In the fall of 1998, Good Mustard entered Millevolte Recording studios in Hartland and recorded the tracks which Good Mustard in its original incarnation had written and played at COS parties. Tha band had morphed from a 6-piece band from Northwestern College in Watertown, WI to a three piece band with Pete Reese living in New Ulm, MN, Benj Lawrenz living in Watertown and going to school in Mequon, WI and Bob Buss living and teaching in Oakfield, WI. The band had recorded its three song demo (Rebirth, Sealplug Records 1998) and sold enough to continue documenting the band's extensive catalog before seeking to tour in the summer and fall of 1999 and beyond in a new millenium. Band members traveled to Hartland over the course of several months for late night recording sessions with VInny Millevolte at the controls and introducing Ray Fister to the mixing and mastering sessions. Both are recording engineers of renown. These connections were thanks to Dan Gieschen, who was a big logistical supporter of the band and was in some ways a Mr Henry to the band's early efforts to plunge out of Lutheran college obscurity into the underground rock and roll scene of the greater midwest. The band had spent an entire summer at Camp Calamus 2 on Huth Family Farms of Oakfield, rehearsing on the edge of the Horicon Marsh and playing gigs in Fond du Lac, Oshkosh, Appleton, and several legendary COS parties and a pig roast with Luke thompson's band Dustradio, which included future Koine drummer Seth Koch. This secret operation, dubbed Professor Trith (Pig ROast From The Rooster - In The House) was declassified recently. All of these operations as well as the band's starry-eyed boyishness were all inspired by the movie Bottle Rocket. Mr. Henry is also a reference to the film. While booking shows, Benj would call bookings claiming to be manager Bob Fox from Sealplug Records (a reference to Bob's backed up shower in the Levorson farmhouse in Oakfield). THe band' smythology grew along with its Greek influenced themes of Dionysian revelry and a more philosophical approach to the usual themes of rock and roll, all viewed through a Christian conscience. This album centers around the various self-destructive tendencies of a libido-centered existence. The lyrics are cryptic and explore the logic and reasoning of a young man on the prowl. International Dream Lover longs for a girlfriend absent as an international foreign exchange student. Third Star takes a teenage narrative to a clumsy rounding of the bases \"sending me to hell\", Tiajuana contains quotes from Mankato club scene/meat market when the band played Buster's, Pluto's, and a few other college clubs in 1996-1999 all with rockabilly guitar solos written Pete Reese. Pancho Villa is a villainous womanizer's tale who is incapable of love and conquests all leading to violent death. Sancho and Quixote is the opposite side, focusing on the stuff of sappy romances smashed with the reality of life's need for genuine trust, love, and square thinking for survival. The song Speakeasy replays several scenes from Mankato clubbing days and contains veiled references to bands with whom gm played: DazyHedMazy, the Void, Leap 27, and others. (Face of the) Spy (translated Das Gesicht des Spion) is a mirror gazing session in which the protagonist justifies a double life in a Jeckyl and Hyde sort of conflict. The band's eponymous song recalls days of grassers, pig roasts and COS parties, living in a haze of whatever sort and seeking to juice up the party with fierce southern rock guitar solos from Dan Gieschen who also appears on Third Star. Carnival is a haunting guitar duet whose engineering adds to its genius, no effects in recording or mastering outside of the concrete and glass stairwell used for recording. Lady 'Lectric Light wraps all of the themes together with the cryptic line, \"When we pretend like angels, we're half way home\" yet fails to define whether those angels be good or bad and to which home they lead, yet parades the album to a close, hailing \"Goodbye, Lady'Lectric Light.\" Good Mustard was formed in the years that six theology students went to college together and recorded and toured when two left plus another drummer took those themes to the world for a few years. The small mountain of studio recordings the band produced while self-recording in aptly named Bottle Rocket Studios continue to twist and contort style and mindset to seek truth and outreach to a conflict-laden world. The band never released this magnum opus due to financial strains and focus on new material and recordings. Until now. Remastered and levels fixed, enjoy this relic from the end of analog recording days!
