"I Want To Say Thank You To The Fans By Telling You A Secret!" -- ILX Pre-Covers The Tortured Poets Department

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/53521191716_63bf07f6c4_z.jpg

Fortnight -- sund4r
The Tortured Poets Department -- matthew mathieu
My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys -- La Lechera
Down Bad -- Acoleuthic
So Long, London -- Mfktz
But Daddy I Love Him -- kurt schwitterz
Fresh Out the Slammer -- Tom D (ft. Norman Stanley Fletcher)
Florida!!! -- Maresn3st (feat. Alfred, Lord Sotosyn)
Guilty as Sin? -- a hoy hoy
Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me? -- Chris Irregardless
I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can) -- Josh in Chicago
loml -- Josh in Chicago (feat. Ned Raggett)
I Can Do It With a Broken Heart -- HI DERE
The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived -- Bo Jackson Overdrive
The Alchemy -- ShariVari
Clara Bow -- Moka

Bonus Track: The Manuscript -- Renegade Priests
Bonus Track: The Bolter -- The Misunderstudd
Bonus Track: The Albatross -- Heez
Bonus Track: The Black Dog -- front tea for two

https://www.sendspace.com/file/gdljki

this might be a dumb q but who's that guy?

god i'm so stoked to listen to this

xpost -- That's Taylor's pre-Kelce rebound last year, aka Matty Healy of the 1975:

https://www.vulture.com/2023/06/why-taylor-swift-matty-healy-broke-up.html

yay! let's go

xpost (And he's more of a self-conscious tortured poet as such than Joe Alwyn so he felt more appropriate for this.)

two songs in and already better than any Taylor Swift album.

i'm stuck in a work meeting w/ rambling manager and don't know how to ask "can we wrap this up so I can listen to this Taylor Swift album me and some online pals made?"

I don't know how it sounded beforehand but Maresn3st did a stellar job making these sound in the same level.

oh just realized I was listening to these on shuffle. Favorites so far: Florida!!! and Albatross

Granted my spot was a last minute fix but I like to think it introduced a strong one-two of vocals/lyrics with HI DERE aka DJP and Bo Jackson aka Neanderthal.

finally started. yessssssssssss....

and we're off to a great start w/ sund4r

omg m bison, for being handed this assignment late, you sure created a hell of a bop

and same comment for LL - I vibe so much to this.

Thanks for listening! I was glad to have something to offer. I also like how I dropped a bell at the end bc it fits the song title (which I didn’t know when submitting) 😀

haha yeah that was a perfect tag!

loving the narrative in imago/acoleuthic's!

great use of samples over ambience on "So Long, London"

[I also like how I dropped a bell at the end bc it fits the song title (which I didn’t know when submitting)

Yeah I'd already thought up the idea for 'loml' so I figured you'd get the other spot and as it turned out, you were perfect for it title-wise!

"goddammit, daddy, I love him!"....lol kurt that was great. earwormy as fuck

Also Ty Ned for the explanation — honestly didn’t know who he was

lol, love reworking the Going Straight theme tune as a dance-pop tune, Tom. awesome.

i want to live in Maresn3st and Alfred's version of "Florida!!"

YES to Ric Flair samples on "guilty as sin". love the loop in it as well.

gotta pause to take a lunch break but man y'all are some creative people. looking forward to the rest.

All kinds of awesomeness within.

I'm sitting in a dentist's office with my client downloading this to my phone.

You all knocked it out of the park. I feel my contribution is unworthy. Loving “the alchemy” atm.

I'm listening to this now.

Is it sampling TS vocals?

I'm sure (positive) mine is the lowest fi, but thanks to the new demixing software, it's now stereo-ish

Will be cued up for tomorrow's commute!

Which one is yours? I doubt it sounds more lo fi than mine as I recorded everything on my cellphone, even the samples were being played and recorded live as I had no idea how to properly import samples lol. Maresnest did a good job at making it less like crap lol.

I'll leave it up to youse to discover, but.

(I.e. upthread...)

Should have spent more time learning how to properly do stuff, already had several samples that I wanted to turn into a full song… wanted to do a bohemian jazz sort of thing with “taylor” reading a poem (some bongos from here, a bass from there, a saxophone, etc…) maybe next time I’ll be ready… it was fun either way.

Oh wait lol I think I know which one is it, I hadn’t gotten to the bonus tracks yet.

I think it’s cleaner sounding than mine! I ended up adding way too much reverb and low end on things and mine is very murky imho.

such a fun ride!

frankly stunned by what Tom D has pulled off here

I finally got to channel my inner Bernard Sumner and scribbled my lyrics on a napkin after a glass of wine.

A fine approach. (Mine, logically, arrived yesterday morning in the shower when I realized something had to happen for that last track.)

Pretty sure I read that Taylor Swift writes all her lyrics on napkins *in* the shower, then celebrates with a glass of wine after. Different strokes etc.

I'm loving everything on this. I wish more superstars of Swift's stature took risks collaborating with internet randos.

Why thank you for the compliment but don't sell yourself short by saying you're an internet rando.

Haha. Swift should call her next album "Internet Randos" and just release this.

I refuse to believe she could write a better "The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived" than this "The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived".

frankly stunned by what Tom D has pulled off here

Oh stop it, it's not that difficult to do. Time consuming though.

I've got to say, the way my track follows kurt's track is so perfect it sounds like a deliberate piece of sequencing instead of a complete accident.

...and i'm proud to be internet rando, where at least no one knows me
i can make my noise and mock unknown boys where no one else can see

This is dope

Is it sampling TS vocals?

Thank you! Mangled, but yes.

This album is amazing. Congratulations to everyone involved.

three songs in this is great stuff

love the abstract, controlled chaos of "The Bolter"!

love everything about "The Albatross" - the lyrics and that chorus is gonna stick w/ me for a while.

Oh you’re too kind Neanderthal.

Also you have to listen to The Fall!

and we come home with the David Lynchian "The Black Dog". love the radio-dial turning intro.

that was a swell listen and won't be my last. this was fun to be a part of!

"The Manuscript" is great... it sounds like what late-period Parquet Courts should be (bad sadly isn't)!

“Fresh out the slammer” synth melody is reminding me of another thing. I love it.

Too difficult to choose a favourite, so I won't, but very good job to everyone.

I kept hearing Heez's lyrics as "hanging around my dick like an albatross" -> petition to get My Dick to cover this pre-cover?

settling in for this right now. here's play-by-play thoughts. i'm listening on headphones―

01 sund4r - fortnight
great mood setter, when does taylor come in?

02 matthew - tortured poets
catchy + confusing. i love it.

03 la lechera - my boy
this should be taylor's real entrance music for the tortured poets tour. have a gong-laced synth vamp to tide your anticipation, friends.

04 acoleuthic - down bad
lol this beat! vocals good, yes. but this beat is... making fun of me or something?? i have no clue, but how much i'm enjoying it seems inappropriate. well done.

05 mfktz - so long, london
idk how else to follow "down bad" than with a paranoid dark ambient collage.

06 kurt - daddy i love him
moar fuzz!

07 tom d feat nfs - fresh out the slammer
omg, this is great! you taught me about porridge just now!

08 mares feat alfred - florida
no clue what's going on here, but it sure does sound nice.

09 a hoy hoy - sin
walkin around in alligators, indeed. great samples!

10 chris i - who's afraid
yeah, this goes exactly with the title.

11 josh - i can fix him
this is legitimately great. i want to hear taylor write a rap for it.

12 josh feat ned - loml
i mean this as a really high compliment: this has mc 900 ft jesus vibes. bravo at including the audible mouse click at the end of the vocal track. love.

13 hi dere - broken heart
this went in a direction. i was not expecting that turn. that big middle eight! lol! 'everyone that i proved wrong gets to listen to this song.' lol nailed it.

14 bo jacks - smallest man
needs more jordanaires. ace narrative tho. feel like this is way more effort than was necessary lol. really good.

15 shari - alchemy
i think this is the exact sort of music that would get me to start taking ts seriously.

16 moka - clara bow
this beat is legit! nice!

17 renegade priests - manuscript
i did not expect something this well-produced. "IT'S A HOLOGRAPH!!!" is awesome.

18 misunderstudd - bolter
lol have you ever heard the trypes? this is great!

19 heez - albatross
this is the start of something beautiful. i'm with neanderthal: you hit something special in this chorus.

20 tea - black dog
perfect outro.

always a blast, ya'll.

bravo at including the audible mouse click at the end of the vocal track.

Unintentional but I am glad for the fates.

Lol back in my home studio a capella recording days, just about all my tracks ended with one

This is far better than Taylor's version could ever be.

Emily did you notice the line the “I could live off penis”?

a hoy hoy reaching Bush of Ghosts levels of found sound brilliance.

Okay I'm up to a hoy hoy and a boy boy is this great

Down, Bad also still stuck in my head

I'm sleeping on the couch tonight

https://i.postimg.cc/DZG6C002/Screenshot-20240403-114639-Messages.jpg

Hahahajaha

Lol

Pretty bold there!

Lol

(Will listen properly when driving tomorrow)

I'm just getting the chance to download this now, very excited for it!

I am three tracks into this and I absolutely love it

Emily did you notice the line the “I could live off penis”?

― Comfortably numbnuts (Heez)

Ha, no! I was listening with the volume pretty quiet and I kept having to lean into the speakers trying to work out if you were singing "my neck" or "my dick" - genuinely couldn't tell if it was just my dirty mind.

i just wanna say that heez's track is not only my favorite song on this thing, it is my favorite of any pre-covers song ever made

Neanderthal, when are we going to do a duet

Xpost seriously like Heez's song blew me the fuck away

DJP anytime! I feel like you and I could be the most amazing studio choir!

yeah bet, would be massively fun

I would type more but I just got to "The Manuscript" and I'm luxuriating in the B-52ishness

Also want to jump on the Heez love. Probably my favorite song of the whole project.

You all did some great work in here. Consider voting for these instead of the actual TS songs when the eoy poll comes.

Gosh thanks y’all. Nice to wake up to. I do not sing I live off penis but it sure sounds like it!

It's so great Heez

Yes, it's a standout among standouts.

Just like Swift to slot one of the best songs as a bonus track.

on my phone but finished up, really great stuff from everyone, definitely the most front to back consistent of all the pre-covers albums, I enjoyed every song

the manuscript just puts a smile on my face for the entirety of the ride

I can confidently say I like this more than any TS album I've heard (and I've heard a bunch). Good work!

Man, everything on here is legitimately great & inspiring, I am tempted to say something about how this kind of burst of creativity is a testament to the human spirit or some shit, but I'll just say "good show everybody"

Properly dug into this over the weekend, great stuff all, totally agree about the consistency and goodness within.

One of things I really like about these (apart from taking part) is each tune is like a curious little window into the psyche of familiar ILX names.

*gulp*

I know what you mean, it's like putting a face to a name.

The matthew mathieu track is a favourite so far. Aside from "Down Bad" and "Manuscript", which I had praised before elsewhere, La Lechera's track is also a standout for me.

hey is 'the manuscript' part of the main album?

xp to sund4r, that is very kind and gracious of you to say! i was nervous about following your track because you always do such cool guitar work (and your track is no exception!) but im glad you liked it

Enormous thanks to Ned for getting this all organised and great job all.

Copy maresn3st on the illuminating peek into the minds of usernames. And conversely allowing ppl to peek inside mine.

Xp to sund4r — thank you!! It feels so good to be heard!!

https://i.imgur.com/L38p5cX.jpeg

What's a scrobble? More importantly, where is my money!?

ain't been scrobbled since the Great War

oh there will be no money

but on your deathbed you will receive admin privileges

but not sitewide

Just the one board?

so are we doing a post-covers album of the bonus disc