Caprice (music video) 3'26" stereo © 1984

Background

Caprice was one of the first music projects of → ↑ →, commencing in early 1977. The concept was to form a band to play Muzak-style instrumental covers of the evergreen/easy-listening songs (ones we equally loved and hated) and perform them with synthesizers, a drum machine, guitar and sax. By 1978, the ideas for this were developed into a suite of original 'minimalist-muzak' pieces for the → ↑ → Venitian Rendezvous project.

A selection of the cover versions were recorded for an EP in 1980, augmented with an original composition, the eponymous track Caprice.

1st pressing © 1980

Credits

Record

Arrangements, synthesizers & drum machine - Philip Brophy
Bass synth - Maria Kozic
Guitar - Leigh Parkhill
Sax - Ralph Traviato
Recording engineer - Brian Parrish

Music-video

Direction, camera & editing - Philip Brophy
Lighting and camera - Kim Beisel
Choreography - Louise Brophy
Dancers - Louise Brophy & Romano
Additional cast - George Huxley, Bernadette Brophy, Rosaleen Brophy, Ralph Traviato, Peter Lawrence, Kim Beisel

1984

Music-video for Present Records

1983

7" EP second pressing - Present Records

1980

7" EP first pressing - Innocent Records

Overview

In the mid-1970s, Glam, Pop and Hollywood all merged in a gaudy audiovisual carnival of second-hand styles. The sound of old movies, the feel of old photographs, the image of old music - everyone seemed to dissolve into a faux-nostalgic past. The important distinction, though, is that the past was alien, weird, and faced in an opposite direction to world-conscious socially-relevant enterprises of the same time. You supported either Bowie's Young Americans or Eric Clapton's I Shot The Sherrif - for identical reasons. Immersed in the sonic worlds of music, Philip and → ↑ → heard Glam in all sorts of places - from the harmonious golden sound of Glen Miller's sax lines to the harmonizing multi-tracked fuzz sustain of Robert Fripp. The weirdness of all sounds in the Pop realm (in contrast to their sodden realist guise in the then-dominant 'singer-songwriter' arrangements and productions) fuelled much of → ↑ →'s musical explorations. Caprice is probably the most ungainly and discomforting manifestation of this.

2nd pressing © 1983

Technical

Record

The music was recorded at Latrobe University studios with Brian Parrish.

The record was released in two pressings - the first featured gold ink hand-silkscreened on embossed leatherette card; the second featured 3 colours hand-silkscreened on gold foil card.

Poster - 1st pressing © 1980

Music-video

The music-video was produced at Open Channel studios in Melbourne. It was shot on Super 8 to give it a 'cine' feel. The choreography is by Philip's sister Louise. Hollywood musicals are directly referenced in the ballroom costumes and bare staging (particularly the Stanley Donen / Gene Kelly collaborations of the '50s), and the music-video's approach follows a stylistic vein established in the Asphixiation music-video for Aural/Oral Risk.

Flyer & poster - 1st concert © 1977

Recording @ Latrobe University recording studio, Melbourne © 1980 - photos by Maria Kozic