chris
- The music and all artistic content is Copyrighted. Please refer to our Legal Page for information about distribution, streaming, sharing, fair use, and Copyright information. The site’s TOS is also explained there. Our contact information is also available there.
Well I got bored and mixed down a ’single version’ of the song D Street from the unreleased album, Blue. (music: Chris and Erik, vocals: Chris).
This song was recorded in 2002 with Erik on the baritone guitar and Chris (that’s me) doing vocals and guitar. It definitely sounds like the songs on our previous release F***ed Up and was a lot of fun to write and record….
Released in 1999, this is the album that really started to refine the Beckament sound.
Our album Very Rough Mix, really is pretty rough… but we had a lot of fun making it (which is obvious when you hear it). We would save rum bottles to use as percussion and use the reel to reel as a funky tape delay / echo. Terry and Brandy would switch off on drums in the studio, so this album has a variety of beats & sounds.
In 2002 we had a pretty big lineup change… We lost Erik, Nate, and Crystal, and picked up Kevin and Jer. We have an album that is pretty much done, but have yet to put the finishing touches on it - it’s on permanent hiatus. Our sound has changed from the early ‘rough’ style to a more refined/progressive style and we’re not sure how this music will fit in… We may release some of the songs online, or we may eventually release the album as it is.
As a band (and as individuals) we’ve [Beckament Band] decided to record everything at small to medium sized studios (even houses!) for several reasons… When we record in a large studio it’s a rushed experience, very little about it is enjoyable. We’re always thinking about how much it will cost rather than focusing 100% on making our music.