OR 'Night Version' - limited to 450 copies.
Movietone recorded three Peel sessions, all of which until now have mystifyingly remained unheard since their initial broadcasts. The band's now-classic debut single, 'she smiled mandarin like', was released in 1994, their first session following soon after, with the further two sitting between and around the release of their first and second albums. The sessions would encompass eleven recordings in total (n.b. there's nine on the LP, all eleven included on the bonus CD), consisting of early or alternative versions of songs from all three of their studio records. I mention all of this not simply so you know what you're buying here, but also for what it tells you about what kind of band Movietone were. That's a lot of music in a fairly short period of time, and it was a type of music that seemed to continually evolve and redefine itself. In that sense, these are the quintessential types of Peel session, bearing witness to a band in creative flux, embracing process, finding the limits of their expression. In the context of 1994, the birth of Britpop traditionalism, they're near radical-sounding: often quiet (Movietone never scream for your attention; they earn it), always explorative, unhemmed by genre codification. The touchstones are invariably rich - jazz, musique concrete, British folk, slowcore, US 90s cassette culture, indiepop - yet i'm still not entirely sure if i've heard a band that sound much like them. I don't think it's an overstatement to consider this an essential document of an unheralded but important band, one who ran against the prevailing orthodoxy of their era and, because of it, sound more relevant in 2022 than a lot of what is being released now. One final housekeeping point - we've two versions of the record. There's the World of Echo (our name is written on it!) 'Day' version of the record, personalised by Kate Wright from the band and hand numbered (edition of 30). And then the 'Night' version, limited to 450.
Session 1:
Recorded on 12/05/1994
Broadcast on 18/06/1994
Tracks 1-4
Session 2:
Recorded on 28/01/1996
Broadcast on 10/02/1996
Tracks 5-8
Session 3:
Recorded on 31/08/1997
Broadcast on 30/09/1997
Tracks 9-11
