Red Mosquito

liebzz wrote:This is fascinating. I would have thought the best fits to replace interludes would have been Habit and Lukin, or to potentially cull from Merkinball and include I Got Is and Long Road.

All of those songs you've mentioned have nothing to do with the Vitalogy recording sessions and were recorded by a different line-up of the band, in some cases yeas later.

There were so many B-sides that never made the cut throughout the years, which is a damn shame. I don't mind the interludes, but a track list like this would have been so much more satisfying. Vitalogy is a pretty flawless album in my book, but it would have been untouchable with Hard to Imagine (imaginary, of course).

I don't really think Hard to Imagine fits on the album.

Long Road and I Got Id were not recorded from the same sessions but from their sessions with Neil Young on Mirrorball, which was within months of the release of Vitalogy.

Habit and Lukin were both prominently played (not recorded) throughout their 1995 tour in support of Vitalogy.

I would posit that while they did not come from the same recording sessions they more or less lived in that same company and timeframe.

I also think that although nearly 2 years and 2 drummers separate Vitalogy and No Code, these albums are not so different. Both thrived and were ultimately limited in some ways from where the band was at the time, and while are uneven albums, they are also at their very best despite internal band struggles. Dave A. and Irons are very different drummers, but Vedder was clearly running the show at the time and there’s a common thread through those two albums that doesn’t repeat itself before or after.

Monkey_Driven wrote:I don't really think Hard to Imagine fits on the album.

They did record it (for the second time) during the sessions, so at the very least they'd considered including it at some stage.\

liebzz wrote:Long Road and I Got Id were not recorded from the same sessions but from their sessions with Neil Young on Mirrorball, which was within months of the release of Vitalogy.

Habit and Lukin were both prominently played (not recorded) throughout their 1995 tour in support of Vitalogy.

I would posit that while they did not come from the same recording sessions they more or less lived in that same company and timeframe.

Sure, but that doesn't fit within scope of Ridley's project, which presents an alternate view on what might've been based on the recording sessions as they were.

I like the interludes but I dig this.

Birds in Hell wrote:

Monkey_Driven wrote:I don't really think Hard to Imagine fits on the album.

They did record it (for the second time) during the sessions, so at the very least they'd considered including it at some stage.\

And it was left off for a reason.

I don’t want to argue to the ends of the earth about it. I read the project as adjusting Vitalogy by removing the interludes more generally, not in the sense of what the specific Vitalogy recording sessions were.

In any event, it is ultimately not so serious a thing since Vitalogy is what it is, the arguable warts and all. An album I would put in my personal top 5 favorite. It’s at least fun to play around with it nonetheless.

liebzz wrote:I don’t want to argue to the ends of the earth about it. I read the project as adjusting Vitalogy by removing the interludes more generally, not in the sense of what the specific Vitalogy recording sessions were.

In any event, it is ultimately not so serious a thing since Vitalogy is what it is, the arguable warts and all. An album I would put in my personal top 5 favorite. It’s at least fun to play around with it nonetheless.

I think it's a cool listening experience.

I'm really enjoying this. I hadn't realized there was so much I skip on this album.

I like the idea of Habit/Satan's Bed/Corduroy back to back.

Biff Pocoroba wrote:I like the idea of Habit/Satan's Bed/Corduroy back to back.

*to back

i like the interludes. they definitely give the album a different identity and make it unique. they beat the same old paint-by-numbers approach that they've taken the past 4 albums.

Chris_H_2 wrote:oh what i wouldn't give to hear the studio recording of better man from the vs. sessions.

I think it is interesting that the version of Whipping from the Vs sessions is out there.

Better Man probably sounded similar to the Bad Radio demo version with the drum backbeat at the start, which if I remember correctly they eliminated when they reworked it for Vitalogy because it sounded too poppy. Meanwhile, I think that it became a huge hit in part because of the first verse, which gives the song a particular kind of vulnerability that appealed to mainstream listening audiences at the time.

The track listing in the OP was how I listened to vitalogy for years. I made a tape of it without all the weird tracks.
I came around on them years later though

h2sublime wrote:

Chris_H_2 wrote:oh what i wouldn't give to hear the studio recording of better man from the vs. sessions.

I think it is interesting that the version of Whipping from the Vs sessions is out there.

Where?

Always thought I got id would sound cool in the back half of No Code.
It could go on vitalogy too though. But it feels more like a no code song to me now.

I just want to know how Jimmy Shoaf factors in on this whole thing.

Ridley - I admire what you do for the community, but I cannot get on board with this one. Glad others can though.

P.S. - please tell me you at least left in the creepy rusty wind chime sounds that close out NFY.