NOW vs LATER
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ca. 1975, Tom Scholz ran around to 47 different studio executives trying to sell his first Boston "demo tape" (which was, obviously of higher sound quality than typical released masters). Of those 47 shot-callers, approximately 47 of them told him that More Than a Feeling and Long Time were unusable. When #48 finally released the album on a lark, it sold 8 million copies -- and then the studio demanded a followup. They figured six months; Scholz figured four years.
He did give them Don't Look Back in a measly two years -- eons in studio time back then -- but resolved to be an "absolute rock" against studio pressure in the future. He took 8 years to give them Third Stage and gloated on the back liner:
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Time to record an album is usually measured in months. After the first two or three years, I began to lose perspective of the months and I discovered other ways to measure progress; one hundred and seventy-five light bulbs burned out in the studio before I did. The record button was pushed nearly one-million times-that's nearly a million chances to accidentally erase something. Over one hundred reels of tape were filled with music. Brad produced over 300 P-pops, and I lost my pick at least a thousand times.
