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In that historical musical backdrop, a new band called Delay Tactics emerged from the St. Louis, Missouri area in the early 1980s. The two Delay Tactics vinyl LP’s released made a sizable impact on music fans, especially those that lived by the bible of new music information of the early and mid 1980s, called Option Magazine (formerly OP magazine). Among their many fine album reviews, Option championed Delay Tactics as being a most promising new music entity. Yet, by the close of the ‘80s Delay Tactics had become a fond memory, no doubt another promising band of musical prodigies that were overran like many other great musical imprints of the era by the sheer onslaught of compact disc “reissues” that began swamping the music world by 1985.
Over the course of his many fine solo albums, Carl Weingarten has proven to be one of the most prolific and versatile guitarists in the US today, while in 2024 David Udell released a pop meets prog masterpiece It’s Worth It, the best album of his relatively underrated solo career. This 2024 double-disc Delay Tactics CD reissue on Weingarten’s Multiphase label sets the record straight, containing both Out-Pop Options and Any Questions? along with 10 never before heard bonus tracks spread over the course of the album set. A long overdue look back on the origins of this overlooked band of American music pioneers, the double CD reissue on Multiphase Records presents a rare sonic snapshot of the initial music by Delay Tactics.
mwe3.com presents an interview with Walter Whitney, Carl Weingarten and David Udell of DELAY TACTICS WALTER WHITNEY mwe3: How do you look back on the first Delay Tactics album? Walter Whitney: Regarding Out-Pop Options I would say generally we wanted to do something progressive and a bit different without being too alienating and abstract. Hence the chosen name. mwe3: 42 years later, what do you remember best about recording the album? Walter Whitney: At the time I met Carl I had a 1/2" Scully 4 track demo studio at my house and he came over to do some tracking for a project he was working on. After a few visits we discovered we both were on the same page musically. We were both into Crimson and Eno, Talking heads etc… but wanted to keep it instrumental using the occasional vocalist just as another instrument not using anything lyrically.
Walter Whitney: Carl brought in Reed Nesbit with his what I called "Aztec" guitar skills. "Yellow Samba" really illustrates his sound. mwe3: Can you tell us some reflections of your favorite early Delay Tactics tracks? Walter Whitney: We kept it very simple doing most of the tunes with just the 4 tracks. “5 PM Expressway” also shows Reed’s playing against an Arp 2600/sample rhythm and Carl's gliding slide work. “On The Roll” features an amazing funk bass player, Jim Mayer, who among others was in Jimmy Buffet's band for years - definitely overkill skills for such simple music but a guy's got to make a living! I remember starting the tune "Journey To Omdurman" by stealing a drum track from one of those thin floppy demo disks for a Linn drum machine and half speeding it with some FX. Reed adding a chord progression. "Le Need De Viperes" was something Carl and I did live a couple times where Carl played guitar and I altered things with a bank of FX. "Cymbolia" was what I would consider our single of the album. Mostly me on synths. "Rommie Dancing" - more Reed on Aztec guitar, Carl on slide, me on drum machine and Gato Drum/percussion. "Pterodactyl" is one of my favorites! Carl on slide, Jim Meyer bass, and me playing a sample of a fuzz guitar note on a very simple Electro Harmonix one note early sampler. Carl making the sweeping dinosaur sounds! When Reed Nesbit left and moved to Indiana we sought a replacement and found David Udell, who is quite different from Reed. It reminded me of Pink Floyd replacing Syd Barrett with David Gilmore. There were some parallels. I hope this helps. - Walter Whitney
CARL WEINGARTEN mwe3: Can you say something about the 2024 2-CD Delay Tactics reissue? Carl Weingarten: The Delay Tactics albums have been out of print since the late 1980s. I still receive letters from fans asking about the recordings and have seen the LPs sell for collectors' prices on eBay, Discogs, and in other record stores. After recording the reunion album Elements of Surprise in 2022, I thought it was time to bring the first two albums back into print. mwe3: Is this the first time both of the early Delay Tactics albums have been released on CD? Carl Weingarten: I did a short run of the first two Delay Tactics albums on CD in the early 2000s. They sold out and we never repressed them. mwe3: Can you compare the new 2-CD set to the reissues of both albums that came out in the UK a few years ago? Carl Weingarten: The Emotional Rescue LP Imperfect Strangers is a best-of album. I lobbied for LPs of both albums, but they weren’t interested. mwe3: How did you find the Emotional Rescue label and did they only issue the vinyl on a best-of? Carl Weingarten: The owner contacted me and offered to reissue several titles from the catalog on LPs. They released Dreaming In Colors, which was great. It sold well, but they didn't follow through with the other titles aside from the Delay Tactics compilation. The new double CD set we’ve released is a complete and fully remastered edition of both albums, plus extras. mwe3: There are ten bonus tracks on the 2024 remastered double CD reissue. Where did you find the bonus tracks and is this the first time they've seen the light of day? Carl Weingarten: Between 1982 and 1986, we were writing and recording music all the time. We ended up with a lot of material that never got released. Several of those tracks were intended for Any Questions?, but they were not included on the original LP because we could only fit 20 minutes of music per side. It wasn’t that big of a deal, as David, Walt, and I had already started work on a third album.
In the meantime, I hung on to the tracks we had finished. Some were released on compilation tapes, like The Urban Cabaret Series of 1980s St. Louis bands. Everything else was archived and stored away. I wanted this new reissue to be as complete a document of the band as possible, so the best of those tracks are included. We’re offering two versions. The first is the 2CD set for listeners who just want the two albums and bonus tracks. The second is a 40th Anniversary Box that has all three CDs, plus a live disc. mwe3: Tell us about the Live At River Styx Poetry Series CD. Is that a live Delay Tactics concert that you're releasing in the box set? Carl Weingarten: Yes, the live CD is exclusive only to the box set. Reed Nesbit and I started out by playing in movie theaters between matinee shows. There were gigs in art galleries and one at the St. Louis Art Museum. David and I were the opening act one evening at Mississippi Nights, a rock venue in St. Louis, and later for a dance rave at the Anchor Masonic Temple. We recorded all our gigs, but very low tech, usually just plugging a two-track recorder into the soundboard. The River Styx show was an exception. It was one of the better recordings and was a good night for us in front of many friends and local fans. We played songs from our albums like “Under The Ice”, “Cymbolia”, “Basic Tactic”, and “Between Clouds" from Windfalls, plus new songs like “Big Sound". David was in great form, but the highlight, in my opinion, was Walt’s solo piece, “K9 from M9”. Brilliant. - Carl Weingarten
David Udell track-by-track interview about the 1984 Delay Tactics album: Any Questions? "Pterodactyl" – Our high energy album opener. I got to experiment with my wah-wah. All I really remember was Carl's screaming guitar at the end. I said it sounded like the pterodactyl at the end of the Johnny Quest cartoon. Carl said, "There's our title!" "Hands On Fire" – Walt had an old analogue sequencer that we ran cymbals through as the piece faded out. I loved that. I wonder if he still has it. I have a small part on this. I added the pop synth hook. I think I was trying to give it a Talking Heads groove. Carl asked how I'd like to be credited. I said, "Just say synthesizer." We got a great write-up in Keyboard Player Magazine and they credited me with all the synths. Poor Walt, after all that spectacular synth work, I got the credit. "Oysters" - I was listening to Tom Tom Club and really liked Adrian Belew's panned delay guitar on “Genius Of Love.” Walt had a really cool little synth with a keyboard that was just drawn on… No actual keys. I played a simple hook on it and panned it like Belew's part. Had a blast working with Joan Bouise on the vocal part. She asked for ideas about overdubbing her part. I suggested singing it in rounds like “Row Your Boat”. She ran with it.
"Almost Touching" – The guys had a groove they'd recorded with Jimmy Mayer on fretless bass. I thought plenty of great songs were made from a simple groove. Walt and Carl told me to do something with it. I gave it a song format with a chord progression using keyboard strings. I have a huge ego and have always dreamed of achieving artist genius. Never quite made it but my fingertips have brushed up against it. That's where the song's title comes from. "Kites" – I had been listening to Jade Warrior at the time so the song's title is a shout out to them. I programmed the drum machine. I was trying to get a King Sunny Ade groove. If you try to get something specific, you'll never achieve it. I'm happy with that. I think it became something unique. I also tried to get a Country & Western sort of guitar at the end. "Under The Ice" – I used to make music for my mom every Christmas. I was trying to come up with an idea for a song that could play like ambient electronic winter chimes on a loop playing in the background. With that in mind, Carl wanted me to lay down a guitar tape loop to build a piece from. In those days we were still using 2 tape decks. Before the song’s release, we performed it live for a TV show and I play fretless bass. I think we called it “Antarctica”. I was going for a Percy Jones sort of bass part. Walt had an African Gato drum I got to play too. There's a lovely dance video of it by Suzanne Grace. “Trio” and “Spring Man” – I don't remember much about these. One of them is the only piece I was ever on with Reed Nesbit. I never got close to Reed. I always felt like he viewed me with suspicion. We were both extras on the John Carpenter movie “Escape From New York”. We eyed each other from a distance and never spoke. Our parts illustrated our differences perfectly. He was a prim, futuristic looking New Wave character and I was a grungy, long haired, bearded hippy.
To sum it all up, I think my replacing Reed took us in a slightly different direction. My real love is song writing so I usually give the music a bit of song structure. I think that's why we were compared to Eno's song albums. I fell in love with Out Pop Options the moment I heard it and wanted to be part of it. I wish I had gotten a little closer to Reed. – David Udell Thank you to Carl Weingarten, David Udell and Walter Whitney
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Remember the 1980s? Without the internet of today and the ease with which people these days find out about new and old music at the touch of a computer keyboard, music fans had to search high and low for new sounds, back when it really mattered. For alternative rock and even progressive rock fans scouring the new music bins in the early 1980s, life was both a challenge and a veritable adventure. College radio ruled and then reliable NPR stations like WNYC and WXPN in Philly and KCRW in L.A. took chances on and lauded new vinyl releases, especially compared to the world of college radio today, and the early 1980s music playlists reflected that. Back then, for example WXPN in Philly would print weekly or bi-monthly “tear sheets” that had charts of their most played albums.
It was in that musical environment at the end of the 1980s when technology and CD “reissues” would soon replace forward musical evolution. It was also in that early to mid 1980s era that Delay Tactics lived, worked and exited, only to be reborn 40 years later. The early Delay Tactics lineup featured on their 1982 debut Out-Pop Options included guitarists Carl Weingarten and Reed Nesbit and Walter Whitney with David Udell replacing Reed on the second Delay Tactics album, 1984’s Any Questions? It's a tribute to their ever evolving musical directions, that the Weingarten, Whitney, Udell lineup resurfaced nearly 40 years later on the band’s 2022 comeback album Elements Of Surprise.
mwe3: How about the early member Reed Nesbit?
We finished several new songs, and things were moving along with reviews, local TV and airplay nationally. The pressure was on to start touring, but we had never thought seriously about that, nor had the money to finance a tour. So the three of us decided to take a break, and we never regrouped to finish that third project.
"On Green Waters" – This was always one of my faves. Walt had just gotten an EMU Drumulator drum machine. We had the luxury of separate outputs so we ran the cowbell through a delay. Totally spaced it out, giving it a Pink Floyd-y sound. One of my favorite recorded pieces was the coda from King Crimson's “Larks Tongues In Aspic”. Right after the climax of the crescendo it fades with infinite voices. I wanted to get that effect coming out of the sustain of a cymbal. Walt had a gong so we used that. It didn't produce the effect I wanted but we loved how it came out. Voices of humanity in infinite space.