A Mad Undertaking

an undefinitive guide to the Aadam Jacobs Collection

  • Checking In: One Year Into the Aadam Jacobs Collection Project

    vanark

    How This Journey Began

    A year ago this month, the Aadam Jacobs Collection Project team began converting Aadam Jacobs’ audio recordings to digital formats and preparing them for public access. But the story actually started in 2019, shortly after WBEZ Chicago ran a feature and podcast on Aadam – the “Chicago taper guy.”

    As audio archivists for the Live Music Archive on the Internet Archive (now 280,000 shows and growing), we immediately understood the value of a collection like Aadam’s. His recordings span more than three decades and capture everything from first-and-only performances by local bands to early sets from now (and then)-international acts like Nirvana, Hüsker Dü, Liz Phair, Phish, and many more. It was clear these tapes deserved preservation – and that they should be heard, not hidden away in a warehouse.

    We reached out. So did others. Aadam took time to sort through the possibilities and weigh what he wanted for his collection. Every six months or so, we would check in to see where things stood. Finally, in fall 2024, I visited Aadam at his home in Chicago and left with the first 120 tapes.

    The Challenge of 10,000+ Recordings

    Once we had tapes in hand, the path ahead looked deceptively simple: convert the tapes, lightly master the audio, split it into tracks, and upload it for public listening.

    Straightforward – if you’re dealing with a couple dozen tapes. But we were staring at more than 10,000, some with two or three or more separate sets on them.

    Scaling the work became the central challenge. We did the math early: at 10 shows per day, this would be a 10-year project. We were committed, but we also knew sustaining a volunteer team for a decade wasn’t realistic. To finish within a more reasonable two- to three-year window, we’d need to process 25 – 30 shows per day – roughly 200 per week.

    That meant building the equivalent of a production train… while it was already moving.

    Building a Workflow That Could Scale

    The process has evolved continuously. Today, no one person is responsible for taking a tape from raw format all the way to the Live Music Archive. Instead, we’ve structured the work into stages, each handled by different team members:

    1. Cataloging
      Each tape is entered into our database and routed to the transfer team.
    2. Transfer
      Transfer specialists convert tapes to raw digital audio.
    3. Prep & Metadata
      Another group handles naming, dating, venue identification, transfer-equipment info, and splitting multi-show tapes.
    4. Editing & Mastering
      Editors select shows to master, track, and prepare for upload.
    5. Final Review & Upload
      A final reviewer checks everything and uploads the show to the Aadam Jacobs Collection on the Live Music Archive.

    Then we do it again – 30,000 times.

    The First Recordings Shared – Scruffy the Cat

    The first box of DATs Aadam handed over was a true grab-bag of recordings. When he asked whether I wanted anything specific, I asked about Scruffy the Cat. As it turned out, he had sorted his entire collection alphabetically during the early pandemic, so he knew exactly where to find them.

    I flew home to Massachusetts with 115 DATs and five Scruffy the Cat cassettes in my carry-on.

    We started with Scruffy the Cat because I had a working cassette deck, but no DAT deck. Most of the team had never heard of Scruffy the Cat – a rockabilly-punk / cow-punk / roots-punk hybrid. Think Jason and the Scorchers, if they leaned more punk. The band started in Iowa, moved to Boston in the early ’80s, added banjo and keys, signed a record deal, and released four albums before breaking up in 1990.

    One teammate messaged:
    “Man, loving these guys! Never heard of them before… How did I not know about this band?”

    Link to Scruffy the Cat recordings in the Aadam Jacobs Collection at the Live Music Archive.

    That’s been a theme: the sheer joy of stumbling into something you didn’t know you needed.

    For me, the Scruffy tapes triggered a rush of Boston-era memories – late-night shows, dark rooms, cheap beer underfoot, a band playing in the corner rather than on a stage. Even though the recordings were Chicago-based, the vibe came right back.

    Follow Along: More Gems Ahead

    You can follow the project on Facebook and Bluesky (Bluesky feed of new uploads here), where automated feeds announce each new upload. You’ll never miss when we upload that The Cure show from 1984 of their first visit to Chicago. And yes – the 1984 Cure show is coming soon.

    The Cure - cassette image

    Aadam shared this memory from that night:

    “I won tickets on WNUR, but they were so late with the guest list that, if there was an opening band, I have no memory of seeing them. I found a spot on the terribly crowded floor slightly closer to the left stacks, maybe the equivalent of 12 rows back…

    “The better story is missing their 1985 show because I was seeing Philip Glass, but I had to be at The Cure when it ended to flyer for a late 10,000 Maniacs show at the Vic. Natalie Merchant helped. I reminded her of this about 20 years ago after a Wilco show.”

    What We’ve Achieved So Far

    Before we uploaded even a single file, we knew these recordings would spark memories, conversations, and connections. And they have.

    In the project’s first year, we’ve:

    • Uploaded 1,500+ shows
    • Seen 133,000+ streams or downloads

    Yes, at that pace it would take 15–20 years to finish. But the team is finding its rhythm, and the coming year should be even more productive.

    Want to Help? Here’s How

    If you’re a taper – or simply someone with experience or interest in:

    • transferring 2-channel live recordings (either DAT or Cassette)
    • editing or mastering 2-channel live recordings
    • helping with setlists, metadata, or database work

    …we’d love to hear from you.

    Email us at aadam.jacobs.project@gmail.com.

    Transfers currently take place in Chicago, Cleveland, Palo Alto, Charleston (SC), and Wilmington (NC). Editors span Vancouver, the UK, the Netherlands, and dozens of U.S. cities.

    Our goals for next year:
    Reach 8,000 uploaded shows and one million visitors.

    With help, we’ll get there.

  • Phinding Phish

    mrkliked

    It started pretty innocently. A simple conversation about the Aadam Jacobs Collection in a private discord channel.

    So it began….

    I brought this info to the AJC team.  Everyone acknowledged that it would be a cool find, but we were in the very early stages of this project; we’re still in the very early stages of this project, and searching for 1 tape in a collection that’s measured in the tens of thousands seemed like a fool’s errand. Nonetheless, our fearless leader, Vanark, reached out to Aadam to see if he recalled taping Alex Chilton at Lounge Ax in November of 1990 and if he happened to record Phish’s opening set.  In short order, we got the response:

    “Yes” 

    So then we waited.

    The team working on this project is spread across North America and Europe. We all have families and jobs that occupy our time. Many of us actively tape and share recordings of our own. Additionally, only one of us has actually met or spoken directly to Aadam. 

    That is to say, what we are doing, and the way we are doing it, is not normal. Aadam’s home isn’t a lending library that we stroll into, paw through his collection, and take what seems interesting.  We get batches of music, and whatever it is, we work through it. All or nothing. No Tape Left Behind.  For context, I’ve mixed 55 shows for the effort. Of that 55, I hadn’t heard of about 25 of the bands before working on them. For all of us, the idea of this massive tranche of music from one of the great music cities in the world not being preserved was an impossibility.

    The project started with a giant trove of CD-Rs Aadam had made by a friend.  As we worked our way through these, logistics were being hammered out for the rest of the physical media. We have several people with professional-level equipment in various parts of the country prepared to do tape and DAT transfers. But how are we getting them there? Who’s paying for shipping? Does the USPS even have funding and exist as a Government agency anymore?

    Enough about us, you’re probably just here for the Phish.

    Here it is. The master cassette of a Phish show no one had heard in 12,623 days.

    So here is the chain of events that led to you listening to this right now: Vanark flew from Boston to Chicago and went to Aadam’s home. He gathered up as many cassettes and DATs as he could fit in his carry-on and flew home. Then, he cataloged everything, packaged them up for transport, and shipped them off to RyanJ in South Carolina and JohnB in Philly for transfer. 

    Ryan is the archivist behind the unbelievably comprehensive NinLive archive. Alongside his passion for Nine Inch Nails, he has a passion for archiving in general, and he has assembled an incredible collection of equipment for transferring physical media to digital formats. Ryan transferred Aadam’s master cassette via a Nakamichi CR-7A > NI Komplete Audio 6 >Adobe Audition > WAV. 

    The WAV was sent back to Vanark, who eventually passed it to me for mastering.  We noticed something interesting as soon as we took a listen; it seemed that each channel of the stereo recording was an individual source.  The left channel, we guessed, was a PZM mic, which Aadam used often.  The other channel was clean enough that we wondered if it was a board feed. Aadam confirmed that the source was two mics and no board feed; the PZM we had assumed and a TEAC ME-120. The TEAC, as mentioned, sounded excellent but lacked ambiance and was a touch light on bass, and was a bit forward in the mix.  The PZM had excellent bass and room presence but was a bit blown out.

    The edict of this project has been to master with as light a touch as possible. Considering that, I very nearly released the recording exactly as Aadam captured it, but the nerd in me couldn’t resist playing just a little…

    I split the stereo recording into two mono files. I placed a version of the TEAC source on each channel with a bit of EQ and compression, then blended the PZM source in at a significantly lower volume to give it some low end and room vibe.  I then took that file and used a plug-in that helps manipulate the soundstage to get it centered and add some width.

    So, how does it sound?

    Honestly, it sounds amazing, particularly with headphones. I am continually shocked at how good many of Aadam’s recordings are. Considering we started with a 35-year-old cassette, I did not have high hopes, but seconds into the start of “Suzy Greenberg” you can hear the vitality and excitement that makes early Phish shows so intoxicating.

    I’ll leave the deep analysis to the phish.net folks, but on a purely sonic level, “The Landylady” from this show is, in my opinion, superior to the recordings from 11/8 and 11/10. It offers more punch, life, and energy. “Possum,” as with most early 90s versions, sees Trey doing his best Hank Scorpio with a flame thrower impersonation. “The Lizards,” always a joy to hear, features a particularly beautiful rendition of the ending instrumental section with the resonance the Languedoc is known for on full display. 

    So here we are: a plane trip halfway across the country, two rounds of USPS, and considerable hemming and hawing on how to master this, and, finally, a missing piece of one of music’s most well-documented bands has been recovered. History is written, and we can all finally hear another example of Trey screwing up the lyrics to The Lizards.

    Enjoy!

  • Across the Mekonverse

    Neil deMause

    It’s no exaggeration to say the Mekons changed my life. I was minding my own business, trying to find my way in the musical world just a couple of years into young adulthood, when their simultaneously-ironic-and-not album Rock ’n’ Roll crashed into my consciousness, providing me with a perspective that would allow me to both take art more seriously and the horrors of life less so, or maybe the other way around.

    But that’s a story I’ve already told elsewhere. Here, I want to talk about the strangest corners of the Mekons extended universe, as chronicled by Aadam Jacobs.

    Though the Mekons first formed in the UK — they began as a bunch of student at art school in Leeds, “the first punk band that didn’t know how to play their instruments” — many of them eventually migrated to the United States, the country that introduced them to country. In particular, singer/songwriter/drummer-turned-guitarist Jon Langford and chanteuse Sally Timms both landed in Chicago in the early ‘90s, just in time to catch both the alt-country wave and the peak of Aadam’s recording activity.

    As a result, there’s a ton of Mekons shows in the Aadam Jacobs Collection. And more than that, there’s a ton of Mekons-adjacent shows, each more unlikely than the next:

    • Freakons, Hideout, September 22, 2013: Rumors of this first burbled up as what sounded like a joke at a live show somewhere in the early 2010s: Jon and Sally were planning to join forces with Freakwater — another part-Chicago-immigrant band, in this case from Kentucky — to form a supergroup called the Freakons (or possibly Mekewater). This eventually coalesced as a project of songs about coal mining to benefit attempts to stop mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia, and a 2022 album that is well worth picking up. But as befits two of the most hilarious bands that ever interrupted a performance with endless stage banter, the Freakons’ true genius shows up in this live performance, neatly summed up by Hideout impresario Tim Tuten in his equally rambling intro as “from my little goldfish, mighty whales become!” 
    • Jelly Bishops, Record Riot, July 11, 2015: The Jelly Bishops were a one-off band that existed for only three shows in 1986, all in and around Chicago, after Langford’s spinoff band the Three Johns imploded on a U.S. tour and he, John Brennan of the Three Johns, and Tom Greenhalgh of the Mekons decided to form a new one on the spot. Twenty-nine years later, their sole EP, Kings of Barstool Mountain, was reissued, and the Jelly Bishops (or two of the three, anyway) chose to reform to open three Chicago-area Mekons shows, learning all of one of their original five songs, and adding a Mekons song and a Hank Williams cover before departing the stage. It is all faintly ridiculous, in the best possible way.
    • Mekons, Schubas, October 10, 1999: An actual Mekons show, but also not an actual Mekons show, as the band performed in the guise of the “Australian Mekons cover band Where Were U2.” Was this accompanied by terrible Aussie accents and terrible jokes about how “we discovered the Mekons because they were next to Men at Work in the bin at Tower”? Of course it was. Was it also a terrific musical performance, with songs from throughout the band’s then two decades of releases? You bet.
    • Sally Timms and Les Garçons, Martyrs’, October 16, 2010: Sally Timms doesn’t play all that many solo shows, and those she does are mostly in Chicago. This one is notable for its unusual backing band: members of the instrumental surf band Mar Caribe, playing as a classic banjo-cello-trumpet power trio. One song on the setlist baffled me so much that I finally messaged Sally to ask her what it was; her answer: “It’s from one of Susie’s albums that I sang on,” though she didn’t remember the title. This turned out to be the mesmerizing “Silenus” from the two-song CD Little Sparta & Sally Timms, Little Sparta being the side project of Mekons mad fiddle genius Susie Honeyman, which I immediately had to click the “Buy Digital Discography” button for on Bandcamp.
    • Jon Langford and Sally Timms, Hideout, March 13, 2005: This was one of a series of rehearsal shows in various cities workshopping “The Executioner’s Last Songs,” a multimedia piece by Jon that explored the death penalty, murder ballads, the history of punk rock, high and low art, and lower-division football fandom, all through songs and spoken word and video of Jon appearing on a TNT kids’ TV show as a sailor in a tiny rowboat in a sink. When I saw the New York performance a month later it featured numerous extra musicians, including Mekons drummer Steve Goulding accompanying on percussion made up of a plastic bucket and a fire extinguisher, and that was pretty great, but Aadam’s capture of this two-person rendition (Sally joined in as well) is by far the most high fidelity.
    • Moxie Tung, Hideout, August 31, 2015: For a certain kind of Mekons completist, Moxie Tung was legendary: Sally Timms and Freakwater’s Janet Bean, performing some sort of … performance art? It all existed only in occasional photos passed along on Facebook with cryptic descriptions, until this partial Aadam recording of a Moxie Tung live show turned up, and all was … still pretty unclear, actually. What are those backing tracks they’re shouting revolutionary (?) slogans over? Is someone playing some kind of trumpet? There are some things, it seems, that music fans are not meant to know.

    And that’s just from the first 5% or so of Aadam’s collection. No one knows what treasures the rest of his tapes hold, though I for one am holding out hope of one of Jon and Sally’s legendary Christmas pantomime performances, which are reported to have involved Daleks and Moby Duck, the Pantomime Quacking Whale. It might not make much sense with audio only, but then, making literal sense has never been the point of the Mekons.

  • The Coctails

    Brandon

    If you haven’t heard the Coctails, they were an instrument-swapping pop-jazz ensemble, with songs ranging from slow delicate instrumentals to raucous novelty singalongs. It doesn’t make sense at first, but the more Coctails you listen to, the more you need to keep listening.

    The Coctails came to Chicago from Kansas, and became Lounge Ax regulars from 1988-95. They ran their own vinyl label and put out records by Dump, Brokeback and Dianogah. Their first reunion was 25 years ago this January as the final act to play Lounge Ax before it closed. Then their late 2004 reunion was to celebrate the release of the great “Popcorn Box” compilation, released on Chicago’s Carrot Top, run by the same people who own Saki. After this Hideout gig, the Coctails played two nights at the Aragon opening for the Pixies, then hopped up to Hoboken where I caught them opening for Yo La Tengo, off to Japan for a week, then back to Chicago in January 2005.

    Aadam’s Coctails recordings to date: