19 MAY 1986

The Pat Wright archive is packed with oddities and unknowns, but the radio broadcasts are some of the most interesting. While there are a few chunks from random stations around the country, the bulk of the collection is recordings from KALX, where Pat was a DJ for the better part of two decades. The shows are all over place, just like the tastes of the DJs (including Pat - and thankfully most of the recordings are from his sets), but this is one of the coolest I've come across. I first heard JOY DIVISION when Substance was released - I was already a NEW ORDER fan, so this glimpse into their darker, more intense beginnings enthralled me and I scooped up everything I could find (which was not very much in Ponca City, Oklahoma). But two years earlier, the folks at KALX had enough material to broadcast a fucking two hour special of JOY DIVISION oddities and live recordings. Seventy minutes of that broadcast is here - three versions of "She's Lost Control," live recordings, Peel Sessions, early demos....all of it. True fans only? Perhaps. But hearing all of this shit piled up top of even more of this shit is a good reminder of how much JOY DIVISION were simply in their own league. The performances and recordings are so varied that listening to "Transmission" four times in a row doesn't even seem weird, and the casual confidence from the DJ just makes it sound like someone's giving you a guided tour. I know there are more bits in Pat's collection that will get the juices flowing, but this is one of the low-key best stones I've unturned so far. 

KALX - 19 MAY 1986

Seems like a reasonable time to mention the Copy Wright mixtape series. Tracks and field recordings and bits curated from Pat's archive and copied onto cassettes from his collection. Vol.3 is just complete and Vol.4 will be ready early next week. I'm making these in extremely limited quantities (mostly for Pat's friends, to be honest). General Speech may have a few of the first two left, and future volumes may be available from Iron Lung and/or Sorry State. Or there will be some copies of each in the (new) Escape Cassettes webstore. It's a pretty humbling project. It's also pretty awesome.