Was a new remix an excuse to write a new set of sleevenotes, a new chapter to the ZTT story?
Paul Morley: “Well, it was wonderful for me because, I think at the time, Island records, who were distributing our records, I think they probably wouldn’t have believed we could generate, say, seven sleeves for one single. At one point, one a week. But because I was a writer and, in a way I felt like I was writing a story, to me it was just wonderful because I just got more pages to write the story and put more pictures in. I find it quite exciting and, again, was communicating largely to Trevor, you know, ‘OK this one’s the blah blah mix, it’s about the end of world, this one’s the holocaust mix, this one’s going to have some, you know, Adolf Hitler on it (laughs) And for some peculiar reason it all worked, it all came together … until it didn’t, until we all got self conscious I guess.”
David Smart: “We never paid for any of these (photos of Thatcher and Reagan) Hideous typography though!
(loud protestations from me as it’s one of my favourites)
“I suppose it was a bit iconic at the time but now I look back on it I just think I would do it so differently, but then don’t we all…”
So did you come up with things like ‘Annihilation’ and Trevor went away and put ‘The air attack warning sounds like’ on it?
Paul Morley: “Yeah, at the time there was a lot of things in the air about nuclear bombs and strange ways of protecting yourself and we got hold of the CND… CND had a tape of what we were going to hear if a nuclear bomb was about to hit London and it was this stupid Patrick Allen. And just about everything he says on it is what we would hear over the loudspeakers in London if a nuclear bomb was heading for us. Except for ‘This is the last voice that you will ever hear’. So even the things about putting bodies out on the street and wrapping them up, that was all what we were going to hear, it was quite extraordinary.
But it just then struck me, Patrick Allen was fantastic, we used Patrick Allen quite a lot and he had a room not unlike this and he would only do one take because he was the King of Voiceovers. In fact Reeves and Mortimer used him a lot on early editions of their show, they always used Patrick Allen because he was immaculate. He would only do one take and he wouldn’t want you with him, you would just send what you wanted and he would just send it back and it was always perfect.”
artist: Frankie Goes To Hollywood title: Two Tribes format: 12″ single design: XLZTT photography: Anton Corbijn (front) cat. no: 12ZTAS 3 date: 04/06/84 art of notes: The first of several remix 12″s that were released. Some copies of this 12″ came with one of three different posters of the band photographed in US and USSR military costume by Eric Watson.
