 A stunning 3 CD re-release of the classic Prog album Fact And Fiction by Twelfth Night
Format: CD / Cat No: TNCD23 / Released: 09/09/2022
Track Listing: CD 1 - Studio: 1982
Recorded at Revolution Studios, Cheadle Hulme, Stockport, Summer 1982
1. We Are Sane (10:23)
2. Human Being (7:48)
3. This City (4:02)
4. World Without End (1:51)
5. Fact and Fiction (3:59)
6. The Poet Sniffs a Flower (3:50)
7. Creepshow (11:50)
8. Love Song (5:41)
9. Being Human (3:46)
10. Paradise Locked (0:24)
11. East of Eden (3:24)
12. Eleanor Rigby (3:22)
CD 2 - Live: 1983-2012
1. We Are Sane (11.54)
Recorded at the Marquee, London, 5 November 1983
2. Human Being (8.09)
Recorded at the Marquee, 9 March 1984
3. This City (3.57)
Recorded at Montgomery Hall, Wath-upon-Dearne, 28 May 2010
4. World Without End (1.34)
Recorded at Rotherham Rocks, 16 May 2008
5. Fact and Fiction (5:34)
Recorded at the Marquee, London, 4 November 1983
6. The Poet Sniffs a Flower (3.38)
Recorded at the Marquee, London, 4 November 1983
7. Creepshow (12:27)
Recorded at Summer’s End, Lydney, 29 September 2012
8. Love Song (7:56)
Recorded at the Marquee, London, 5 November 1983
9. Fact and Fiction (4:43)
Recorded at The Guildhall, Barbican Centre, London, 15 December 2012
Demos: 1982
Recorded at Matinee Studios, Reading, March 1982
10. Constant (Fact and Fiction) (2:24)
11. Fistful of Bubbles (3:18)
12. Leader (2:41)
13. Dancing in the Dream (2:58)
14. Creepshow (After The Bomb Drops) (3.53)
CD 3 - Covers and interpretations: 1983-2018
1. DEAN BAKER - Electro Sane (1:26)
Recorded in Poole 2010, remixed 2018
2. MARK SPENCER - We Are Sane (11:07)
Recorded at Dysfunction Studios, Letchworth and Thin Ice Studios, Virginia Water, between 2011 & 2018
3. PENDRAGON - Human Being (6:51)
Recorded at Halfway Houses, Maidenhead, 1994
4. TIM BOWNESS - This City (4:42)
Recorded in Poole and Bath, March 2018
5. COBURG - This City (5:21)
Recorded in Poole and Rushden, March 2018
6. CLIVE NOLAN - World Without End (2.18)
Recorded at Thin Ice Studios, Virginia Water, March 2018
7. GALAHAD - Fact and Fiction (5:01)
Recorded at Thin Ice Studios, Virginia Water, February 2018
8. MARK SPENCER featuring LEE ABRAHAM - The Poet Sniffs a Flower (3:44)
Recorded at Dysfunction Studios, Letchworth and Dockside Studios, Southampton, March 2018
9. TWELFTH NIGHT - Creepyshow (12:20)
Recorded at Montgomery Hall, Wath-upon-Dearne, May 2010
10. ALAN REED & KIM SEVIOUR - Love Song (5:55)
Recorded at Clanjamfrie Studios, Guildford, February 2014
11. AXE - Don’t Make Me Laugh (3:52)
Recorded at John Verity’s Studio, Bradford, October 1983
12. EH! GEOFF MANN BAND - Fact and Fiction (4:20)
Recorded at The Norderlight, Tilburg, Holland, May 1992
13. EH! GEOFF MANN BAND - Love Song (6:51)
Recorded at The Norderlight, Tilburg, Holland, May 1992
More information: PLEASE NOTE: The MUSIC IS EXACTLY THE SAME on this re-release as the version released on the Festival Music label on 11/06/2018 (catalogue number 201805 - now deleted). This re-release has been issued on the band's own label, and the cover and part of the booklet has been updated.
Original press release for the Festival Music edition:
Fact And Fiction is the latest of the Twelfth Night original albums to be given the Definitive Edition treatment, and released by the excellent F2/Festival Music label. However, in a change to the previous releases, rather than augment the original LP with other tracks that featured in the band’s live set at the time, this time there is more focus on the original tracks giving a glimpse of how they developed through the various processes of writing, rehearsing, demoing, recording, and finally being played live.
In addition, as a number of cover versions and reworkings already existed, new recordings were commissioned from band members, contemporaries and current artists to show how other artists interpreted the tracks, and these really complement the Twelfth Night versions, and bring out the true strength of the original songs.
To accompany the CDs there are some extensive, sleevenotes written specially, including an extract from Michael Anthony’s ‘Words & Music’ book that reviews Geoff’s lyric writing in incisive detail. In addition there are never-before seen scans of some of Geoff’s original handwritten lyrics and sketches, as well as new photos, etc.
The content of the three CDs is: Disc One – Studio 1982, Disc Two – Live 1983-2012 and Demos 1982, Disc Three – Covers & Interpretations 1983-2018.
Disc One includes all the recordings done at Revolution studios: the album, the single, and the original version of Human Being. For the first time it includes the sound of the ‘locked doors of paradise’ showing how Human Being was originally linked to East Of Eden.
Disc Two includes a live version of each album track compiled from a number of different sources enabling you to hear how Geoff, Andy and Mark (and the rest of the band) interpreted the songs on stage. Several of these recordings are previously unreleased, most notably the three tracks recorded at Geoff’s farewell shows in 1983. Although these songs were released on Live And Let Live, two of these versions are from the night not featured on that album, specially remixed for this release by Karl Groom. There are also as-they-were-played renditions of World Without End and Creepshow, the latter from 2012’s Summers End show, described by Prog magazine’s Jerry Ewing as “simply amazing!” And, as an encore, the guitar-based version of Fact And Fiction from A Night To Remember, recorded at the Barbican in December 2012.
The live tracks are followed by the demos, recorded in the band's favourite local studio (where they recorded Blondon Fair for Virgin several years later). It was the time of the first affordable drum machines so to save time the band often used them when recording demos as was the case for three of the demos here, while Fistful Of Bubbles and Creepshow features the band playing live in the studio. Confusingly, the track called Leader (aka Utopia aka Live And Let Live) later became Fact And Fiction, while the song (Constant) Fact And Fiction was never developed further. And although Geoff is renowned for his intelligent, passionate lyrics, his great sense of humour was a most welcome element in those intensive days of writing, rehearsing and recording. This is nowhere more aptly portrayed than in the ‘nonsense/stream of consciousness’ lyrics’ of Dancing In The Dream.
For the first time the demo of Creepshow (closing section) has been added which starts with a completely different speech. Originally titled ‘After The Bomb Drops’, this was later replaced by the ‘Nerve Centre, Mirror one’. As you will hear this early version references the ‘haphazard planning for nuclear war’, the theme that underpins the lyrics of Fact & Fiction.
Disc Three contains at least one version of all the original album’s eight tracks. Mark Spencer has given advance mixes of two tracks, one featuring Lee Abraham, that he will one day release on his own version of ‘Fact And Fiction’. Tim Bowness, Clive Nolan, and Coburg recorded their tracks especially for this release, as did Galahad’s Dean Baker & Stuart Nicholson, which is fitting as in their early days, Galahad played several songs from Fact And Fiction but, alas, no releasable recordings exist. Pendragon’s version of Human Being was originally released on the Geoff Mann tribute CD Mannerisms. The first version of Love Song on Disc 3, arranged by Mark Spencer and performed by Alan Reed and Kim Seviour, was released in 2014, in aid of cancer research, while the Eh Geoff Mann Band tracks were previously issued on Recorded Delivery a compilation of Geoff’s live performances with various bands. It seemed appropriate to let Geoff have the last word…
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