In the year 2023 I finally got to ask Burns what truly happened to his unreleased EP Deep Sea Recovery Efforts. I was quite nervous to get up to the microphone, but I am very proud of myself of even making an attempt to talk to him. There are captions for the video so please turn those on if you want to better understand what we were saying. GalaxyCon also uploaded their own video if you want to watch the whole panel. I appear around 20:50.

What I came here to talk about is his reasoning behind why he decided not to release this EP. My initial guesses were that maybe he didn't like it or maybe he didn't feel that there was any interest for it. I did watch a few panels of his from other conventions that he attended and when asked about his music he would often joke that only his mom bought a copy of Songs For Dustmites which gave me the impression he feels that people don't care for his music. I do know that it is only a simple joke, but I do hope that my and other's expression of appreciation and love for his music during his current fame renaissance helps him understand that more people listen to his music than he thinks. I think it was quite interesting how we had opposite opinions of this EP and were surprised by each other.

I want to share the track listing so you can easily refer back to it when reading through this page. I really do not know if this is the order that it is supposed to be in, but this is what we have and this is how it has been presented to us. Also, if you haven't already, go listen to the EP before you venture forth.

Let's get into the first thing that he touched upon which is that he thought it didn't sound cohesive and didn't sound like an album to him. In regards to the lyrics, I understand where he is coming from here because if we do compare it to Songs For Dustmites you can see that it lacks this central theme that his first album has. Unfortunately, I don't have the lyrics to all of these songs and I can't understand him at some parts so I can't connect all of them together in a more proper manner to try and find something that links all of them together. Songs For Dustmites has this overarching story that I feel you can really envision if you sit down and take the time to analyze the lyrics. I always interpreted the album as to be about this man who gains this newfound super power and is unsure of how to deal with that and how this affects the relationship that he has with others. Usually I only see people have this interpretation when it comes to the first song "Mighty Little Man," but it really continues on into the other songs. Of course, you might interpret it in a different way, but that is always how I viewed it to be. Deep Sea Recovery Efforts could have some sort of sea theme to it if only more songs had mentioned different bodies of water. The only song that does mention the sea is "The Newton Creek Song" unless some of the other ones do I just don't hear it.

When it comes to the musical aspect of this EP, I always felt that all the songs worked together. Perhaps it feels this way to me because I am used to this track listing that I just never thought of a way that it could be different. Also, I am not a music person so I lack the knowledge when it comes to being able to talk about the specifics, but I will try my best to explain what I hear from the perspective of a regular music enjoyer. I think of "Projecting," "The Unbeliever," and "Leviticus" as sister songs. Those three really work together and all have that very fuzzy guitar tone. "The Newton Creek Song" also has that fuzzy guitar tone, but it isn't loud like the other ones. For that song, I really enjoy the climbing part in the second half. I like to whistle and hum along with that whenever I listen to it. "Tiger Tiger" is probably one that feels like an outlier perhaps because of the space noise solo. On most of his songs he likes to have these programmed noises that lie within the underbelly of the song so this part of the song isn't surprising, it's just very prominent which is something that he hadn't done before except possibly with the song before this one, "A Slightly Bigger Space," despite them being quite different from each other. Personally I wouldn't count it. I really love this drums on "Tiger Tiger." It is my favorite off of the EP and I always imagine this song to be one of those songs that bands would love to elongate and have an everchanging improvised mixture within a live show especially during that space noise part. You could really keep going with those programmed noises and those drums together. Those programmed parts within each song is one of those things that really ties the whole EP together for me.

One thing that I noticed is that there is a lack of really quiet songs on this EP. I would categorize "Strange," "A Slightly Bigger Space," and "Lords of Cobble Hill" as being the quieter songs. They still aren't quiet like ">1," "Stick Around," and "A Reason" from Songs For Dustmites, but they're just the EP equivalent to those. "Strange" is such a great cover and I truly commend Burns for making his covers unique and his own instead of trying to recreate it the exact same way that it sounds especially with his cover of "Dead" by They Might Be Giants. I really love the addition of the female backing vocals within this cover, he should have had her (I assume it's Mary Fridmann) on more of his songs. I always love female backing vocals and I advocate for more female backing vocals within rock songs. There is cello on a few of these songs and possibly some other strings which is nice to hear because I really liked the strings on Songs For Dustmites. I also enjoyed the inclusion of an instrumental song on here. Songs For Dustmites did have an instrumental song with "Music For Montgomery County, PA," but that song is a lot different than "A Very Troubled Day." I know there are vocals within this song which could mean that it truly is not instrumental, but I view this as an instrumental song with the way that the vocals are used. The voice is an instrument no matter what others may say and there are different ways it can be used. The vocals within this song lack any actual words and it blends in with the other instruments so, to me, this song is completely instrumental. I think instrumental songs are always great to have as an album opener or closer and I do enjoy an album even more when one is added. I think they can show off the song writing skills that a band has since there aren't any words to rely on to keep the song going.

I do wonder what parts of this EP isn't cohesive enough for him, which song or songs would he feel doesn't fit. Another thing that he said about the EP was that it sounded a little vanilla for him and too polished. I don't think I can agree with him on them being vanilla unless someone can point out to me which parts of these songs feel too safe and could have been expanded upon better. I think these songs are pretty rocking and I do think they fit well within his canon. If I had to choose which song I think would be the boring song on the EP then I would choose "Lords of Cobble Hill" for that. I am wincing as I type this. I wouldn't truly say that it is boring or vanilla, but it just keeps going. I am not one to complain about the length of a song, though. I like that Burns isn't afraid to go over three minutes and I think he uses his time quite wisely. You never notice that most of these reach four minutes. I also can't say anything about them being too polished because what we have of these songs are lower quality mp3s so I can't truly compare the production of them to Songs For Dustmites when I am unable to hear it. I also do not know what to look for when someone says a song is too polished or over produced.

One thing that I do want to say about Burns' music in general is that I love how the vocals are mixed in. With a lot of rock music, especially within punk and metal, I feel that the vocals are way too high up in the mix and really should not be that way. The instruments get muffled and so quiet while the vocals become the only thing that can be heard well. It's rock music, why can I not hear the guitar solo? I saw this complaint with a few Amazon reviews for the initial release of Songs For Dustmites where people were wanting to hear his vocals more, but a lot of those reviewers were saying that they usually don't listen to this type of music so they aren't ones that I would personally take any criticism from.

Last thing that he said was Songs For Dustmites sounds more like The Flaming Lips which is something I would agree with him on, but only in regards to how The Flaming Lips sounded within that era of the late 1990s and early 2000s. Burns is one of the rare musicians out there who is willing to compare himself to other bands and to his influences and really REALLY wants to sound like them. Bands usually hate it when you lump them in with other bands. I am not much of a fan of The Flaming Lips, but I do understand why a lot of people love them and how they've cultivated this big following. Since Songs For Dustmites was recorded within the tail end of the recording sessions for Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and there are obvious influences from that within Burns' album, would you argue the way that Deep Sea Recovery Efforts ended up had to do with the way that At War with the Mystics was made? This is just something to think about. Burns also said that Songs For Dustmites felt more like the impulse that he had while writing the songs and with the newer stuff it was lost in the production process. I would love to hear him expand upon this more. That was the most interesting statement that he made and I wish he could have kept going.

Exciting news for all you Burnsers out there, I have been sent an email from WolverFox who originally uploaded Deep Sea Recovery Efforts onto YouTube! She states that she saw two different torrents of the album on PirateBay in 2010 and compiled them together into one. One torrent included the tracks listed on MySpace and the second one included some of those as well as a few tracks that were never posted there, but were recorded around the same time. She said she recalls "Projecting," "The Newton Creek Song," "The Unbeliever," "Tiger Tiger," and "Lords of Cobble Hill" being the songs that Burns had posted and "Strange," "A Slightly Bigger Space," "Leviticus," and "A Very Troubled Day" were tracks that she found on the torrents. She said "A Very Troubled Day" was the one track not from MySpace that was included on both torrents at the end of the EP so she made that the closing track. She ended up placing "Leviticus" as the penultimate track since it was the second to last track on one of the torrents but not the other.

Her first email influenced me to revisit steveburnsrocks to see if there is anything on there to figure out the true track listing and which songs were uploaded to his MySpace. WolverFox was a teenager at this time and was allowed a very limited amount of time online so there is a possibility she could have been missing some things. This is what was located on the news page of steveburnsrocks. I don't know how closely they were paying attention to what was being uploaded and what was being taken down so some things could be missing. I told her about how "A Very Troubled Day" was taken off his page days later and she said she might remember "Leviticus" being on there.

I did search for the torrents she was talking about. She couldn't remember who uploaded them or what the actual track listings were on them so I tried to see what PirateBay and other sites had. I did find two torrents, however, they both had the same track listing. The main torrent that I found was uploaded in 2009 and had this track listing:

I sent this information to her and she was unsure if this is one of the torrents she found. It is old enough for her to have found it in 2010 so I would assume that this is one of them and the other is just gone now. There is so much mystery to this. Since I found a few different track listings from different places I wanted to put all of them together in the chart down below so you can see where each song has been mentioned.

I really wish I could find that other torrent or at least see what was on it and how the songs were arranged. There's only so much I can figure out about what was on his MySpace and what wasn't. You can't really poke around the site that well in the wayback machine so all I can see is what's on the front page of his profile. Were "Leviticus" and "Strange" on there? Maybe. If you have any information about this abandoned EP then please share it with me.

I also asked WolverFox if she wanted to share her opinion on the reasons why Burns decided not to release Deep Sea Recovery Efforts. Here is what she shared:

After becoming obsessed with Steve Burns' music after discovering Songs For Dustmites in 2007, finding out Steve planned to release Deep Sea Recovery Efforts EP only two years later felt like a huge stroke of luck, as if I became a fan at just the right time. Unfortunately, he never did release the EP, and never said a word as to why (until very recently), which was a huge punch in the gut at the time, and in a way added more mystique to the man himself. Just listening to the tracks on his MySpace, it was obvious that he had some really great tracks, and I doubt he would have had issues with distributing his work, be it physical media or even just as a download.

Steve mentioning that he didn't think that Deep Sea Recovery Efforts had any cohesion is quite an interesting take from him because I can almost understand where he's coming from. Dustmites does seem to have a strange cohesiveness to it, even if it isn't blatantly obvious upon a first listen. I always felt the main theme of Dustmites was about handling insecurity and attempting to understand and control an overwhelming feeling or force in one's life, be it a rocky relationship or simply coming to terms with growing up; under a guise of a superhero story. There's a sense that we too are flying and falling with the protagonist of this story, and through the end we too "fly away" with them at the end of "Henry Krinkle's Lament;" maybe without completely knowing what we will do next, but knowing that soaring above what we've experienced in the past is our next step.

Deep Sea Recovery Efforts does seem to explore similar themes of Dustmites if you frame Dustmites to be about the breakup of a relationship. There's a feeling of bitterness and resentment in the some of the lyrics: "When it's cold outside and the bitches bring you down.... it's easier to leave you in this part of town" (The Newton Creek Song), "Last night I swore I'd find you with your belly to the bar, where you always are" (Projecting). Along with this, there are also a lyrics of not really knowing how to feel about what the end of the relationship could mean, or if this is what the protagonist wants: "Give me strength, give me grace, and a slightly bigger space" (A Slightly Bigger Space), "Maybe I'm just not enough, maybe she's got better things to do" (Tiger Tiger). There may be some hints at the protagonist looking to seek forgiveness for some wrongdoings in the relationship as well, with a track being named "Leviticus." Leviticus was a book in the Old Testament provides means to seek forgiveness for sins and misgivings.

However, unlike Dustmites' superhero framing device, there isn't an overarching theme present in Deep Sea Recovery Efforts that puts the songs into a deeper context. There are themes of a breakup and relationship woes, but nothing to really tie the songs together. I think the biggest issue with this is that we don't really know what the actual track listing of the EP is supposed to be, nor do we know if what has been leaked are the final products that would have been issued on the EP. The title Deep Sea Recovery Efforts itself could be a simple allegory to trying to recover a relationship, but it's possible there would have been a theme about water or the ocean in the EP. If that was supposed to be the case, it didn't go any deeper than referencing water in a couple lines and having one track (The Newton Creek Song) have a title related to water.

It's incredibly hard to say what Steve's vision is, since all we really know is him saying that he didn't feel the songs were cohesive enough for a proper release. Maybe that's true, but I also get the impression that there was something deeper in the songs that maybe he later found he didn't feel comfortable letting the listening public in on. I wish the EP was released, mostly for my own selfish reason of wanting to truly experience what Steve had to offer, but if he didn't think he was ready for us to hear it, that's ultimately up to him as the artist.

I'm just so thankful to have had Steve in my life from watching Blue's Clues as a toddler to his music from Dustmites to Deep Sea Recovery Efforts, to occasional comings and goings online as he checks to make sure we're all doing okay. Steve has taught us to be curious, kind and empathetic, and even gave us some really great music too, what more can we really ask out of the guy?