Why is it that the Carl starter tastes so funny. I followed all the
instructions to the letter and made the billow loaves on this site.
Well nobody likes them. They are o.k. for normal bread but do NOT taste
like the sourdough I grew up with (I know a little about sourdough as I
grew up in San Francisco!).

I think that the possibility here is that this starter may contain
commercial yeast rather than wild yeast cultures so it will NEVER taste
like sourdough. I've looked at older posts here and it seems to be
common that this culture is infoererior to most others in terms of
taste, but is a good riser. Which also makes me think that yes this
culture does contain *some* commercial yeast.

Help!! I need you ppl!