SxPxDxCx

The american taper James Freeman a.k.a "SxPxDxCx" has been taping countless concerts since 1999 and we thought to see what he´s up to in 2020 and which past taping stories he has to share with us.

First of all, how are you doing in these extraordinary times with Corona spreading all over the planet?

My wife and I are doing well in Denver.  We live in a very urban area  about a mile and 1/2 half from the main downtown center of Denver. I'm a partner in a long running small business.  20+ years now. We do GIS, custom cartography, CAD, programming related to data and mapping. My wife works in the legal marijuana industry manufacturing edibles and other parts of processing. I've been working from home since mid March.  We have a small crew so I could have kept going into the office the whole time and been safe I think but I was riding public transportation to and from so I decided not to risk it.  I set up my workstation in my basement near my record collection so it has been a nice perk spinning some vinyl every day while I work.

My wife has been going in but they have implemented safety procedures that keep me from worrying too much about her.  She's been smart about it even when her company hasn't been. I've 51 so in the at risk age group. We minimize our trips to the grocery story and have taken advantage of delivery services for local craft beer and food. Trying to support all the local business we love as much as we can.

Sadly my favorite local bar 3 Kings Tavern where I have recorded lots and lots of shows isn't reopening after the lockdown restrictions for bars are lifted. They had a 14 year run and were great guys. They let me put a mic mount on the ceiling back in 2008 and made it really easy to record what ever I wanted there. I've know the owner since back when they worked at other local venues in the late 90s. They were walking distance from my house.  Losing them hurts. I'm afraid they are not going to be the last either.  The Federal government doesn't seem to care about really helping out small business and the State government is strapped for funds already. The cultural and economic impact of this pandemic is going to be huge.  I don't think many people realize how big the impact crater is going to be.

Could you tell us a bit on why you started to tape concerts and some early recollections from the first year of taping?

I had access to lots of music and tape recorders very early. So I was making funny tapes with friend and recording stuff off the radio in grade school. The Doctor Demento show mostly. But I got into KISS back then too and would record stuff off the TV when cool bands came one. I don't think I knew about people actually recording live music at concerts until high school.  I think I saw some vinyl bootlegs and wondered about where they came from. Then later at the start of the 90s I found out that a classmate's cousin had recorded Slayer and Megadeth at the Colorado Clash of the Titans tour stop on cassette. It wasn't very good but it was listenable it opened my eyes to the possibility or capturing some shows myself. I purchased a recording portable cassette but never used it in that way.

I've always been super into music. Searching out B-side tracks. Rare versions of stuff.  Live stuff.  The 90s were a heyday for bootleg

CDs. Many from Italy and I wanted to hear all that stuff from my favorite bands. Those CDs were expensive though and you never knew what you were going to get. Mid 90s I saw this guy at a Foo Fighters show messing with some gear. He was hesitant but talked to me and described his equipment. That really planted the seed that I could do that too.

Then the CDR trading boom really took off.  I had enough rare live stuff that I started trading it out through a webpage that I had. I ran into
tapers that didn't want to trade with non-tapers so in 99 I went for it and bought my first taping rig.

Some Coresound CSB's and a minidisc recorder.  The first show I recorded
was a small venue and a Smashing Pumpkins show. With Queens Of The Stone Age 

opening. I was stoked because I had been a Kyuss fan. It didn't turn out as successful as I had hoped. I was still worried about getting
caught and only managed to capture all of the QOTSA set but botched the SP set. In retrospect the QOTSA set wasn't a terrible first attempt and I did post that on my blog to celebrate my 20 year taping anniversary.

After that since I was creating my own source material for CDR trading I went whole hog.  I was trading out 100 CDRs a month and getting that many in return.  I still have 1000+ CDRs from that day.  That waned mid
aughts with torrenting and I barely ever burn a CDR now but it was a hell of a start into this hobby.

You tape in USA. How is it to tape concerts in the states?

Well before COVID I was mostly recording shows at small venues, bars, and the like.  Up and coming bands and underground music interest me more than arena level bands.  Those venues and bands don't care much.

  
I've become friends with many of the venues I frequent owners or the folks that run the shows over 20 years. They know what I'm up to and either are into it or don't care. Recording at those places is easy.

Getting gear into the bigger places has become a chore since they all have metal detectors. The chance of getting busted with gear is higher. Which is so stupid since at most shows everyone can bring in their cell phones and capture media as much as they want but I would be stopped from carrying in my small recording device and microphones. It's not impossible to get gear in though. They aren't primarily looking for 
that in the searches. If I really want to capture a bigger show I would make it happen.



If you would choose 3 concerts that you have recorded which one´s would that be and why so?

This is a tough question. I have recorded 1000s of shows.

Let see off the top of my head my favorite 3 recording I have made are as follows.

1.  Queens Of The Stone Age - 15th Street Tavern, 1999-09-02. Small 100 person capacity venue on tour for their first album. The sound is really good on my recording and they show was just electric. Never going to 
see that band in a place like that again.

2.  Motörhead - Ogden Theater, 2005-03-27.  I almost didn't go to this show.  It was on Easter Sunday and I had just driven back from Wyoming to see my Mom.  Drove by the theater on my way home and saw the 
marquee.  Called my friend that worked there and he said "come on down". I got there and he let me in the side door. I was tired so I sat 
up in the balcony with my gear and recorded and enjoyed the show. Obviously Motörhead played very loudly so they could be a bit trick to record. I didn't have high hopes but I think this one turned out great. Sadly I had a hard drive die and lost most of my 2005 recordings. I only have an MP3 source for this one.

3. Ryan Adams - Su Teatro, 2011-09-15.  Ryan came to Denver to play at a small venue for a record store owner convention that was in town. It had been a private event but they put a small amount of tickets onsale 
to the public. I was able to score a pair. The venue was walking distance from my place as an added bonus.  Walk in wearing the mics.  
Got a nice seat in the middle of the small room. The crowd was all big fans and dead silent while he played.  You can hear me breathing occasionally and the squeak of the old theater chairs. It was in the summer so it was hot as hell in the venue and towards the end of his 2 hour set they opened the side doors to let in some air. While he was 
playing Jacksonville Skyline you can hear the whistle of a passing freight train that runs through that area of town.  Kind of magic.  This is also probably my most distributed live recording. I got 1300+ downloads off my site and who knows how many from other people posting it other places.

Which concert has been the most trickiest to tape so far during all these years?

The Iggy Pop show for his Post Pop Depression tour which featured Josh 
from Queens Of The Stone age was a bit tricky. It was at a fancy theater in the performing arts/theater district in downtown Denver. They are a strictly no recording venue. They had walk through and wade 
metal detectors in addition to pat downs. Always stay calm and act like everything is normal and you can get away with a lot.

From when you first started to tape up until now have there been many changes in the way that you tape?

Well no more physical media is the big one.  With minidisc or tape there remains a master copy of the recording. Now everything is digital so you have to maintain backups of all your recordings since those are the master copies now.  I've done pretty well in that department but like I mentioned before I had a hard drive incident were I lost pretty much all of my recordings from 2005.

Do you collect other tapers concerts too and which bands are your favorite one´s?

I will download live recording from DIME or other places that catch my eye. But I have such a backlog of recordings myself it has to be something I really want. I'm always on the look out for Richmond Fontaine, Slobberbone, The Gits, Faith No More and other Patton projects.

Back to 2020. Many tapers ended up with no option to tape in 2020. How was it for you, did you tape any concert in 2020 before Corona took over?

I recorded a couple of friend's punk bands at a very cool book store venue near my place called Mutiny Information Cafe.  That was at the end of January.

The last question for this time. Do you have any band or artists that you still haven´t taped that is on your “taping bucketlist”?

Willie Nelson. Hopefully I will get another chance. I have lost of shows that I regret not recording. Can't catch them all. 

Many thanks for answering the questions for us!

Check out SxPxDxCx:s recordings here:

http://thatsthethingaboutthat.blogspot.com/