The cover for 2008’s The Tribute Album. This cover art was permanently lost and only recently rediscovered in the FAM archives. (photo used without permission from Summer Burton)
Liner notes for Spare Parts and Spare Ribs: A Collection of Outtakes from Ten Years of Making an Album Every February
If any artist records for a decade, it is inevitable that a certain amount of usable sludge will get left behind. Included here are eighteen songs that couldn’t make the ten albums of the month recorded between 2007 and 2016, but deserve reconsideration. Maybe these songs didn’t try hard enough. Or maybe they ran into bad luck. Maybe they had a scheduling problem with the bus system and just couldn’t show up for the interview. Whatever the reason, they were left behind. This compilation is an attempt to swoop back through time, find all of those old lost feelings and ideas, smash time into one big new thing, and poop them them all out at once.
As with impurities that a body never fully flushes from its digestive system, only by splaying open a corpse can one fully inspect what lies buried inside. Over the past month, Jeff Rose and his research assistant Miles Shropshire have poured over hours and hours of digital files, listening to failed takes, forgotten jingles, and vomited-out instrumentals. Their exhaustive post-mortem revealed many disgusting things, of which these were the biggest and most notable musical kidney stones formed from this long period of drinking melody coffee and eating rhythmic magnesium pills or something. Each track has been remixed, remastered, researched, and presented here with context. Please enjoy these tidbits as you would any ground-up-and-reconstituted, diseased, chicken-organ product.
Compilation albums are by default incredibly collaborative. As the years pass and people come in and out of our lives, then back in and then back out again, we accidentally collect little things left behind by them: memories, pieces of advice, books, jokes, hair pins, grudges. As can be imagined, there are too many people who influenced this album to mention. We can’t be bothered to list all the inspirations, but here, at least, are the friends and family and direct contributors in order of appearance:
Emily Rose
Casey Cochran
Noah Poole
Amarin Enyart
Jeff Freeman
Lloyd Thompson
Paul Whitener Jr.
Nate Lineback
Aron Taylor
Wellington Chew
Dave Faloon
Jeff Fleischer
These people cannot be thanked enough. Thank them for us if you see them.
And without further ado, we present Spare Parts and Spare Ribs: A Collection of Outtakes from Ten Years of Making an Album Every February
Jeff Rose and Miles Shropshire
February 2007 The First Album Outtakes
“Smoke-Filled Room”
A damning indictment of Bush-era torture policy, this song was never released because of paranoia that the political statement would make Jeff a target of the powers that be.
“Porky Piggin’ It”
This song was conceptualized as a tribute to Booker T. & the M.G.s during their high-school years, when they were still learning how to play music. It was discarded because the title is about being so slovenly that you don’t bother to wear pants.
“Oh Babe, I Know What You Need”
This wonderful, stream-of-consciousness song about awkward dating was not included on the album because of fears that the singer’s ex-girlfriend would find it too personal.
Proposed Homesteadin’ Cover
February 2008 Homesteadin’ Outtakes
Two songs from a soundtrack for a fictional western named Homesteadin’. The rough demos were scrapped when other non-western-y songs were recorded and added to the playlist. Some songs from the original project remain on the actual album: “Pick Up Your Luggage with Confidence Traveller!” and “Nick Cage v. Bruce Willis.” Those two included songs are the only other remains of the abandoned sessions. Regardless of the results, the forward-thinking, thematic attempt is an artistic precursor to 2010’s Dyatlov Pass Incident.
“Shitty Wooden Cross Grave”
Inspired by Neil Young dropping his guitar for two hours in the movie “Dead Man,” this song was cut from the final album because of a strong wind piercing the microphone guard.
“You Better Have Clothes On Under that Blanket”
The more epic of the western songs, this time about a tall, nameless stranger who rides into town on a pale palomino, while chomping on a cigarillo and porky piggin’ it.
February 2009 The Tribute Album Outtakes
There were no outtakes from The Tribute Album because the album was perfect in concept and execution.
February 2010 Dyatlov Pass Outtakes
“What Could I Ever Do?”
An outtake from the Dyatlov Pass musical. Recorded early in the month before the decision was made to replace synthesized strings and keyboards with real fiddling. The song was never fully realized and the lyrics never finished. This song is about when Lev’s girlfriend compound fractures her leg and dies in his arms. He holds her body as his comrades dig a grave. Later in the musical, they dig up her body and eat it.
November 2010: Lullabyes and Advice Outtakes
Proposed Lullabyes and Advice Cover
An album that began as an album of lullabies with parenting advice. The project died within two days when it discovered that it wasn’t February.
“Bababye”
The creative process requires unabashed experimentation and improvisation. This raw little uncut diamond, recorded just days before a calendar was properly used, is a unique look into the creative process of the album of the month.
“Spare Part”
A song transparently written after watching a reality show about hoarding. This song follows ploddingly in the already rutted footsteps of songs like Paul McCartney’s “Junk” and Tom Waits’ “Soldier’s Things.” This song was never revisited or replayed because it’s weaksauce.
February 2011: 34-Year Bluegrass Outtakes
Five incredible songs from an early February bluegrass jam-out featuring a reunion of the original lineup of “Can I Punch Your Baby?” The all-night-all-day-all-night-again session featured eighteen recorded songs that could not be used on the final 2011 album because of a legal dispute after the songs were mistakenly copyrighted to Enyart/Freeman/Rose/Lineback/Taylor/Thompson/Whitener, Jr. instead of Enyart/Freeman/Rose/Lineback/Taylor/Thompson/Whitener Jr.
“Nothin'”
Thematically, the second-most-relevant song to this set. The disembodied voices captured as a moment in time sing wistfully about the things that slip, oh so softly, from your grasp as one turns to look the other direction. We always think that a pillow will be there to rest our heads on, and then one night, we get to our beds and find that the pillow, the one we used all these years, the one drenched in head sweat and hair grime, has mysteriously disappeared and left us to hurt our necks when we try, uncomfortably, to sleep with our skulls pulled too far in one direction to reach a bare mattress. You know what I’m talking about.
“Killer”
Before Jethco Heathcomb died in the process of trying to build a wood-powered missile, he had openly disagreed with the song “Killer,” calling it “a bunch of panty-waist libtard bullshit about the men in blue.” So it probably would not have made the cut regardless.
“Who You Used To Be”
Amarin Enyart: “It’s impossible to sing harmony with you because you sing the words the way they spill out of your brain.”
“Thinking of You”
This laid-back track was ruined when some asshole neighbor entered the room and started talking.
2010 34-Year Bluegrass sessions
“Tobin Spirit Guide”
When you get a whole lot of talented people in one room and set them in the same direction, the torrential outpouring of creative energy can sometimes overwhelm good sense. “Tobin Spirit Guide” is a song that requires between fifteen and sixteen consecutive listens to fully grasp and appreciate, even for the most discerning ear.
February 2011: 34-Year Bender Outtakes
“Husk”
Recorded in a late February session at the same time as “If I Quit Drinking I’d Be Home By Now” with the Rotten Liars on back-up, this electrified version of “Who You Used to Be” was rejected because it was too similar to another song on the album.
February 2011: Ubasute Outtakes
The 2012 album was started with the decision to teach oneself piano and evolved into an album with a very dense wrapper, to try to cover for the fact that the album was just an attempt to teach oneself to learn piano.
“Etude 41: Outtake”
A song for parts of the fictional transcript that were cut from the fictional audio book. This song was cut from the final album when the part of the fictional audio book it was supposed to accompany was cut from the fictional transcript. The fictional transcript part is printed here:
***
NARRATOR: I suppose I understand this: For most of us fail in life, the same way that my father failed at being a songwriter. We half-ass it in public. We can burn inside with creativity, passion, and energy, but once we have a moment to share it or use it, push it or play it, we shrink. We are enormous inside and tiny in the world. Maybe it’s because we shy from disapproval or fear success. Maybe we simply can’t translate our own language. Perhaps that’s as it should be. After all, we all remain small whether we stand at the base or have climbed to the peak of the holy mountain.
***
Alternate cover for Spare Parts and Spare Ribs
February 2013: The Outtake Collection Outtakes
“Ubasute: The Audio Book Credits Song”
A fake outtake from Ubasute with lyrics about the album about the audio book about the story about a series of songs about a legend about a Japanese forest. This unlistenable painful haze of navel-gazing, recursive self-indulgence was cut from the songs for 2013’s Spare Parts and Spare Ribs and therefore isn’t included here.
Google search for “Jeff Rose album future”
February 2014: ??? Outtakes
“????????????? (Faloon Remix)”
The future is a strange and unpredictable place, full of twisted cyborg versions of people you loved and now struggle to see any remaining humanity in. Remember that when you think you have something relevant to say to your children.
February 2015: The Live Album Outtakes
“Hey Marci”
While David Bowie and David Byrne are clear influences throughout all of the songs on all of the albums created for February, the failed vocals of this song only bring those influences more to light. This song didn’t make 2015’s live album because it wasn’t live.
February 2016: The Last Album Outtakes
“Ten Years”
Although very relevant to this collection, this song did not make the final 2016 album because it wasn’t recorded in February 2016.