Thanks, dontlookdown.
Let me address a couple of the things you said in your post.
"I'm actually really surprised that it's taken this long for this stuff to see the light of day. I guess we have the internet to thank!"
This single dates from '68/'69, so it saw the light of day back when it was newly (or fairly recently) recorded. How it got released under the name Sincerely, San Jose apparently without the band members knowing it - Javier Pacheco says in the Q&A that he doesn't think anything was commercially released by Fritz - is anybody's guess. Do we know if Fritz had a change in managers during that time period? If so there's always a chance that the original ousted manager sold the masters to Karma Records for cash which he then pocketed (the name "given" to the band kind of sounds like a goodbye salutation from a letter, possibly meaning the original manager's "parting shot"). Anyway, that's only one possible - and I emphasize possible - scenario.
And yes, we do have the internet to thank for me being able to make the connection of Fritz to this single (and as far as I know I'm the first to discover it though the record's been out there for some 3 1/2 decades). Before the internet there wasn't much info on Fritz out there.
"It's pretty clear that this indicates that there is more out there."
Well, we know there's one other song from the same 1968 San Mateo demo session - "Wondering Why" with a Stevie Nicks lead - and Pacheco says he has live tapes of the band. Oh, and there's Stevie's demos from the Fritz period, but those aren't full band recordings. Pacheco doesn't mention any other Fritz sessions in his Q&A, so we really don't know right now if there may be more stuff out there. We know he wrote quite a few songs for the band, and if "You Don't Get Young Anymore" is any indication of the quality then I'd love to hear more too.
"Knowing Lindsey and his attention to detail and perfection, you'd think he has all these masters somewhere up in the attic - or at his parents house...."
I have to say that I don't think this is particularly likely. When this was recorded Lindsey was only 19 years old or so and probably wasn't the perfectionist that he later became. It was probably one of his first, if not the first, times in a studio, and he was probably thrilled just to be there. You have to objectively look at it in perspective with what was going on at the time. Pacheco says these were just demos, and I'll bet he'll be as surprised as anyone to find out that they had been released. As far as Lindsey having the masters now, I'm sure he wasn't thinking about making sure he had the masters so that he'd have them when the box set of his work was compiled. :-) I would think it's more likely that the manager at the time had them.
And then there's the issue of what you mean by masters, because there will be at least three sets of masters - the original multitracks (probably 4- or 8-track, with the vocals being done as overdubs), the mixdown masters (most likely done only in mono, but I'd love to find out that stereo mixdowns were prepared as well!), and the final "mastered" masters from which acetates and records could be cut. It's possible that the multitracks were left at the studio (something The Beach Boys did way too often; when their box set came out back in 1993 they found the 8-track vocal session tape for "California Girls" at Columbia Studios in Hollywood; now it's back in their custody where it belongs. And the 8-track vocal session tape for "Good Vibrations" is currently lost because it was probably left at the same studio and now can't be found, so a true stereo mix of "Good Vibrations" is currently an impossibility). It's also possible the mixdowns were left at the studio and that the only copies the band or manager took were the final "mastered" copies. All pure speculation, but quite possible. Hopefully someone will do a follow-up interview with Javier Pacheco or maybe one of the other members of the band that can shed more light on all of this.
"Maybe we'll get a nice boxed set of vintage Buckingham Nicks someday."
How long have we waited for the Buckingham Nicks album to be issued on CD now?
I'd love to see these Fritz tracks get a legit reissue as part of some historical set, even if it had to be mastered from vinyl (btw, the single I have is in very nice shape). And I'd love to see what Lindsey and Stevie thought of these tracks once they heard them anew. Both tracks enhance their legacy, and we all know that that isn't always the case when you hear early tracks by performers who later became famous.
Jeff
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