PLACE PIGALLE PARIS JUNE 4TH, 1983

Liner Notes – Place Pigalle | June 4th, 1983

Birthday session, Paris, June 4th, 1983.

LA dried up by the early '80s - session work disappeared, glam metal took over the strip, and cats who played real music found themselves obsolete in their own city. So the band went north first, Quebec City for a comp/soul jazz album that never saw official release. Then Paris, where rent was cheap and nobody cared what you used to be.

The record starts heavy — three slow burners right in the middle of side one following the opener. "Wrong Church, Right God" sets the tone, Benny and Lou asking questions through their instruments. Tracks two through five make up the spiritual side: Sanctuary seeking refuge, Coffee and a Confession documenting morning-after reckonings, God Rest Her Soul mourning loss that follows you across oceans, Enough From The Pulpit declaring the sermon over and living begins now.

Flip the record and you're in different geography entirely. Side two is what happens when the band gets free and the city wakes up around you - lighter, looser, all that American heaviness left behind in whatever wreckage you escaped.

Jacques Moreau ran Studio L'Insulaire like it was holy ground. Former assistant engineer at Studio Ferber during the Brel era, he'd converted his Place Pigalle apartment into a recording sanctuary - kitchen as control room, carpets on every wall, our TEAC 80-8 (we hauled it across the ocean) positioned like an altar. Chain-smoked Gauloises through every take, repositioning microphones with safecracker precision while muttering French criticism that needed no translation. Taught Len which frequencies lived where, how to make that horizontal deck sing honest. When the take finally matched what he heard in his head, Jacques would just nod once and move on. No praise, just professional acknowledgment that the work met standards.

The kind of engineer who made better records by refusing to accept good enough. The kind of man whose Birthday present was a reset button for 4 strange cats starting their European chapter. What came after was worth the exile.

Side one (tracks 1-5) available for streaming. Complete album available for purchase at ko-fi.com/barstoolbenny - side two only available as part of the full record.

Personnel: Drums: Frankie "Thumper" Morello Bass: Jimmy "Two Hands" DelVecchio Organ and Piano: Benny Guitar: Lou Mercer

Produced by Lou Mercer Engineered by Len Tillerson and Jacques Moreau at Studio L'Insulaire

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