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Introduction

My investigations into the instrumentation and production of the original LTL recording are intended to narrow down the date, place, and style of the song, while debunking the wild speculations about the band’s identity. We must work from the only musical evidence we have: a mid-80s discovered cassette. Because the audio is so degraded, I secured professional technical assessments rather than relying on guesses from non-musicians. There is far more going on below the surface than a casual listener can hear.

​The Process of Analysis

I sent the cleanest available YouTube version of LTL to three different recording engineers (in Australia, LA, and Houston). I intentionally selected professionals in their 50s and 60s for their broad musical knowledge—all are accomplished guitarists, and one is a respected luthier. They were employed to:

• ​Conduct track and instrument separation using the latest software; ​
• Identify every instrument on the recording; ​
• Suggest the track-count used to compile the master tape; ​
• Assess production effects, player expertise, and the probable era of the session.

​These technicians hear details that amateurs miss. I have combined their analysis with my own 70 years of experience in semi-professional folk and pop performance—including recording, roadie work, and managing bands—to finalize this breakdown.

Modern Audio Changes to the Original

Over the six years LTL has been online, various people have attempted what they call "remastering." Strictly speaking, true remastering requires the original master stems. These are simply bandpass filtering attempts to "clean up" a degraded, ancient cassette. By accentuating certain frequencies, these amateur filters often create "psychoacoustic illusions"—bringing out artifacts that weren't in the original room. This has led to total confusion regarding what instruments are actually present.

​Most amateur listeners can identify the primary female vocal, intermittent harmony, rhythm guitar, slide lead, bass, drums, and occasional tambourine. However, over the years, others have postulated keyboards, synths, drum machines, or 12-string guitars. My professionals have now provided a definitive mix. Their assessment of the original instrumentation follows:

* * * *

Instrumentation

Primary and Backing Vocals

​Overall, this girl's voice is satisfactory but not outstanding. She does not have any standout tones or vocal range. If she was a belter or a natural soprano or had a lovely warble vibrato, she would have shown those skills on a demo for the recording industry. Her flat mid-range presence without high-end "sparkle" EQ is typical of late-60s dynamic mics like the Shure SM58, not 1980s processing.

​No talent scout would listen to LTL and think, "Hell yeah. I could make a star out of that girl". This is the underlying mindset towards every demo tape: "Can our company make a lot of money out of investing a little money on this unknown artist? Has she got a bankable X-factor?" The short answer from the LTL Demo is clearly no.

​The vocal harmonies in the original were undoubtedly the primary female singer too. Her higher range harmonies are quite background, weak and unsure of themselves, present only for tonal colour rather than performance. She starts a harmony line then drops it because she gets lost in unresolved phrasing. She certainly had not spent much time rehearsing vocals as you would with a second vocalist to get harmonies tight. If a second singer were any good, they would be featured much more. This was not a two-girl band, and it would make no recording sense to invite another singer for this session just to add so little, so poorly. Note: In the new 2025 Remastered Version, we have added excellent new harmonies. It truly uplifts the song to what it should have been.

​Rythym Guitar

​Agreement was found to be a six-steel-string --  possibly a semi-acoustic, but most likely a full-body acoustic guitar recorded with close-in microphone. It is definitely not a solid body they all said. Everyone agreed it is not a 12 string, as myself and some others had once suggested. The strumming accompaniment seemed linked to the singer's own vocalisation rythym, suggesting the songwriting was hers. It’s fairly easy to tell when a singer "owns" her own song; the rhythm guitar provides the solid folk foundation, which then allows the lead guitarist the space to layer on those "trippy" atmospheric swells that define the song's texture. Session musos and visiting players are always very aware of not taking over the songwriter's song.

The rythym guitar was standard tuning, E-A-D-G-B-E. She was playing all open cords. Key of D major. No bar chords. All strumming, no finger picking. That is a typical folky-style for a female on a wide-necked acoustic guitar. You don't usually play open chords on thin-necked electric guitars nor bar chords on a wide-necked acoustic folk guitar.

​I wish we could better narrow down the exact instrument. In that era, the Martins D-18, D-28, and D-35 were the classic workhorses, ranging from $300 to $450. While luminaries like Dylan and Mitchell used the luxurious D-45 ($1,200), it is highly likely our player was using one of the more affordable, standard models used by every folk amateur of the late 60s.

​Lead Guitar

​Different opinions arose between the experts here. It may be a semi-acoustic or a solid body. Humbucker pickups were suspected into a guitar amp, which was then miked to the recording mixer. Humbucker pickups sound warm, thick, and powerful, with more bass and mids and a "fatter," more compressed tone compared to the brighter, sharper sound of single-coil pickups. I keep thinking of a Gibson ES series: the 335, 345, or 355, which many popular electric folk players used.

​A swell or volume pedal was used to accentuate the slide tonality. The swell is what makes it sound rather "trippy" and also makes the notes sound bowed like strings. This is what has tricked some listeners into hearing instruments that aren't there.

​Bass Guitar

​Here it gets interesting. I uploaded the bass track to several bass forums, posing the question: "Is that a fretless or not?" The consensus was about 80/20 in favour of it being fretless. Most said "definitely yes." A few said "probably, but not necessarily," proposing that a really good player with flat wound strings on a fretted bass could feasibly sound fretless.

​My three technicians were a definite "yes." But the clincher came from a famous and respected fretless bass guitar repairer, working in Burbank LA for 21 years who, after I sent him the separated bass track, emailed me:

• ​"I can confirm that track sure sounds like the fretless Ampeg AUB-1. They were made from September 1966 through late 1968. The original AUB-1 has a unique type of pickup that no other bass of that time had. It detects the movement of the whole bridge, rather than the individual strings. The sound has a very percussive attack curve with a noticeable pop and warble. And the mid-range is exceptionally rich with background coloration. But it's not mushy, like a Fender with tapewounds. It's possible to get close to that sound with a Fender, with some good musician skill and recording technique. But my guess is that this is the real thing, somebody playing their cool new late 60s Ampeg AUB-1, and probably through an Ampeg B-15 amp." [7]

​So there we have it—an experienced ear identifying the exact model and year of the fretless bass. Sure, it could be a later recording on earlier instruments, but more implications about that are discussed following.

One elderly bassist of that era pointed out to me that many early fretless bassists probably came across into pop and rock from playing an upright bass in orchestral, jazz, or trad-folk genres. 

An amplified upright bass was a common crossover thing for early electric folk in the 60s. See The Seekers. [8] This is precisely why the Ampeg AUB-1 was engineered; it was specifically designed to bridge the gap between a traditional upright and a modern electric. That's why the early Ampegs had a scrolled headpiece ... a nod to the hand-carved orchestral basses and cellos of the last few centuries.

It is clear from the bass playing that he is no virtuoso fretless player like others of the time and later. He's moderately competent, moderately melodic, but no Jack Bruce or Jaco Pastorius!

​Contemporary Icons of the AUB-1

​It is worth noting the contemporary experts on this specific instrument:

• ​Rick Danko of The Band, who made their concert debut in San Francisco at Winterland Ballroom in April 1969. He played an AUB-1.​
• Walter Becker (Steely Dan) played Ampeg basses in the late 1960s, including a 1968 Ampeg AUB-1 fretless.​
• Rod Hicks (Butterfield Blues Band) used an Ampeg AUB-1 at Woodstock 1969.​
• Daniel "Freebo" Freeberg, (b.1941) famous LA bassist, singer-songwriter, active since 1960. Reputedly played fretless but no references to him playing an Ampeg in that era could be found.​
• Phil Lesh of Grateful Dead played Alembic fretless around SF in that era, but not an Ampeg.

​I am not suggesting that any of these players are the LTL player, but it is highly likely he aspired in instrument and style to some of these contemporary bass heroes who were using the AUB-1 at the time.

​Our LTL bassist remains a rare bird among the mostly non-fretless bass players of the time. The bassist stands out as the most creative in this group—his ear is good, and his licks are really appropriate. And he was using the cutting-edge fretless "scroll-head" of his day.

Drums

​On my first listen, I thought—What's with that drummer? Sounds like he's asleep, or some remnant from the 1950s, or just a teenage beginner.

​Amazingly, there is only a snare drum and a kick drum. There is NO high hat, NO toms, and NO riding or crash cymbals. Nothing but "boom-tuck, boom-tuck" all the way through. Maybe he only had one leg and one arm. And it is definitely a human playing, NOT a drum machine—as some speculated. This was proven by measuring against a "click track." The beat occasionally wavers, contrary to a drum machine's perfect mathematical beat. One commenter posited he was sure it was a LinnDrum LM-1 ($4,995 in 1980), arguing against another fantasist for a Yamaha RX11 ($900 in 1984).

​It is laughable that LTL would have had such an instrument. The guy on real drums was probably paid $25 for his 3 minutes 10 seconds of work. A clear contemporary discrepancy is the absence in the drum stem of the ubiquitous 80s gated snare delay and reverb, only introduced post-1980.

​The question needs to be asked: why such a basic drum kit? Possible answers: too big for daddy's garage or the student dorm; the drummer only owned a small kit for small folk venues; the songwriter didn't want a big rock sound; or the drummer was only proficient with snare and bass. Even Ringo had a bigger kit in 1957! Who in the 70s or 80s would record with just a 2-piece drum kit?!?! Lol.

​The drummer is clearly following the songwriter's guitar rhythm rather than laying down a tempo to guide the song. He's basically just "filling in," keeping everyone in time (sort of) with little sympathetic connection to the bassist. They were certainly NOT playing like a rhythm section. The drumming was a sign of musical immaturity, which perfectly suits a simple folk-pop ballad like LTL.

​Keyboards/Synthesiser

​Years ago, a single individual claimed: "I can hear a Yamaha CP80 in there. I know, cos I've got one." This delusion persists all over the web, leading others to prattle on about "the keyboards in LTL" to justify their further delusion that it was recorded post-1976.

​For God's sake, the CP80 was a baby electric grand piano weighing 170lbs with a cast iron frame. Imported from Japan, it required two roadies, 15 minutes of assembly, and cost a fortune. It was not used here. [REF 9]

​Neither was there any synthesizer. Audio analysis indicated that the wavy, string-like sound was a byproduct of tape wow and flutter, the slide guitarist's swell pedal, and overtones between the rhythm and slide guitars.

​Furthermore, late-60s pop-folk could never have included a synthesizer. The Moogs and ARPs of that era were monophonic (one note at a time), producing sci-fi sounds suited to acid pop. They were the size of upright pianos and prohibitively expensive. [INSERT PIC] https://www.reddit.com/r/electronicmusic/comments/oh80vc/hans_zimmer_and_his_moog_modular_synthesizer_1970/

​Smaller, polyphonic string synths did not exist until 1979–1983. This chronology precludes their use on this. All three sound engineers agree: there is NO keyboard or synthesizer in the LTL recording.

​Other Instruments

​There is an intermittent tambourine, played by someone who seems to move toward and away from a room microphone—a clear hallmark of an amateur recording. No professional studio would ever let such inconsistent mic-placement go to master. It was likely the singer or a bystander contributing in the background during overdubs. Rather than a standard round tambourine, the thin tone suggests an Indian-style "jiggle-stick" (straight tambourine), which was highly popular in late-60s folk circles. [PIC]

​Furthermore, what many listeners initially identified as a mandolin in a few bars turned out to be nothing more than poorly mixed guitar fills.

And there is definitely no dulcimer in the mix, regardless of what certain webpages claim.

* * * *

Summary of Instruments and Players

​When combined, each of the above assessments give an overall picture of the band as an ad-hoc ensemble of amateur or maybe semi-professional musos, keeping it cheap and simple for a once-off demo tape.

​I used to think it might have been a budget studio recording with some cheap session players behind the solo singer/songwriter. But the professional studio engineers who have broken down this tape all think not. The playing is far from advanced and the technical aspects—including obvious microphone bleed between instruments—are all too amateurish.

​I've long had a picture of some college kids who maybe played weekend gigs around the folk clubs. They would have played covers of all their fave bands of that era, as I did in my teens. Maybe they borrowed some recording gear from friends and just gave this demo their best shot.

​However, I still find it hard to believe that an average singer, with an innovative fretless bassist, a very competent lead guitarist, and a sleepy two-piece drummer, were actually "a band". I'm more of the opinion that the singer/songwriter roped in some muso friends to help record her self-promoting demo tape.

​When assessing any demo, a talent scout would assess the whole sum of the band for commercial feasibility, as well as look out for any individual member who might jump out of the mix. He might say the band has great potential as a collective entity, or as backing for the front "Star". Or, exactly like Simon Cowell does on America's Got Talent, he might say that one member has great potential but the others are holding him/her back.

​So did the LTL band as a whole, or any specific player, have big standout potential? Doubtful. I would say that neither as an ensemble, nor any one member on this recording, ever went on to musical fame.

​Tracking Down Players and Singer

​Imo, the singer/songwriter had hopes for a solo career, and that LTL was her first and last shot at it. But what happened to them all?

​They may each have continued playing little gigs as semi-professionals until a career change. In the 70s, I knew dozens of "Friday and Saturday Night Wine Bar Musos" who ended up in far better paying day jobs! In the 80s I knew dozens of people who could say "I used to be in a band"! That is what makes the LTL singer, songwriter and players so hard to trace. They never got into Google!

​Maybe innumerable rejections of her LTL demo caused her retirement as she realised she was not good enough for pop fodder for the record companies. Maybe motherhood took her far away from pop fame. Maybe the changing musical genres of the West Coast 70s just weren't her style. A song like LTL was totally out of West Coast vogue by 1972. The move away from experimental folk-pop modulations toward 70s arena rock or 80s synth structures explains why this specific sound became a "lost" genre.

​The other players might have gigged around for years in clubs and pubs just for casual fun, never desiring to get involved with the sordid, rip-off music industry, then retired from playing music ... or maybe not! It's probably not odd that -- if are still alive today -- they'd be aware of the LTL search. Who would care about some 50 year old demo tape you made in college days. That's why a radio campaign for LTL might expose them. Surely, some living bassist must remember this innovative player of the time with his uniquely crafted scroll-head Ampeg AUB-1. The fact that no modern processing can alter the original "dry" frequency response confirms these players are part of a strictly pre-digital analog time capsule. Look it up here >>> [REF 10]

​But the evidence seems clear that no band or solo singer would ever go on to have later recorded some other material we might find online now, yet somehow neglect this great demo song for 50 years. And hence the search for this song or this singer in internet archives is, and has been for 6 years, totally fruitless. But I don't think the path is completely dead yet. But I am convinced we have to look OFF THE INTERNET -- in the memories of those who were there.

​I have previously written that the search must go local, to real people in LA and SF. Sure, the originals may well have died or moved out of town in the interim. Imo, finding witnesses OF THAT TIME, to the folk club performances of this song would be a key.

​Page References

​[7] Bruce Johnson, Ampeg Historian and Luthier. http://www.xstrange.com/

[8] The Seekers, "Morningtown Ride" (live). https://youtu.be/UZ8tdFr1tKk

[9] CP-80 Demo. https://youtu.be/IUUd0Hv4StQ

[10] https://www.myrareguitars.com/bcm-ampeg-aub-bass