THE WOW FACTOR

Between 1998 and 2004, David Gedge took a break from The Wedding Present and instead released music under the name of Cinerama.

In essence, it was a duo of the great man (on his releases he was known by his full name of David Lewis Gedge) and his then-girlfriend Sally Murrell, augmented by guest musicians. The initial songs were a long way removed from the guitar-driven indie-pop of TWP, and instead were often heavy on strings, keyboards and lush instrumentation. Lyrically however, they didn’t stray too far away from the subject matters that Gedge is such a master of  – the joys of love, lust and romance, the misery of infidelities and heartbreak and the utter pleasure of revenge. Oh and there was also the occasional belter of a cover version.

The fourth single is an absolute masterpiece.

As you’ll hear, it is one of the songs about infidelity. What I love about this lyric is how the protagonist spends the first two and half minutes detailing all the nagging doubts about cheating on his girlfriend, even as he climbs the stairs to a bedroom. And then…….

…….he utters “But don’t close the door because I’m still not sure.”, after which there is a gap as he makes his mind up. A gap that is about two seconds in length…………….just long enough to let the listener know he’s feeling guilty but just short enough to let the listener know that lust has again triumphed over love.

Song writing of the raw and brutal variety.

mp3 : Cinerama – Wow

The CD single was released back in 2000,  and thanks to the production involving Steve Albini, it’s not a million miles removed from the brilliance of Seamonsters, the classic 1991 LP by TWP. I reckon its one of the best songs David Gedge has ever penned. And the b-sides are rather good as well:-

mp3 : Cinerama – 10 Denier
mp3 : Cinerama – Gigolo

Later on, there was also an near seven-minutes-long  extended version of the single made available on the LP Disco Volante on which the band were now a five-piece, backed with additional musicians on flute, cello, violin, trumpet, french horn and accordion.

mp3 : Cinerama – Wow (extended version)

Wow is a word I expect t0 be using a lot over the next 10 days or so.  Just a matter of hours after this post is published I will be boarding a plane and crossing the Atlantic. My eventual destination is Hilton Head Island in South Carolina where I will playing a lot of golf in the company of some great friends, including occasional TVV contributor Mr John Greer.

Mostly it will be the scenery which leads to the use of the word but hopefully I will also be able to utter it after the occasional spectacularly good hit of the golf ball.

In the meantime, TVV will continue in my absence with the usual weekend and S-WC features interspersed with a short run of old reposts from the old blog before normal service resumes on 14 May.