Album Archives: Land Of Abandonment 1999

Around 1996, the R S Crab alter ego started taking shape and I really have no idea how that happened.  Perhaps me and Clarice was talking and she thought I was a sweetheart but I told her I was a crab.  But I found a stuffed toy crab at Wally World and maybe that's where it started.

After Light At The End Of The Tunnel, I took an extended break from music once again.  I tried my best to be the boyfriend that Clarice wanted, we talked marriage at some point, but on the forth of July of 1996, we had a big fallout that would change our opinion of one another forever.  It was beginning to show big time, and nothing I could do made things that much better.  Living at Broadcast Manor, my rental duplex was still not bad, but my brother was looking to leave the premises and he was looking for an acreage.  Clarice in the meantime finally got a trailer over at Summitview.  She then started on losing weight to which she lost over 125 pounds to which I outweighed her.  And to celebrate that we went out on the company party to which when she came over in a a revealing dress, I was very shocked of how much she did lose weight.  But unknown to me she was beginning to look for somebody new and it was beginning to show.  By summer of 1997 we were spending more time apart and the love that was shown and made was few and far between.

Geoff and I started working on some demos for the next project at Broadcast Manor but nothing came of it and when my brother announced that he found a perfect acreage, it was time to decide if I should go with him, or move in with Clarice in a strained relationship, or stay put and hope the next renter next door could tolerate drums. I chose to move out to the new acreage in Viola Flats.  We moved in September of 1997.  With that Clarice and I were done, I saw her three times, one a short lived booty call, the second a disastrous meeting to which she was worrying about paying her bills on time and then showing me the door around New Year's Eve 1997 and then finally the break up on Valentines' Day 1998, to which she finally admitted she was seeing somebody for two months.  And here she was, complaining that I was seeing somebody time and time again, knowing damn well I was at home or the record store.  Certainly breakups bring tears but it also gave me back my freedom.

Which comes to Land Of Abandonment, which went under a few titles (Stranger In Your Town, Avenues) and a few of the songs dealt with the breakup between me and Clarice.  Yes I still loved her in a way, but a few songs was a reaction to the breakup, The One That Knows Me Best and Stolen Heartaches were about trying to keep it together and then failing to do so, The two people, too late chorus of the the latter song summed things up better than anything I've done prior to breakup songs.  ...and so, was written after I got home after the breakup on Valentine's Day 1998, it's a song about frustration of knowing somebody was seeing somebody else behind your back for 2 months.   For starters,  we rented out the Whittier Community Center for a night of playing original stuff, and on that I led the band and Bob Muncie sat in on drums for that show.  It was kinda nice to get the demons out and just jam for about an hour with a small crowd helping along the way.

When we started the sessions that became Land Of Abandonment Brian Mullahan came out during a blizzard in March of 1999 to oversee Avenues and then decided that he didn't want to continue producing the new album.  A clash of ideals, Geoff and Brian had a heated exchange and that was it. So, Richard Dennanbaugh got tapped to help keep me in line.  The next session in April and we came up with 151 Song, a song about the highway I went home on or up to Madison US 151.  It recorded during a thunderstorm to which you can hear in the background.  This album I bought one of those expensive 2000 dollar hard drive recorders with all these effects put into the player and Richard encouraged me to record different types of styles and I did.  The heavy metal guitar of Love 99, the deep reverb sound of ...and so.  It was a lotta fun transcribing songs into tape although it turned out to be hard work doing so.  I wasn't used to a new four track of hard drive recording.  Certainly adding a bullhorn type of vocal to Love 99 gave us a whole new meaning and sound.

But also while the technology was there, the songs were lacking of sorts. The Wrong Side Of The Tracks was a half assed written song about Susan Tedeschi the famed blueswoman who later married Derek Trucks, at that time I thought I could get her as a girlfriend.  What You Don't Get, was a rewrite of All Over Now and Biscuit Girl was a rant against a senior at work Nicole Somebody.

The album also focused on death.  Till The Next Time was written for our 14 year old dog Pepper who was not long for this world, the object was to finish the record and play it for her.  Pepper for many years was a faithful dog who loved jumping the fences and playing with a plastic bat that she would woof till you threw it.  After I got the song done, I played it on the CD player while holding her head in my lap and cried all the way through.  When I went to Arizona to get away from it all, my folks put her to sleep, but not after having rolling down the window and Pepper getting enough strength to pop her head out in the window and feeling the breeze one last time.   The other song Stories Of The World, was written for Paul Sterynski, a one time guitar player for The Routers to which I jammed with in 1991, he lived in Minneapolis, and was friends with Greg Nutter so they played together in this band before I joined up and rechristened them The Routers.  Paul passed away from cancer and best way I knew how was to sing his praises in this song.

Outside of that, it was uneven.  After Pepper's passing I sat on the album most of the year. There are highlights and I have my favorites but I didn't see the need to issue it till December 30 of 1999, to which is considered to be the last official release of not only 1999 but the whole 100 years of the 1900s.    It's a dark album to say the very least.  But I ended up meeting a nice woman from Oregon, Lisa that would be a big part of the final part of 1999, in fact she made me a lot happier at the close of the year and there was promise and a hope that 2000 would be a start of better things to come, even after the bad ending of me and Clarice, something good was bound to happen.  Land Of Abandonment isn't a pleasant listening for the faint of heart but I tend to think it does have its rightful place in history. 

"If we're going to fail let's do it in style"  Mel Torme

Technical notes:

Avenues was recorded March 8th, 1999 during a blizzard
151 Song, originally titled 151 Blues Song recorded May 1st, 1999

Major recording of the album started on May 29  and concluded June 30th

Sessions and songs:

May 29 Session 1
Is Your Love Strong Enough (rejected)

June 1-Session 2
Saving Grace, Love 99 (titled Job Number 234 on Recording sheet), Time To Love You

June 2-Session 3
Wanderlust

June 6-Session 4
The One That Knows Me Best, Stolen Heartaches

June 16-Session 5
What You Don't Get, Pulling The Wings Off Angels (re-titled Find My Way)

June 17-Session 6
Down To You (rejected)

June 18-Session 7
Stories Of The Road

June 21-Session 8
Wrong Side Of The Tracks

June 23-Session 9
Biscuit Girl, Until The Next Time

June 25-Session 10
If I'm In The Way

June 26-Session 11
Shimmer (Rejected), ...and so..., Stone City, The Highway Is For Dreamers

June 30, Session 12
Too Long In The Parking Lot

Drum overdubs July 6,7,8

The Album:

Avenues  (R.Smith)  3:55
Love 99  (Words: Smith/Music: The Townedgers)  3:28
151 Song (R.Smith/R.Dennanbaugh)  3:40
The One That Knows Me The Best (Smith/Redding)  3:55
Stolen Heartaches (R.Smith)  4:11
Time To Love You (R.Smith)  3:10
Stories Of The Road (R.Smith/G.Redding)  5:30
Too Long In The Parking Lot (Bonus CD Track) (Smith/Redding)  2:30

Wrong Side Of The Tracks (Smith/Redding)  3:13
Biscuit Girl (R.Smith)  4:20
Saving Grace (Smith/Redding)  4:20
What You Don't Get (Smith/McClelland/Knowles)  4:20
Find My Way (Smith/Redding)  4:30
and so (Lyrics: Smith/Music: The Townedgers)  4:20
Until The Next Time (Smith/Redding)  2:55

Songs: copyrighted 1999 R.Smith/Townedger Music Emporium 

Band: Rodney Smith, Geoff Redding, Mark McClelland, Pepper

Recorded at  Smith Brothers Studio, Viola Flats Iowa  Feb-July 1999
Recorded by Richard Dennanbaugh, assisted by Ken Miller and Martin Daniels
Production by Rodney Smith and Richard Dennanbaugh
Associate Producer: Geoff Redding

Thanks to GOD, Brother Rick for the recording space, Mom and Dad and You for being you.

Dedicated to the memory of: Mel Torme, Mark Sandman, Curtis Mayfield,  Paul Styrnowski,  Ron Glarington, JFK Jr.  and Pepper.

While The Highway Is For Dreamers didn't make it to the final track listing, it was later issued as a single and later put on the outtakes collection called More Rodney Smith And The Townedgers along with Wunderlust, If I Am In The Way and Stone City.

Released on Radio Maierburg Records RMR-25032 as Land Of Abandonment, December 30, 1999