Memory is a funny thing. This week I did a bunch of reading about Fiona Apple's third album, Extraordinary Machine, and how it had been shelved due to lack of interest from Apple herself, as well as her label. I consumed a bunch of articles about this as if I had never encountered this information before.

A quick search through the (embarrassing) archives yields plenty of posts about the events, as they were happening. Maybe I'm forgiven because that was 14 years ago?

Regardless, here's some worthwhile reads:

• The Untold Story Of Fiona Apple's Extraordinary Machine - great interview with Brian Kehew (Moog Cookbook), who had a direct view of the entire experience from the groundfloor. He worked on When The Pawn..., recorded some bits on the original Brion version and re-recorded the new version. Though, ultimately, even his vision was not honored.
• Shelved: Fiona Apple’s Extraordinary Machine - another play-by-play article on how the album split into two.
• The Jon Brion Version - a reddit thread with a link to a Google Drive containing the supposed abandoned album.

The interesting thing about that last link - particularly when paired with Brian Kehew's insight, is that it's likely not the Brion version. It's a mashup of demos, new pieces and fan added parts. At least, so the story goes.

If you're not into downloading MP3's from a random Google Drive linked off Reddit, you're forgiven. Here's a YouTube playlist version of the supposed record.

If all goes well, I'll write all about this again in another 14 years.