Ballot Result

Ballot Result is a posthumous live compilation album by Minutemen.

The story of Ballot Result starts with the Tour-Spiel EP in 1984. Minutemen had been given a copy of a tape of a live radio performance for the Virgin Vinyl Show they had done in Tucson, Arizona, four songs of which they used for the EP. The engineer of that particular session later claimed that Minutemen had not got his permission to use the recording and reacted by releasing a bootleg album, ...Just a Minute Men. The sudden existence of the bootleg album, which the engineer blatantly promoted through magazines like Spin and Flipside, upset Minutemen enough that the group decided to do an anti-bootleg album, 3 Dudes 6 Sides 3 Studio 3 Live. The group printed ballots which they passed out to fans during their summer and fall 1985 performances as well as planned to insert into the first pressing of their next studio album, 3-Way Tie (For Last); the ballots would determine which songs the band would record for the live portion of the album.

The automotive death of guitarist and lead singer D. Boon on December 22, 1985 scuttled Minutemen, putting an end to both the band and the planned live album. Surviving members Mike Watt and George Hurley, a few months from reuniting to form fIREHOSE with singer/guitarist Ed Crawford, decided to use the ballots and existing live recordings (many sent in by fans and friends) to compile the album.

The final album contains all live recordings plus a few rarities and a couple of previously released studio tracks to compensate for the fact that Minutemen had not performed the song live yet (as in the case of "The Price Of Paradise" from 3-Way Tie...) or that no live recording of the song was available ("Song for El Salvador" from The Punch Line and "Dreams are Free, Motherfucker!" from Buzz or Howl Under the Influence of Heat, to give two examples.)

The CD version deletes most of the previously released studio recordings (except for "Shit You Hear at Parties" from The Politics of Time, which SST didn't have the rights to at the time) but also, curiously, deletes the live version of "Hey Lawdy Mama". The cassette version adds a cover of "Fortunate Son" that was an outtake from the Joy sessions and a "Closing Jam" (from 1983) to the double vinyl track listing - these two tracks appear at the end of side one, after "Song For El Salvador".

Read more about Ballot Result:  Musical Personnel, The Actual "Ballot Results"

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