Chet wrote: sooo much better than what was presented on the E&N record. Here, for the first time, Ride sounds like it would fit perfect on SOTB. thanks again.
Though I comprehend exactly where your remarks are coming from in the sense that the completed version of Ride is much more upbeat and comes across somewhat modernized compared to what comprises Secrets Of The Beehive, I happen to disagree with your point.
Back when the track was finally released on Everything And Nothing, I threw together a resequenced version of SOTB including Ride just for the h*ll of it. Using a program that could even out the levels of the tracks so that the overall sound was consistent throughout and a little more reverb was added to Ride to give it a closer sheen to that of SOTB, I opted to replace Maria with Ride - right in between Boy with The Gun and Orpheus. (Maria is obviously a worthy track, but in my opinion, it is a little too rigidly gothic and electronic {as well as downright spooky

} and reminds me more of the sound of Gone To Earth when listened to amongst the organic sounds of the rest of SOTB.)
In my opinion, the inclusion of the completed version of Ride works strongly on three aspects:
The track includes contributions from the main session players who were prominently featured on SOTB --- Ryuichi Sakamoto, David Torn, Phil Palmer, Mark Isham, Danny Cummings, Danny Thompson, Steve Jansen, as well as the Stringed Orchestra --- a continuity with the rest of the disc is created in respect to that.
For me, the slightly more upbeat feel of Ride works as a fine contrast to the more dour tone of the disc. I happen to really enjoy some sort of contrast, even if I contradict myself for not being all that appreciative of Maria.
Lastly, placing the track in between Boy With The Gun and Orpheus serves to break up the pace --- Both of those tracks are performed in a very similar 6/8 time signature with an acoustically folkish feel. Maria definitely served the same purpose but that particular track goes by much too quickly with it being under 3 minutes. With the 4/4 feel of Ride in between them, there is a duration of 8 minutes between the two tracks, so the similarities in feel that may be detected are buffered by a longer amount of time. [For a similar reason, I opted to place Promise (The Cult Of Eurydice) in between When Poets Dreamed Of Angels and Mother & Child in order to prevent having two songs with a 6/8 feel back to back -- what can I say, being a drummer/percussionist, I happen to notice these trivial things

-- and Waterfront has to be the conclusion to SOTB so Promise needed it's very own position]
But I digress...The point is that, for me and for what I want to hear, the completed version of Ride does fine enough to flesh out my preferred version of SOTB:
September / The Boy With The Gun / Ride / Orpheus / The Devil's Own
When Poets Dreamed Of Angels / Promise (The Cult Of Eurydice) / Mother And Child / Let The Happiness / Waterfront
Try it, believe me, it isn't that bad.
