CLOSE-UP : THE CINERAMA SINGLES (Part 5)

A GUEST SERIES by STRANGEWAYS

Close Up: The Cinerama Singles #5 :  Disco Volante singles (2)

The year 2000 had been a prolific and highly creative year for Cinerama. LP #2 Disco Volante had been backed, as was usual, by fairly extensive touring across the mainland UK and out to the USA. In addition, a compilation of John Peel sessions had been released.

The DJ had been an enthusiastic and instrumental supporter of The Wedding Present from the band’s earliest days and this patronage had carried across to the new group. Now Peel got just what he always wanted: a song that, beyond his incalculable influence as a broadcaster, he himself had directly made happen.

Your Charms, inspired by a chat/challenge between Peel and David Gedge on the nature of old song titles, had begun life as a Peel session track in June of 2000

mp3: Cinerama – Your Charms (Peel Session, June 2000)

Subsequently re-recorded and appearing on Disco Volante, Your Charms was effervescent and catchy, lifted by a sing-along chorus and therefore absolutely prime single material. Resplendent with a summery sheen, there’s an argument that this song, and not Lollobrigida, should have been announcing the new LP.

mp3: Cinerama – Your Charms

B-sides? First up was Reel 2, Dialogue 2 – its title a subtle nod to the origins of the bleeping Star Wars droid R2D2. The space references begin and end there though, with David Gedge and bandmate Sally Murrell swapping lead vocals in a sort of call-and-response dialogue concerning the familiar foibles of the heart. It’s solid enough, and it’s good to hear Sally M’s plaintive vocal unfettered by harmonies or battling with instrumentation amid which it could be easily lost.

mp3: Cinerama – Reel 2, Dialogue 2

Girl on a Motorcycle – another of a zillion Gedge titles pinched from films – is ace. A winner of a chorus stays with you long after the song has zoomed off into the distance, plus Murrell’s accompanying ahhhs are so much more the sum of their parts.

mp3: Cinerama – Girl On A Motorcycle

Finally, for reasons of trainspotting and pedantry, it’d be remiss at this point not to mention that the single version of Your Charms clips a short pre-song patch of dialogue heard on the album take.

mp3: Cinerama – Superman

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s Superman. The fourth and final Disco Volante single from Cinerama.

The likes of Lollobrigida had tried its best to stretch and pull at my own shamefully narrow musical preferences. But in short order Superman, clothed in a more recognisable and comforting get-up, swooped down as if to scoop me far from the accordion.

To be honest, good song that it is, I’ve always found the words and overall sentiment of Superman to be a bit too self-pitying. That said, I do admire the entrance into the plot of the Man of Steel and the applying of the familiar comic-book phrase ‘that’s a job for Superman’ to a breakup issue rather than to one of global significance. Illustrating again a real purple patch for Sally Murrell contributions, her backing harmonies add texture throughout, whilst more substantial, if brief, vocals are latched onto the closing seconds.

Flips are Starry Eyed, its tinkling keyboard sections, its pace and prominent distorted guitar parts perhaps previewing what would be a switch in Cinerama’s sound.

Segueing on the CD single with little or no break from Starry Eyed is a corker: a cover of Yesterday Once More, the lovely song made famous by The Carpenters. This Cinerama take introduces things with several seconds of crackling, channel-hopping radio and the whole thing, with guitars-a-plenty is how you might imagine The Wedding Present tackling such a task. It’s recommended if you haven’t heard it.

mp3 : Cinerama – Starry Eyed
mp3 : Cinerama – Yesterday Once More

Worth mentioning is the Spanish-language version of Superman (Superman Versión en Español to give it its nombre del domingo). This was released on Scopitones as a limited seven-inch – all pressed up on thick green vinyl: the colour, it now strikes me, of Kryptonite.

mp3: Cinerama – Superman Versión en Español

Your B-side was Dura, Rápida y Hermosa (known in another life as Hard, Fast and Beautiful – one of the key tracks from debut LP Va Va Voom). This studio take – again in Spanish – is preceded by a clip of amusing gig banter.

mp3: Cinerama – Dura, Rápida y Hermosa

The four Disco Volante singles, their B-sides, and those Spanish-language takes are collected on the Cinerama Holiday compilation. This was released by Scopitones in 2002.

Trivia Time : Chansons dans d’autres langues

Superman, with is comic-book connection, and those Spanish versions of a couple of tracks, was only continuing tradition, really, where Gedge compositions are concerned.

As early as 1988, The Wedding Present – disguised as Cadeau De Mariage – released another limited seven-inch: Pourquoi Es Tu Devenue Si Raisonnable? – a French-language version of Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now? Since then, other non-English-language takes, in a list unlikely to be exhaustive, have included:

In French, Cinerama, 2001: Health and Efficiency

In French, Cinerama, 2002: Lollobrigida

In German, Cinerama, 2004: Erriner Dich

In French, The Wedding Present, 2012: Deer Caught in the Headlights, End Credits, Metal Men, and Mystery Date

In German, The Wedding Present, 2013: Back A Bit… Stop!, The Girl From the DDR, You Jane and 524 Fidelio

In Welsh, The Wedding Present, 2014: 1000 Fahrenheit, Meet Cute, Journey Into Space, and Can You Keep a Secret?

And of course, a whole LP of Ukrainian-language folk songs (Wedding Present, 1988)

Pow!

As for comics and superhero references, I wouldn’t even attempt a full list, but in addition to Superman, connections across either LP/song titles or within lyrics have offered:

Bizarro – (Wedding Present, 1989)

Brassneck – (Wedding Present, 1989)

Dan Dare – (Wedding Present, 1991)

Catwoman – (Wedding Present, 1994)

Flame On – (Wedding Present, 1994)

Real Thing – (Wedding Present, 1996)

Cat Girl Tights – (Cinerama, 2002)

Santa Ana Winds – (Wedding Present, 2008)

Spider-Man on Hollywood – (Wedding Present, 2008)

Hulk Loves Betty (Wedding Present, 2008)

Metal Men (Wedding Present, 2012)

Connected, kind of, with these is Tales From The Wedding Present – billed as David Gedge’s autobiography in comic-book form. Recounted by the band and associates, and illustrated by Lee Thacker, these are well worth a read.

The separate issues have all but sold out, but gathering and supplementing all of the original comic material, an anthology has been released.

You want it darker? Next up, Cinerama enters a new stage. One that would bring Gedge closer than ever to territory largely unvisited for six-plus years. It was the beginning of a phase whose sound was increasingly glancing back whilst moving forward and would eventually, logically, culminate in the return to the indie scene of a very familiar name.

And on that unnecessarily dramatic note, thanks as ever to JC and all readers.

strangeways