One problem I'm running into with tapes from this particular era of the Oxford experiment (I'm guessing this is somewhere around 2000?) is the number of 'studio' run-throughs of songs that turn up. These are various attempts at getting a decent mix, something modern technology has made easy, what with your flash drives and various portable media; but back then you had to get stuff down on a cassette, or possibly a CD-R (but then those were toast after burning just one mix to listen to in the car).
In retrospect, I should've dedicated some tapes solely to trying out mixes of these songs (most of which have gone on to join the proud Oxford Boys family of completed recordings, currently housed at chuckzak.com). As youthful regrets go, this is a minor one of course, but vast swaths of Copiously Odious (misspelled on the tape case, fyi*) consist of these dry-run mixes.
But among the other stuff, there is one clear winner: "The Shoulder," or as it's probably more properly called, "Let Me Come Back Home," which is kind of a sad sack title that I don't really care for. Still, I've been waiting to find this, even though I already remembered the melody, lyrics and most of the chords.
Other than that, there's a brief bit of a song I'm calling "Daredevil" that clearly had possibilities, but wasn't developed enough to warrant pursuit at this point. There's also two songs whose current recorded versions are sub par to say the least ("The Other Shoe," and "The Way You're Made") that may get a revisit someday if the good lord is kind enough to grant me the time and resources to do so.
* actually, Gubernatorial is also spelled incorrectly as "Gubnatorial" on the tape itself. That's a very rare, possibly singular, instance of a double misspelling on a tape/case title combo.
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