C R E A V O L U T I O N   2 2 :  

T H E   B O N U S   A L B U M

Marc seemed happy with the results, so there ya go. It was an enjoyable visit, I said we should do it again some time, so Marc said "Why don't you record your new album here?" And I said "We're an underground band, we can't afford it." And he said "No, for free." So I said "Seriously?" And he said "No shit." And the rest, as they say, is history. However much I take the piss out of the Thamesmead Rollers, and if I'm honest, I may have made one or two quips over the years, we owe Marc an enormous debt of gratitude for that. The release of "Creavolution" made such a huge difference for myself and M&E and that opportunity was so much down to his kindness and generosity. I'm really pleased his band became so successful, in spite of their being offensive to the ears of genuine music lovers, he deserves that, decent guy. Now I'd better stop being nice about him before he's the one who needs to be wearing an ECG monitor for a day!

MAGIC MOMENTS AT TWILIGHT TIME

► 10. STORM

By the summer of 1995, all ten tracks were finished, mixed down and mastered to DAT. However, one, unfortunately, stood out as a weak point. I have to say, it sounds a lot better 23 years later, away from the panic and stress of the moment, but at the time, we were absolutely sure it had to go. My bad entirely. I was very lucky to have the vocal talents of Inga Leru available to me and wanted to make the best use of them, faked orgasms not withstanding, so I had the idea of juxtaposing a dark and plaintive vocal with the bright 70's style of space disco that had originally been the backing track for "Freedom Overflow". First mistake; it was right at the lower end of Inga's range, so it was nigh on impossible for her to get much emotion into the bottom notes. Against all odds, she still produced the goods, but then comes the second mistake; the juxtaposition simply didn't work, it would have needed a lot more of 'something else' that we just didn't have the time to experiment with. One day, I will come back to this track and do it justice, until then, my apologies to Inga for screwing up and thank you for all the great work you did for us. Incidentally, this track is also the explanation for why the opening tale was at the beginning of track 2; "Storm" was in the middle of the album somewhere, it was originally supposed to open with "Lights Turn Blue". After Leonie had redone the vocals as "The Starship Psychotron" with a rush visit back to Braindead in July, me still working on the lyrics in the way there in the car, we soon realised it didn't fit anywhere. So, it either had to open or close, and we already had the perfect closing track in "Rock & Roll Lifestyle", et voila, opening tale gets relegated to after track 1. Not many people know that...

TMR

► 11. ARMEGGEDON TIME (F.A.M.E. MEGA MIX)

The release date of 25th October 1995 came and went as we found ourselves in a bitter legal battle with the original CD manufacturers, following their doing an absolutely appalling job, which we had quite naturally rejected. It was this hideously poor quality product that inspired Marc Bell to turn out this little gem. He'd recently been working with Mike Westergaard, of The Blessing, on an album of psyche dance mixes of Thamesmead Rollers tracks. The album was "Ghosts" (M&E 337), released under the TMR banner in the May of 1996. As one of the tracks was a remix of "Armegeddon Time", which included some of my guitar, synths and vocals, he picked it out to do a special mix, complete with just about every digital error he could think of at the time; dropout, distortion, false starts, bad editing and many more. Personally, I think he might have been having a pop at someone, but hey, it's all water under the bridge now. This, Marc notes, is 'Take 5', and is a previously unreleased mix, consider yourselves privileged!

CHEAPO CARD COMPANY

► 12. THE MAGI CRAP (MEGA MIX)

Oh, come on, where's the love in your heart? This one HAD to be here! Wil Walker's cheeky mix up of "Creavolution" opened almost every "M&E Audiozine" from 1997 to 2001, the backwards version closed most as well. Here they are together, for the very first time, together in electric dreams. If this alone is not enough to put you off, you can find more on the Cheapo's OFFICIAL WEBSITE and on their YOU TUBE CHANNEL. Come on then, what are you waiting for?