Three page interview with Black Tape For A Blue Girl in the new issue of America’s Procession Magazine (#9 • March 2023). “Darkwave dressed with a deep, flowing intensity.”

$11,264 • 125% funded • 227 backers
The goal was reached and the stretch goal as well. You did it! Thanks to 227 incredible backers for the support — joining the team that created this (soon to be) lovely release. Mesmerized by the sirens will be available later this year as a 2CD, LP (two color variations) and MiniDisc at the BlackTape bandcamp page.

25 hours to go, how’d we do?

in progress, design for the 6-panel 2CD digipak

Hello. There’s 25 hours to go in the Kickstarter for the new mix of BlackTape’s 1987 Mesmerized by the Sirens. Join us in creating this physical release in three formats: 140-gram color vinyl (two color variations), double-CD, and MiniDisc. Yes, MD! This will be the 4th BlackTape album on MD and the 10th to be issued on vinyl.

The goal was reached and the stretch goal as well, yet the campaign isn’t done yet! Backers pledged $302 today, adding their support to the team that creates this lovely release (and get bonus items only available at Kickstarter.)

There are 205 people on board as I write this. Join them. Join us!

Stream & download the 2023 mix for free at Bandcamp

Deven H wrote on Facebook: Awesome!! Such a fantastic job cleaning up the sound! WOW! The flip from the ’87 tracks to the 2023 tracks are insanely more rich and have such depth! It truly was like a “Wow” moment!! Great work!!

Fernando from Peru wrote on Facebook: Mesmerized by the Sirens is my favorite album from your band. That album accompanied me in a difficult moment (it was like escaping into a dreamlike space while listening to it).

Thank you so much. I love hearing how my music was there for you at tough moments. Much the same as This Mortal Coil and Dead Can Dance was there for me in the mid-80s (when I began recording as Black Tape For A Blue Girl.) It’s great knowing the art Oscar, Sue-Kenny, Alan, Walter and I created was able to do the same for you.

Thanks to all who have pledged the Kickstarter. I look forward to a few more joining with us in the next 24 hours.

•  U P D A T E   F R O M   S A M  •

Mesmerized by the sirens 2023 mix

My current Kickstarter dives into a new mix of 1987’s Mesmerized by the Sirens. Your support helps fund the rerelease of our 2nd album in three formats: 140-gram color vinyl, CD, and MiniDisc.

More than a reissue, it’s a restoration! I remixed the album from scratch! Stream the captivating 2023 mix at our Bandcamp page; you can download it there as well.

After 36 years, Mesmerized finally matches the way it has always played in my head — rich, detailed and distinct. Everything is more present, and the lovely vocals engulf you in their power and beauty.

Guillaume Roos writes on Twitter: I just finished listening to the 2023 Mix and it’s truly amazing, almost as if we’d been listening to Mesmerized from a distance for years without knowing. The music shines with so much more depth. I can’t wait for the CD!

There’s much more I could say here but as it’s all nicely stated at the Kickstarter, I invite you to pop over there to watch the video, listen to the difference, read about the process, and make your pledge.

I’m excited to be able to create this reissue with the help of people who believe in me and want to help this campaign succeed – people like you!

Sam

1987-Sam, photo by Walter Holland

The Scavenger Bride vinyl arrived from Greece. I’ve packaged all the preOrders, and I’m bringing them to the post office today. It’s a single LP in two color variations, and includes a 4-page lyric insert. The album is remastered and available from our Bandcamp page. In Europe, faster service ordering from the label, The Circle Music in Greece, or from Projekt’s European Webstore.

Hello Mexico!!! Mexican fans are the #2 country for Spotify streams on the new Black Tape For A Blue Girl single, “Bastille Day, 1961.” I ❤️ your passion for my music. With Jon DeRosa and Henrik Meierkord. Listen at Spotify. Download the single for free at Black Tape For A Blue Girl’s Bandcamp page.

The A chaos of desire 2CD, 2LP, & MiniDisc a now available on the Black Tape For A Blue Girl Bandcamp Page.

(Sean’s package, unpacked)

Sean in Scotland wrote: Package arrived safe and sound last week. Wow! Spinning A Chaos of Desire just instantly put me back in my room at my folks in the early nineties, when I’d just come home from Glasgow with the CD and listened to it for the first time. Was in a bad relationship that I was trying to get out of and, I’ll admit, enjoyed wallowing in emotionally-charged music as a soundtrack to my miserableness! LOL! Always amazed by how music can be like a time machine and transport you immediately to a time and place and, more significantly, feeling. Fantastic package – just blown away! The fanzine is excellent. Just fabulous. Can’t wait for the next one!

Could you play this Spotify playlist: Ethereal, Goth & Heavenly Voices.
Many people told me on Facebook that the way they discover new music is when it’s recommended on Spotify (and other streaming sites); ie: when a song or album is finished the algorithm recommends a track you might like. I’m trying to help train the algorithms with this playlist of bands similar to BlackTape. It needs a lot of plays to help train, so please play, share, play again. Thanks.
Sam

Thanks so much to the 260 backers that pledged $13,282 to help bring the A chaos of desire reissue to life. Thanks for loving the music. Thanks to the many many of you who’ve stuck with Black Tape For A Blue Girl throughout the 30+ years since you first heard the band. And thanks to the new listeners who just discovered us. I’m putting the 2LP / 2CD / MiniDisc into production this month; I turned in the LP artwork + masters today. I’ve got some work to do on the DDP master for the second CD (which was funded as a stretch goal), there’s a few files to send to Martin to master, and then I send it into the plant. A couple of people emailed to say they missed the campaign and want to purchase the LP — they’ll be available at our Bandcamp page once the backers receive their copies.

Stream and free download at Bandcamp

In late-December while planning the Kickstarter for A chaos of desire I wondered about how to bring the 2022-era band into the past and involve us in the campaign. Inspiration strikes!!! Jon, Henrik & I could record new neo-classical versions of tracks from chaos. I formed these recordings by reusing my synth parts from the digitized 1990 8-track master tape; Jon and Henrik added vocals and strings in their respective hometowns. Then — like when I mixed The Cleft Serpent — I pulled as much of myself out of the mix as I could to end up with lush, beautiful, mournful versions of “A chaos of desire” & “Could i stay the honest one.”

I edited the video for “chaos” (on the Bandcamp page as well as posted at youTube) before I created the videos for “beneath the icy floe” and “pandora’s box” — the first of the trilogy of videos comes last!

Jon and I tossed around ideas and thought it would be a wonderful surprise at the end of the campaign to give you something entirely fresh: the new band reinterprets the past. We’re thanking you for your pledges which brought us to the funding goal and then to the stretch goal.

The single will be at all streaming sites on April 15.

Sam

One week to go, this is when it gets hectic. Will the campaign make it? I think so. Mind you, it won’t be easy. I am messaging a lot of people on Facebook, using other social sites, spreading the word…. Working hard. You can pledge the Kickstarter campaign here, and listen to the 30-track deluxe album on Spotify, or wherever you stream music..

📹  To begin the final week of the Kickstarter, I’ve posted a 2nd video from the album on youTube, this one for the instrumental “beneath the icy floe.” I’ve always thought of this song as a passage through the shamanic death & rebirth initiation; it was cool to find a cinematographer with footage that captured this idea, and then edit it into something that creates the experimental narrative I imagined. Watch it on your big screen. It’s gorgeous. 🎬