KJN: What about the Chemical Playschool cassettes? 

EK: Well the first one, One & Two, that was recorded after we were in existence a year, and it was meant to document that first year of existence. We made 25 copies — they all went to America with a distributor called Eurock, who really helped us in the early days. And, um, then we accidentally jammed over the master tape, and it was lost for about six or seven years — even we didn’ t have a copy. Then someone tracked one down — and sent us a copy of it — so we were able to re-release it and sort of like, Aaahh! Finally we can hear it again! 

Three & Four was like a real ... yeah, it was an extremely ambitious and altruistic thing — in that we would make 83 copies of Chemical Playschool Three & Four, this three-hour-long extravaganza — which were each hand-equalized as well as run off — you know, every copy was listened to and equalized, sort of like — and each with hand-made covers. And we’ d sell them for £5 each, which was literally the price it cost to make them. What we forgot about was the postage — and so for every tape we sold we lost a pound on. And, um, it actually, sort of like, people were sort of like, saying, “Aagh, you bastards ... Why 83 copies? Aagh, it’s terrible! Aagh, no ...” So we took it up to 120, still losing a pound each time we made one — and then we thought, We’ ve got to stop it! We’ re losing a fortune on this! We never thought of increasing the price ... And, um, ultimately we re-released it and sort of like made it a price where, sort of like, we actually made a little bit from it rather than lost every time, you know. It still goes, you know — it’ s like an old war horse. The best cassette release was Chemical Playschool Three & Four. 

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