Bee Thousand

Guided By Voices is a Dayton, Ohio-based band formed in 1983. Although by 1992 the band had released five full-length albums (not including their 1986 debut EP), Guided By Voices was not a band in a conventional sense. Its line-up was extremely loose, consisting of whoever of a group of friends showed up to short notice recording sessions. Robert Pollard thought of Guided By Voices as more of a “songwriter’s guild” than a band. “Bee Thousand” was to be the original band’s final album. Pollard was close to disbanding Guided By Voices by 1993, due to financial constraints and pressure to focus more on his family and teaching career.

Unlike some of the band’s earlier releases, “Bee Thousand” was not recorded in a studio, but rather on four-track machines or other primitive home recording devices in the garages and basements of various band members. Moreover, many of the demo takes of the songs were the ones that were used for the album. Due in part to both of these factors, several unusual errors are present in the album’s recording and mixing, for example, the guitar track drops out at one point in both “Hardcore UFO’s” and “Mincer Ray”. The band’s choice to use inexpensive recording devices was initially a matter of economics, but eventually the band grew to prefer the sound.

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This is an original Matador UK pressing on red vinyl! The reason why this copy only costs about half of the usual price for a holy grail like this: there is a large scratch at the beginning of side A, check out the photos. The good news is: this only causes a very light crackle and still plays good. The rest of the LP also has faint scratches, but everything sounds fine actually. The only things that sound weird are some of the production choices as described earlier. Includes the printed inner sleeve!