Philadelphia-based Tulipomania describe themselves as an art-rock duo and for the single ‘You Had To Be There’ they have had Martyn Ware and Charles Stooke work on a remix and Joyzine readers are seeing the video for the track ahead of anyone else. The animated video is an official selection at CutOut Fest International festival of animation and digital happening in Mexico in November.
Tulipomania is Tom Murray (lead vocals, synthesizer, electronic percussion) and Cheryl Gelover (synthesizer, background vocals) who originally collaborated on projects for experimental film and animation classes. Of the remix Cheryl says “We reached out to Martyn and Charles and were so glad they were interested in remixing the track – they kept the original mood but added additional orchestration – especially in the intro and outro – and took the song’s groove in a totally different direction – which we really love.”
Tom Murray adds “There has been an overwhelming sense of dread and mistrust obviously brewing for a long time. In the post-Trump post-pandemic now – if it is or ever will be possible to be post either of those cataclysmic events – I wonder what the future will ask about it all.”
Martyn Ware was in the original line-up of Heaven 17 before forming Heaven 17. He has also produced Tina Turner, Terence Trent D’Arby, Chaka Khan, Erasure and Marc Almond. Charles Stooke is a co-composer for the Illustrious Company, founded by Ware with Vince Clark (Depeche Mode, Yazoo, Erasure) in 2001.
The remix takes the nervous tension of the original and makes it widescreen. This sparse to spacious treatment wraps the caffeinated wobble of the vocals in strings and teasing out a more dubby vibe. This version will feature WIRE Magazine’s cover-mounted Wiretapper CD compilation, out on October 5th and the original version of the track can be found on the forthcoming album Dreaming of Sleep released on 17 November available as a download, vinyl and CD.
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Review by Paul F Cook
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