The X Album Cassettes

Originally posted July 11th - October 10th 2021 and August 20th-22nd 2022. Edited, augmented and re-assembled March 7th 2025.

• The Unreliable Narrator

• The (Rough) Mix Tapes

• Wild Orphan Instrumental

• Skye I

• Instrumental After The Style Of Mainstream

• Black-esque 1/9/88

• Downtown Instrumental

• Blair's Song Idea #2

• 4th Time Down

• Parker Dulany - Hail Mary

• Don’t Look Back

• The Witching Hour

• Pretty Arpgeg(gio) With Fred

• To The Church Instrumental

• Live Lovers Do

• Demos Harold Dessau

• No Blue Skies Guitar Genesis Cassette

• The Skyline Studio Session Rough Mixes

• Lloyd Cole, Final Running Order

• Sweetheart Single Mix

The Unreliable Narrator

March 7th - 8th 2025

I kept a diary in 1989. Not 1988. I wish. I spoke with our old manager Derek, yesterday to try to get a handle on the timeline of my move.
After being drunk and depressed in Hazlitt’s hotel for several weeks, after failing to buy a sad single person’s flat, after deciding I should take a break from London, I thought I recalled house sitting for Derek in Maida Vale for a few weeks, before I left. He didn’t buy that flat until 1993. The one I stayed in was in Finsbury Park. He was living with his girlfriend on the South Side. The first concerted writing sessions for my future were in that master bedroom. Sweetheart and I’m guessing A Long Way Down began there. Others must have been germinating.

I’ve always maintained I moved to NYC in the Autumn of 1998, but it must have been Summer. I couldn’t have been mixing down tapes in Derek’s flat. The first rough mix cassette is labeled Akai Mixdowns July 88. I must have hit the ground running in my Charlton Street sublet (one block from Varrick and Vandam).

Sterling bought you $2 in 1988. I had money. Assembling a living room demo studio was fun, and effectively half price, if you were paid in the UK. I moved the bed into the kitchen. I bought an Akai 1212 like the one Ian Stanley had when we were working on Mainstream (Stevie Wonder had one, too, apparently). Here’s what I brought from London.

I met Fred, then Quine. Parker introduced me to Sprague. Nicky Holland had moved to the city around the same time as me. I worked on songs all day and had a lot of fun after dinner.

By the time my lease was up around the turn of the year and I moved to a second sublet on Thompson Street the demos were done, I had 10 songs, more or less, Polydor’s blessing, and we were ready to begin recording.

When UMG released the Lloyd Cole In New York box set a few years ago they wanted outtakes so I gave them demos from 1988-1994. Consequently, missing from this page, are my Akai 1212 demos of
A Long Way Down
Sweetheart
Ice Cream Girl
Wild Orphan
Loveless
What Do You Know About Love?
I Know You Too Well
The Witching Hour
The English Weather
I Confess

---

The (Rough) Mix Tapes

March 7th 2025

Akai Mixdowns July 88

This looks like the original mixdown tape, before I dubbed the choices to a 2nd cassette.

The first two ideas were ultimately rejected, which makes sense - Sweetheart was the earliest solo composition to make the album.

Lloyd Cole Oct 88 No Dolby

This looks like the first cassette of demos I'd made on my Akai 12 track glorified portastudio for Polydor to listen to. Possibly dubbed from Akai Mixdowns July 88.

My first 8 songs, for A&R consideration, after the Commotions.

Ice Cream Girl and Loveless being the first of Blair’s contributions that I has assimilated into the project. Shelly I Do wasn’t initially intended for me.

5 made the album. Shelly I Do and Wild Orphan were recorded and released as b-sides. Only I Know You Too Well was eventually rejected. Funny. At this point I think I may have thought it was the strongest contender.

Demos Late 88

Missing from the photo - the remaining tracks on side 1
6/ To The Church
7/ Downtown
8/Pretty Arpeg + Fred

The next batch of ideas after I’d met Fred Maher and Robert Quine. Downtown being the 3rd and final Blair contribution to the album.

---

No more mix tapes. I do think it’s possible I made DAT dubs of the final rough mix ideas and sent them to Polydor. Maybe, maybe not. The only songs ultimately recorded and included on the album that aren’t here are
I Hate To See You Baby Doing That Stuff - I wrote this with Fred in the studio.
Waterline - I wrote this either during the recording sessions or just before. I was definitely never demoed.
Undressed - I don’t recall, but I do know Quine and I worked out guitar parts in the studio, so it was almost certainly composed after the demo period.
Mercy Killing - I had my London demo but it’s strange that it isn’t on any of the mix tapes for Polydor.
No Blue Skies - wasn’t written until after the initial recording sessions.

---

Wild Orphan Instrumental Demo, From Cassette

Jul 11, 2021 and March 7th 2025

Sometimes, looking back, it's hard to believe that Polydor kept me as a solo artist when my post Commotions demos were so so amateurish. But I suppose they could see the promise of something.

This was my second attempt at a string arrangement without help or supervision (A Long Way Down being the first).

I don't think I ever got the vocal chorus arrangement quite right on the final version. Maybe that's why I still enjoy this...