The Boys In Blue

“I wanted to do something experimental.  I really did, something unusual.  I had done the two blues tracks, and I just gave them weird quirks and styles, really tried to make them different.  And that sort of became the first steps, to just creating something new.  And then I decided to make a sound collage.  Just with voices in the house.  It became so much more, of course.  And the title, that came from a bad experience.  I got caught by a cop for skipping a fare in the subway.  It was a whole ordeal, and I had to pay a fine, and it was just that so much energy was put into working me over, rather than dealing with the real criminals.  So, it is a rather nasty title, really.  It should have been “Fuck the Boys In Blue,” but I’m told that isn’t very pc.”

–Catch The Reference?, New Year’s Eve, 2009

1. “The Pied Piper Of Hameln” (Filosa)

Probably October or November 2009.  While attempting to develop a bass track, Catch The Reference? made this track.  It is done on a recorder, dubbed, and affected by pitch change.  It is more of an outtake than a song, but it fits nice to carry in as an intro.

2. “Train Time” (Bruce)

Recorded October 2009.  Jack Bruce wrote and performed this rousing number while in The Graham Bond Organization, and carried it over into Cream.  In Cream, it would be done with just harmonica and drum.  Here, Catch The Reference? takes up the spirit of that arrangement.  Sister Sarah was under his watch, and interrupted during a percussion overdub.  Her voice is actually part of the drum loop, but midway into the song, we hear an aggravated exchange between Catch The Reference? and his young sister.  Later, he did apologize, and all was forgiven.

3. “At Last, Somebody With A Little Sense” (Filosa)

After coming home in the ungodly hours from a frustrating session with William mid-December, Catch The Reference? recorded a keyboard demo (on a keyboard lent by William, that William had since his grandmother got it for him in his infancy).  He did the demo while in bed, at times half asleep.  His brothers too were asleep, since before he got home, and as so not to disturb them, he had to play with headphones on.  After he cut the demo, he decided to make a brief collage of sound, layering a bunch of brief keyboard tracks, all a-melodic and a-rhythmic.

4. “Outside Woman Blues” (Reynolds)

This classic blues number first came to Catch The Reference’s attention via Cream’s brilliant reading.  But on one particular Sunday morning in November or October 2009, while the family attended church, Catch The Reference? heard a version by Jimi Hendrix, from a concert that also featured the inebriated part time-blues wanderer, fulltime shaman Jim Morrison.  After hearing it, Catch The Reference? took up his Harmonica, and cut the track.   He ended it with a long tamborine improvization, which proved a perfect lead in to the final track, the centerpiece of the album.

5. “Here Come The Boys In Blue” (Filosa)

Started in October of 2009, and continuing into December, this track began as a collage of recordings made in Catch The Reference’s home.  4 tracks, each around fifteen minutes, were laid atop each other.  They included the brother talking about homework, Sarah saying something, and Bisop barking.  Later, more items were added in, including sounds of the bathroom, whistles, tamborine, more talking (including Catch The Reference? whose voice is reversed), and a distorted keyboard.  Bookending the track are recordings made live outside, the first of Catch The Reference? waiting for a bus on Union Turnpike (you can hear a cop car, appropiately), and the other of Catch The Reference? on the E train (which actually occured first.) Both tracks come from one long recording, made as Catch The Reference? commuted home from school.

brother Jonathan on track 5
brother Justin on track 5
Bishop the dog on track 5
sister Sarah on tracks 2 & 5
William Gerrard on track 5
subway passengers and busriders on track 5