Mouthpiece - "Can't Kill What's Inside"-The story of a 4 year discography project.

It's been about 4 years now since the idea was planted and talks had begun on putting together a complete Mouthpiece discography.  Originally, the plans were to release it on Livewire Records, which is run by our long time friend Ed McKirdy and myself. As we began scanning massive amounts of photographs, gathering all the recordings and making the plans, the project seemed to grow into a larger than life endeavor.  Trying to juggle our new band, Triple Threat, run Livewire and put together this Mouthpiece project became more than we could handle. Before we knew it, the project had hit a stand still and all work had stopped.

In August of 2005, Triple Threat was booked to play, what was to be, the final Posi Numbers fest.  My friend Larry Ransom, who at the time was working for Revelation Records, had planned to fly out from California for the Posi Number fest.  Larry brought boxes of Revelation merchandise and was going to set up a table for the entire weekend. I decided I would set up a Triple Threat table and hang with Larry for the weekend as well.  At some point during the 3 hour ride home, when the weekend was over, Larry asked me what my plans were with the Mouthpiece discography and if it was ever going to see the light of day.  I told him that I still wanted to see it happen, but it just seemed like such a large task that I had no idea when it would actually be completed.  Then Larry put it out there, "How about Revelation releases it?".  My natural response was, "I doubt they'd really want to do it", but Larry assured me otherwise.  As much as I wanted to release the discography ourselves on Livewire, the opportunity to release it on Revelation was an offer we absolutely could not refuse.  Not only would all the production concerns be taken off our hands, but the thought of our discography finding it's final resting place along side the likes of discographies by Judge, Bold and Gorilla Biscuits was just about as cool as it could get.

Next thing we knew, we were meeting with the engineer from Why Me? Studios, where we had recorded all of our original records at, retrieving the original reels and making our way to another studio that specialized in the preservation of analog reels.  This second studio would bake the original reels to preserve them, then they would digitize all the recorded tracks.  Once digitized, the plan was to take everything to another studio and re-mix the recordings.  Before we ever got the chance to hit the last studio and start the re-mixing process, we ran into yet another road block.  Unlike the past, when signing contracts to a label was as simple as 1,2,3, things today are a little more complicated.  Lawyers are often involved and the process can easily get slowed down because you are now waiting on the lawyers from each side to discuss everything.  First we had to find a lawyer, then we had to go back and forth over various issues and before we knew it, everything seemed to slow down again to another complete stop.

Eventually, Larry, our contact, left Revelation and got a full time job working for pro skater, Mike Vallely.  Not to worry though, another friend who had originally lived here in New Jersey, Bob Shedd, quickly jumped into Larry's place. Bob tried resurrecting the Mouthpiece project with us, but still, the lawyer involvement was holding us back from moving full steam ahead.  We spent a good portion of 2006 going back and forth trying to get things moving, but at the same time, other things were happening.  Our current band, Triple Threat, was in the studio recording for a full length album. The Triple Threat album became our main priority and focus.  Trying to release an LP of your current band and trying to put together a discography of your past band at the same time, just wasn't happening.  Again, the discography work came to a virtual halt.  

At some point during 2007 we began hearing word that Bob was now leaving Revelation.  First Larry, now Bob... this discography just seemed doomed.  It's not like we thought Revelation was going to can the project because our contact was leaving, but it seemed like it would throw another wrench into the works of a machine that had already been broken and repaired numerous times.  With one last ditch effort we reached out to long time Revelation head honcho, Jordan Cooper and voiced our concerns.  Although little progress had been made over the past 2 years, we wanted to assure Jordan that we were still 100% committed to making the project happen.  Jordan assured us that Revelation was still 100% behind the project as well.  Jordan also agreed to be our new contact and before we knew it, things started happening.  

Must have been a combination of good timing, because both sides seemed to have the time to dedicate to the project.  Working one on one with Jordan enabled us to bypass the lawyer interaction and get to the bottom of the contracts.  Within days, the contracts were signed and time was being booked in the studio for the re-mixing to begin. At this point we've had 2 sessions at the studio and are virtually ready to finish up the re-mixing and head into the mastering process.  This past weekend also brought forth 2 full days of lay out and design of the discography.  I took a trip into Brooklyn NY to work together with Ed McKirdy on the lay outs.  We've done the majority of the design work on the Livewire releases together and all of the Triple Threat releases, so it was a natural move to include him in this project.  I think with one more Brooklyn trip, Ed and I can wrap up the lay outs and we'll be that much closer to the completed project, other wise known as Revelation: 147.  We're expecting a summer 2008 release, but once I have the official date, I'll be sure to post the information here.  -TM