27/09/2025
You've got to love coincidence :-) Only days after reading Ian Peel's latest A-Z column in Classic Pop #97, whose central topic concerned 10" singles, came news of a surprise new Ultravox release for the autumn... on 10". This, of course, is a format that's never utilised before across any of the band's many iterations.
I would have expected this unexpected rebirth for Love's Great Adventure to have been scheduled as an RSD Black Friday event, but released a few weeks ahead of that, it's looking like 2025 will be the first for some years not feature any release by the band across either of the year's two RSD events.
On an initial viewing, this make-over for LGA seems a mixed bag, but the range of material from different periods does reflect the original purpose of the song as a companion to material taken from across the first four Ure-era albums on the singles compendium The Collection.
Leading off with a new 'Blank & Jones so8os Reconstruction' of Love's Great Adventure, a new 12” 'Extended Re-Mix Extra' of All Stood Still follows; a song who initial 12" was only the barest extension of the album track anyway.
For whatever reason, although prepared for last year's Lament boxset, the new Steven Wilson Instrumental Mix of Love's Great Adventure instead makes its first appearance here instead. It's not impossible, of course, that this release was planned so well in advance, that it was always the plan to place the track here anyway.
That leaves, perhaps the most interesting track on this mini era-spanning collection for last: an 'Alternative Instrumental Outtake' of Hymn. At one time acts featuring on TOTP were supposed to recreate a backing track for miming to on the programme, as some arcane agreement with the BBC orchestra who could sometimes be seen on 1970s editions of the show. Thus Bowie's appearance miming to Heroes featured a very take on the music than the familiar Hansa Studios recorded version. This was all quite ridiculous by the 1980s, and the resisted rise of the synthesiser!
With an advertised running time of 6.02, this previously unheard recreation of Hymn - cut at London's Olympic Studios on 1st December 1982 for the show - curiously runs for longer than either the edited single or the full-length album version. It's a shame there isn't a vocal version too, as this would provide the 12" version that the song never enjoyed at the time.
Released on Friday 17th October, there will also be a new video to enjoy on the same day, thanks to the discovery of all the original 16mm film reels from the Kenya filming in Chrysalis' archives. As you'd expect, much of which was never used in the final cut. The present teaser intriguingly uses a brief sequence shot in a blank studio of Midge singing the chorus line to promote this new edit, set to the Blank & Jones remix, created by Nigel ‘Nacho’ Marshall and overseen by Midge Ure.
Hopefully, this release - and the clamshell repackaging earlier this year for last year's Lament box set - are merely placeholders until the resumption of the Deluxe Edition series with U-Vox on its 40th anniversary next year (which could be a more interesting release than might be expected, depending on the bonus material selected), It would be a shame not to see the series run right through to conclude with Brilliant(?).
But then, I'd still like to see things conclude with a box for The Collection box, all the UK singles, all the videos and the various alternate versions, BBC TV appearances, as well as a companion live compendium, if there are other live shows extant that weren't selected for each box set, plus any live footage - seen or unseen. One can but dream, anyway.
If you haven't already pre-ordered the 10" and/or the CD single version, then do click across to the bands official shop:
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