October, 1990 (Earth) Smegma Studios Portland, OR, US

October, 1990 (Earth) Smegma Studios Portland, OR, US

Artist
Earth
Carlson, Dylan (vocals, guitar)
Harwell, Dave (bass)
Preston, Joe (bass, percussion)
Canary, Kelly (backing vocals)
Cobain, Kurt (vocals, assistance with various instruments)
Crew
Lastra, Mike (producer, engineer)
Set
[O] Divine And Bright (Cobain on lead vocals)
[O] Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge (Cobain on backing vocals)
[O] Ouroboros Is Broken (Cobain assists with sequencer)
[X] Private Affair (Cobain on lead vocals)
[?] others?

Best available sources
Source Quality Complete Runtime Lowest Gen Tracks Featured Notes

SBD #1a 10.0 No 0:32:21 Official CD (Earth - Extra-Capsular Extraction)
• A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge Parts 1 & 2
• Ouroboros Is Broken A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge is edited into two parts on this release.

SBD #1b TBC No TBC Unofficial 12" (Earth - 10 1990)
• Divine And Bright
• A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge
• Ouroboros Is Broken Apparently sourced from a stolen DAT. Divine And Bright appears under the title Divine And Bright Extraction; Ouroboros Is Broken appears under the title Oroubaros.

SBD #1c 10.0 No 0:03:03 Official CD (Earth - Sunn Amps and Smashed Guitars Live)
• Divine And Bright

Notes
Kurt Cobain joins Earth to record a session at Mike Lastra's Smegma Studios, Portland, OR.

Whilst Cobain provides backing vocals on Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge and lead vocals on both Divine And Bright and a cover of The Saints' Private Affair (72), his influence on this session is hard to gauge; reports suggest that he was asleep for most of the time. (68)

Speaking to The Wire's Edwin Pouncey in 2005, Carlson gave his slant on Cobain's contribution, [Kurt] sings the lead vocal on Divine And Bright. I felt that his voice would be better for that song because it's a sort of pop song. On the other song [A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge] I sing lead and he was more of a backing vocalist. I wanted different vocal textures. My voice was a monotone, his was a gravely pop vocal and Kelly made cougar howls. Rather than have a straight vocal, I used more textures to prevent it from being a straight pop song. (80)

A cassette of the complete session is known to exist, running at approx. 45 minutes, and is said to feature more of Cobain.

Alex Roberts.