Dead Souls is unquestionably one of the most powerful songs written, recorded and performed by Mrs. Curtis/Hook/Morris/Sumner. It worked great as a live song, being a perennial favourite of the band themselves from before UP was released right up to the very end and eliciting enthousiastic comments from punters in the audience (we can still eavesdrop on what was probably a typical fan exchange at gigs during the intro to the song on the best Derby Ajanta Theatre concert recording). The studio version (recorded at the same session as Atmosphere and Ice Age... how I wish I could have been a fly on the wall on that occasion!) misses the adrenaline from the live performances but nevertheless puts the point of the song across perfectly... plenty of controlled tension, there. Goes to show how well this gang of amateurs was adapting in studio surroundings.
Still, recently, the very beginning of the official studio recording has started to annoy me. These days, I find the way the guitar comes in simultaneously with the drums at the very start of the song a bit jarring. It's almost as if I can hear a clumsy edit at this point, where they chopped off the usual drum 'n' bass opening to the song, such as it can be heard on all live recordings as well as on the Central sound Studio session tape from July '79. Which finally brings me to the point of this posting: has it ever been documented that the Cargo Studio/Oct. '79 recording of Dead Souls began with the standard intro, and that this was subsequently removed from the track at the post-production/mastering stage (say, because the song's duration had expanded considerably - from 4'55" in July with intro, to 4'52" sans intro in October - and because keeping the intro in would have made it even longer, possibly too long for inclusion on a 7" record)?
(Yes, I am aware that longer songs have been issued on 7" records, but if I'm not mistaken, this can only be done by making the physical grooves of the vinyl record thinner than usual, which in turn necessitates the reduction of the recording level)
[This is a repeat posting of a question I have also put up at the JD Central Messageboard]
