If your favorite local karaoke bar doesn’t let you croon along to Split Myself in Two, you can use these tracks to sing along to the Meat Puppets seminal second LP. Drummer Derrick Bostrom has been running MeatPuppets.com as a blog, and helping disseminate rare outtakes, live recordings, alternate mixes, and all kinds of other cool stuff. These are the backing tracks from the Meat Puppets II sessions, rough mixes made before Curt added his vocals.

Bostrom’s description of the atmosphere surrounding the making of that record is surprising. The band’s growth between their debut LP and this record is absolutely remarkable. While Kirkwood’s vocals on the first record sound like a gopher caught in a woodchipper (I mean that as a compliment), his vocals on the second record are much more delicate and nuanced. Despite the obvious growth, Bostrom writes that, “Curt agonized over whether to go back into the studio and attempt to redo the vocals, leave them as they were, or just scrap the whole project. Fortunately, he got comfortable with the takes over time, and we moved on to bigger concerns (like convincing SST to let us actually finish the album).”

Equally surprising was the lack of interest their label at the time, SST, seemed to show in completing and releasing the album, which fed an increasingly acrimonious relationship with the label.

Unfortunately, there were those who viewed our efforts as a betrayal of “the form.” Coincidentally or not, “Meat Puppets II” languished unfinished for six months. [SST staff engineer] SPOT became “unavailable,” and no one seemed to be able to locate him or the tapes. We seethed resentment over the delays, and began to imagine conspiracies and ulterior motives at the label, especially after we discovered that Husker Du, the Minutmen and even Black Flag had “post-hardcore” albums in the works. “Meat Puppets II” wasn’t released until the spring of 1984. Even after the album got a glowing four-star review in Rolling Stone magazine, our disatisfaction with SST hardened, and the relationship settled into a stifling atmosphere of mutual suspicion.

You can read all of Derrick’s comments and download the full recordings at MeatPuppets.com.

I am not alone in thinking that a rock and roll band called The Embarrassment from Wichita, Kansas, is among the finest this country has ever produced. When that band splintered, the gentlemen continued to make great music with other bands. Guitarist Bill Groffier played in a great rock and roll combo in Boston called Big Dipper, who made some very good records with many of the same qualities that make Embarrassment records perpetually endearing. Not least of these are Bill’s thoughtful guitar playing and soaring harmony vocals.

So it’s a pleasant surprise to hear that Big Dipper are getting back together for a handful of shows to celebrate the release of a 3-CD box set. From RockTownHall.com:

Big Dipper is indeed reuniting for a handful of shows in April 2008 and the release of a 3-CD set. The release will include a 12-page booklet with liner notes by Scharpling and, most importantly, songs from the band’s first 3 long-out-of-print albums along with the requisit rarities, unreleased tracks, and even the original video for “Faith Healer”. I’ve been waiting a long time for this day, and I’ve been waiting a long time to have more than this grainy, 12th-generation clip that’s been floating around YouTube for some time as a visual record of the band.

Earlier this week, I had my iPhone set to random play, and Big Dipper’s gorgeous song Ron Klaus Wrecked His House popped up. I then briefly amused myself by singing ‘Ron House wrecked his Klaus’, in honor of the Ohioan who aspired to have a band ‘as big as, but not bigger than the Embarrassment.’ It all made the 45 mph headwind blowing through downtown Chicago a wee bit more bearable.