Album: Forever Now (Original U.S. Vinyl)
Year: 1982
. . .
So here’s some more weird record company stuff. Just as it was with The Psychedelic Furs and Talk Talk Talk, the tracklistings on the U.K. and U.S. versions of Forever Now were completely different. The U.K. version started with “President Gas” and ended with “Sleep Comes Down” while the U.S. started with “Forever Now” and closed with “Yes I Do.”
Which is fine, except that “Yes I Do” was called “Merry-Go-Round” in the U.K. and had completely different verses — but the exact same choruses — than its U.S. counterpart. It was probably called “Merry-Go-Round” for the carnivalesque keyboards added by Todd Rundgren, as well as the circular beat that the great Vince Ely provided, but of course, I only knew the U.S. version. That was the one that I fell in love with and to.
So fast-forward two decades, and Forever Now is released on CD, and unlike the first two albums, they go with the U.S. tracklisting, but the song that ends it is called “Yes I Do (Merry-Go-Round)”, and much to my chagrin, they’ve used the U.K. vocals for the verses, not the U.S. To me, this is fuckery of the absolutely highest order, because I loved Richard Butler’s phrasing on every verse, especially how he ends those verses with “it really doesn’t matter does it any way today?”
That said, both versions had an unutterably great chorus, once again comparing and contrasting Mr. Butler’s rasp with the etherial backing vocals of Flo & Eddie, who sing counterpoint throughout.
Oh, and yeah, I want you
(I’m up in the air over youuuuuuuuu!)
Oh and yes, I want you
(I’m over the moon over youuuuuuu!)
Oh, and yeah, I want you
(I’m up in the sky over youuuuuuuuu!)
Oh, and yes, I do
(I’m over the moon over youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!)
I just love how Butler is singing his “yeahs” as sighs, and how Flo & Eddie hit their long “youuuuuuuuuuuuuus” especially at the end of each verse when they hold them while the cello-driven riff and Ely’s drumbeat march around them. Oh, and intentional cheesiness of “over the moon over you.”
In any event, I could at least tolerate “Merry-Go-Round” because of that chorus, but at the same time, every time it happened to come up in the mix, it made me miss the original version. This, of course, isn’t the only time such a thing has happened, of course: in a few years, get ready for me to complain about how Pete Townshend mixed down the fantastic post-bridge Chris Stainton piano solo from the original vinyl in favor of a run-of-the-mill guitar solo on the CD reissues.
So I searched and searched for a very long time, until a few years ago, Sony put it on YouTube. So it’s not on any of their records, though it is on Spotify — if you choose the version of Forever Now that has the U.S. cover. It’s all very confusing, and probably it really doesn’t matter does it any way today.
“Yes I Do”
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