I Am Kurious Oranj

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I Am Kurious Oranj
I Am Kurious Oranj.jpg
Studio album by The Fall
Released October 1988
Recorded 1988 at: Suite 16 Studios, Rochdale, England; Edinburgh Festival, Edinburgh, Scotland
Genre Post-punk, alternative rock
Length 57:01
Label Beggars Banquet
Producer Ian Broudie, Mark E. Smith
The Fall chronology
The Frenz Experiment
(1988)The Frenz Experiment1988		 I Am Kurious Oranj
(1988)		 Seminal Live
(1989)Seminal Live1989
Singles from I Am Kurious Oranj
  1. "Jerusalem/Big New Prinz"
    Released: 11 November 1988
  2. "Cab It Up"
    Released: 5 June 1989

I Am Kurious Oranj is the eleventh studio album by English art punk band the Fall. It was released in October 1988, through record label Beggars Banquet.

Background

I Am Kurious Oranj was written as the soundtrack for the ballet I Am Curious, Orange, produced by contemporary dance group Michael Clark & Company, and themed loosely around the 300th anniversary of William of Orange's accession to the English throne. The album combines studio recordings with tracks recorded live during the ballet performances in Edinburgh in June 1988.

The opening song "New Big Prinz" (as well as its alternate version, "Big New Priest") is lyrically based on "Hip Priest" off the group's 1982 album Hex Enduction Hour; the original track was also used in the ballet as a backing tape. "Jerusalem" is an adaptation of William Blake's hymn using Hubert Parry's original music (although Parry doesn't appear in the credits). "Last Nacht" is a remix of "Bremen Nacht" off the group's previous album, The Frenz Experiment.

One song which was written for the ballet and performed but did not make the album was "Dead Beat Descendant". It was later re-recorded and released on Seminal Live.

The album's title is derived from Swedish director Vilgot Sjöman's films I Am Curious (Yellow) (1967) and I Am Curious (Blue) (1968). The title appears as I Am Kurious, Oranj on some parts of the packaging formats.

Track listing

In common with other albums released through Beggars Banquet Records by the Fall, I Am Kurious Oranj featured a different track listing across the various formats on which it was originally released. In addition to extra tracks "Guide Me Soft" and "Big New Priest", the UK CD featured several alternate/extended versions of songs (tracks 3,5,7,8,12). In 2013, Beggars remastered and reissued the album on CD as a part of 5 Albums box set; the new edition used the CD mixes reordered according to the vinyl track order, with extra tracks and alternate vinyl mixes added as bonus tracks.

Original UK CD/cassette version

No. Title Writer(s) Length
1. "New Big Prinz"   Craig Scanlon, Marcia Schofield, Mark E. Smith, Stephen Hanley 3:25
2. "Overture from 'I Am Curious, Orange'"   Brix Smith 2:48
3. "Dog Is Life/Jerusalem"   William Blake, M. Smith 8:54
4. "Kurious Oranj"   Hanley, M. Smith, Simon Wolstencroft 6:20
5. "Wrong Place, Right Time"   M. Smith 2:52
6. "Guide Me Soft"   M. Smith 2:15
7. "C.D. Win Fall 2088 AD"   M. Smith, Schofield 4:41
8. "Yes, O Yes"   B. Smith, M. Smith 3:25
9. "Van Plague?"   B. Smith, M. Smith 4:56
10. "Bad News Girl"   B. Smith, M. Smith 5:22
11. "Cab It Up!"   M. Smith 4:54
12. "Last Nacht"   M. Smith, Simon Rogers 3:56
13. "Big New Priest"   Hanley, Scanlon, Schofield, M. Smith 3:08
Note: "Van Plague?" is mis-spelled "Van Plague" on the cassette edition.

Release

The release of I Am Kurious Oranj came at the end of a relatively successful year for the group, which had also seen the release of an "accessible" album, The Frenz Experiment, and a handful of singles in the UK singles chart.

A live version of this album recorded during at one of the Edinburgh Festival performances of the ballet was belatedly issued in 2000, under the title I Am As Pure As Oranj.

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
AllMusic 2.5/5 stars[1]
Robert Christgau A–[2]
NME 8/10[3]
The Village Voice favourable[4]

I Am Kurious Oranj was critically well-received at the time. NME wrote "[The Fall have] retained the power to surprise, to provoke and occasionally outrage that only the Smiths could pretend to possess in the '80s."[3]

A later review of the album by AllMusic, however, is more indifferent, opining, "As a cohesive Fall album it fails [...] I Am Kurious Oranj would have been more interesting to see than hear."[1]

Personnel

The Fall
Technical
  • Ian Broudie – production
  • Cenzo Townshend – engineering
  • C.J. (Chris Jones) – engineering
  • Dian Barton – engineering
  • Stu (Stuart Hawkes) – mastering
  • Kevin Cummins – sleeve photography (band photos)
  • Richard Haughton – sleeve photography (stage photos)

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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