I am not going to deny that I make full use of the immediate gratification that the internet provides. If some hard-working taper uploads a concert from his hotel room just hours after the concert, I am going to race to bt.etree or DimeADozen and jump on board the torrent. Or if I hear of a “must hear” show, I am going to head over to the Archive and see what I can find. Long gone are the days of waiting a week or two before groveling for tapes, or scouring lists with DeadBase open to once side, one eye on dates and the other eye on the generation and grade of the recording.

I am sure there are quite a number of people who would wax nostalgic about the loss of the trading process, the camaraderie, the research and discovery. And I will admit that I miss those things to some extent. But one aspect of tape trading that has been on my mind recently was the concept of fillers. I absolutely loved fillers. To me, they were like the Stockings on a Christmas Morning. Sure, I made a list of gifts that I was interested in and distributed it to my parents and family — the little surprises, the treats so to speak, were to be found in the Stockings. Fillers were these little treats that came at the end of the large, expected Gifts.

READ ON to find out Jeremy’s favorite fillers, and to list your own…