Pixies and longtime label 4AD have placed four hard-to-find studio recordings from the band's original run onto digital streaming platforms for the first time, NME reported on November 3. None of the four cuts is brand new to vinyl collectors. Previously, all four tracks appeared only on bonus 7-inch records included with limited Dinked International vinyl editions of 1990's Bossanova and 1991's Trompe le Monde.
Source: Pixies live at Lokerse Feesten 2024, photo by Haggis MacHaggis via Wikimedia Commons.
Streaming services added "Dig for Fire (Albini Version)", "Go Man Go", "Brackish Boy", and "Punk Loop" together as a four-song set. The sessions behind those recordings stretch from late 1987 to 1991 across three different album eras.
Steve Albini's Late-1987 Surfer Rosa Tape
The earliest recording predates Bossanova by nearly three years, dating back to late-1987 Surfer Rosa studio dates with engineer Steve Albini on "Dig for Fire (Albini Version)". His recording preserves a rougher arrangement cut long before producer Gil Norton polished Dig for Fire into a 1990 single.
From a Kim Deal Co-Write to Black Francis's Solo Debut
Two of the other tracks show how ideas moved out of Pixies sessions into the members' outside projects. Black Francis and bassist Kim Deal co-wrote "Go Man Go" during the Bossanova sessions before Deal carried the song over to The Breeders, while "Brackish Boy" documents an early band take on a song Black Francis later re-recorded for his 1993 self-titled solo debut as Frank Black. A fourth cut from the 1991 Trompe le Monde dates, "Punk Loop", stayed in the tape vault for decades as a short studio experiment before landing on the bonus 7-inch.
Limited Dinked 7-Inch Pressings Join the Digital 4AD Catalog
4AD initially pressed the four songs on bonus 7-inch vinyl for UK independent record shops participating in the Dinked Edition series, leaving streaming listeners without official copies once shop allocations sold out. Other catalog acts have split physical and digital extras in different ways: Paul McCartney's expanded Dungeon Lane release put alternate Ringo Starr mixes alongside bonus tracks on digital services, whereas The Flaming Lips' four-format January album still keeps specific format details tied to physical vinyl and CD pressings.
