Kristen's Blues by The Maudlins

This is the first album by the Maudlins, and it has taken many twists and turns over the years.

After our first live show in late 2017, George and I got together over a few sessions to record most of what was our live set at the time. Our bass player, Anthony, wasn’t available for some forgotten reason so I ended up playing bass.

These early recordings weren’t intended to be an album, perhaps a new demotape to secure some live shows when I returned from my travels over the summer of 1997 – 98. After Duane joined in early 1998, we recorded songs like ‘Supermarket Girl’ and ‘Maggie’s Song’ with his bass parts. The remaining songs are all from the earlier 1997 sessions.
We released this on CD sometime in late 1998. (‘Released’ = a couple of copies with photocopied covers in the local band section of Big Star Records in Rundle Street, Adelaide.) A few more copies were sold at gigs and given away to friends and enemies.

The original release was much longer, including songs like ‘Airshow Disaster’, ‘My Friend Austin’, ‘Antenna’, and some songs from our early live set that I have omitted due to poor audio quality and mediocre songwriting. I digitised the original tapes sometime around 2007, and mixed the stronger songs with the original vocal performances and no additional overdubs.

I found the cover photo somewhere in a junk store or secondhand market in Adelaide.

Orphan Train Project is a musical journey that that began thirty years ago in the secluded hills above Adelaide, South Australia. First records were made on busted tape decks on a bedroom floor. Years passed. I lived in different places. All Orphan Train Project songs and recordings can be used under the Creative Commons Attribution licence.