Vinyl edition is a Series 33 release, limited to 33 copies. 

Smile and Nod Accordingly Notes

Smile and Nod Accordingly was recorded in Coos Bay, Oregon in 1995 and was originally intended for release as a follow-up to Kpants’ first album, “Charmless.”

The Songs

Cory: Some of these songs had germinated for a while as we rotated drummers for an indefinite period of time. A few of the songs were pretty new and I finished many of the lyrics in the motel room the weekend we recorded. I gave up on trying to come up with something for Hooray For Everything and encouraged Mike to come up with something which he did. Mike also gave me a line or two on The Charmer The original ideas for the songs came from Jer and a few from Mike. We would then all jam and tweak different things.

Jer: I remember being really proud of the songs we had ready--I felt that the batch of tunes were really well-crafted and diverse, and was really excited to see how they sounded when put to tape.

The Recording

Jer: Recording the first album, as well as the singles and demos we had done prior, was really easy and organic. These sessions did not turn out to be so. Recording was really hard due to internal struggles and the aspirations that I know Mike and I especially held. We went in with high-hopes and left with something that I felt really crummy about.

Cory: I do recall always having this feeling that we wanted to just get these recorded but never expected it to be finished at the time.

Jer: There was time and money pressure, we had a limited budget with the need to return with a finished product. The engineer was an early bird, sometimes sessions started at 7 AM, not rock 'n' roll hours under the best conditions. Then factor in it was the four of us living out of a hotel, being around each other 24 /7…

Cory: I remember that early morning stuff. We were really crusty at that hour. I do remember really enjoying the studio but we could have used a producer to help us focus. Spook was pretty much just running the board but was really responsive to things we wanted to try.

Jer: I remember all of us being down based on the initial tracks. When I did my overdubs, doubling the guitar parts, it sounded better. Jivan even said “you saved the record.” For some reason the engineer got a really thin sound for one whole set of guitars; that was a big part of the 2016 remix for me.

Epilogue

Jer: I know many in the circle really hoped that this album would do something – for the band, break us out of Eugene, for the label (Grinning Idiot), getting us on Capitol Records so they could buy out the contract and fund the future releases and endeavors for Grinning Idiot. What we came back to Eugene with wasn't what I had hoped. I think that the label heard it and opted not to invest in the album any further.

Jer: The end, for me, was tough. I was really serious about the band but [the band] didn't seem like it wanted to go on.

Cory: We could really have used a manager. It ended up being Mike a lot of the time with booking shows while Jer was always the one pushing us to work on the songs. Everyone was done with school and needed to start working which necessitated moving somewhere else.

Jer: On top of the drummer issues, we weren’t writing songs and people weren’t motivated to practice that much.

Cory: So much regret and so much longing....

Jer: As Ron and I were remixing the album for this release, I felt that he and I were putting in the time and work that I wish we had been afforded to do back then. This baby just needed a little bit more nurturing and attention before entering the world. What we had delivered to Grinning Idiot at that time was simply not a completed, ready-for-primetime album, which is what I feel like we finally have now.

Notes from the label

Rob: I’ve listened to a cassette of the original mixes for this album so often over the last 20+ years that it already felt like a complete record to me, I know the changes by heart and can sing along to almost all the songs. Every once in a while I’d try to come up with a responsible way to actually release it and then last year, when we hit upon the Series 33 concept, it seemed like a perfect fit. When I reached out to Jer to ask if he thought the band would be into it, his reply to me was a photo of the master reels and a note indicating he’d just started remixing the original sessions.

The newly mixed album is exactly what you want to hear, a well written and excellently executed piece of middle 1990’s independent rock and roll from the Pacific Northwest, so compelling you cannot help but flip the record and listen to it again, maybe even turn it up a bit louder this time…