Bardo Pond – Refulgo

I can't speak for the vinyl itself, but if the FLACs available on Three Lobed's Bandcamp page are anything to go on, several of these sound a lot worse here than they did originally. The version of Dragonfly that was on the CD issue of the Big Laughing Jym EP sounds dramatically better than this one does, with audio in higher-frequency bands that seems to have been lopped off here. Same problem with this version of Trip Fuck vs the one on the Does The Word Duh Mean Anything To You? CD comp, this version of Sangh Seriatum vs the one on the Harmony of the Spheres double CD, and this version of New Drunks vs the one on the Disco Sucks CD comp; New Drunks is also now a minute shorter via a later fade-in and an earlier fade-out. On the other hand, the version of Affa here is missing a lot of bass frequencies vs the one on the Succour CD comp. The most frustrating one is Jungle Tune. Compared to the version on the Follow the Bouncing Ball CD Comp, the first minute and a half of this one has been completely edited out via an earlier fade-in, a lot of the low-end is gone, and Isobel's vocals are now buried in the back of the mix.

I also can't speak to the "originals vs the ones here" situation regarding the remaining six tracks (A1, A2, B1, B3, C2, and C3) because those were only ever released on 7" singles that I don't have, so I can't A/B them against these ones. But with the exception of B1, the other five of 'em all seem to have the same chunk of treble frequencies lopped off.

I could understand if it was a situation where these don't sound great because they were all sourced from vinyl on account of the masters being missing or something. That happens. But I can't think of why tracks like New Drunks or Dragonfly sound so much worse and boxed-in here than they do on the CDs they were originally on... unless it all boils down to Michael Gibbons's remixing.

"Refulgo" is from an edition of 1060 copies and is pressed on two pieces of 140 gram Dutch vinyl by Record Industry. The album is housed within an old style Stoughton tip-on gatefold jacket bearing new artwork from Bardo Pond’s Clint Takeda. The material on "Refulgo" was remastered by Michael Gibbons and Patrick Klem.

Tracklist:

01. Die Easy [6:52] (Apple Eye 7” [CPS-014] by Compulsiv – January 1994)
02. Apple Eye [5:59] (Apple Eye 7” [CPS-014] by Compulsiv – January 1994)
03. Dragonfly [6:05] (Blues Tune 7” [CPS-025] by Compulsiv – November 1994)
04. Blues Tune [5:49] (Blues Tune 7” [CPS-025] by Compulsiv – November 1994)
05. Trip Fuck [6:19] (Trip Fuck 7” [DPR-009] by Drunken Fish – March 1994)
06. Hummingbird Mountain [5:10] (Hummingbird Mountain 7” [DPR-009] by Drunken Fish – March 1994)
07. New Drunks [4:31] (Bardo Pond / Bear split 7” [CHE-034] by Che – July 1995)
08. Affa [5:27] (Succour compilation CD [POT CD 01] by Ptolemaic Terrascope – September 1996)
09. Tests For New Swords [5:19] (Tests for New Swords 7” [SB62] by Siltbreeze – September 1996)
10. Good Friday [3:51] (Good Friday 7” [SB62] by Siltbreeze – September 1996)
11. Jungle Tune [6:38] (Following The Bouncing Ball compilation [BING003] by Ba Da Bing! – August 1995)
12. Sangh Seriatim [21:52] (Harmony of the Spheres compilation [DFR25] by Drunken Fish – November 1996)