Coldcut vs Radiophonic

Cut 'n paste kings take on the legendary BBC sound effects department.

26 October 2008 - The penultimate night of the Electric Proms was a massive disco electronica fest in London.

The disco came courtesy of legendary Bee Gee Robin Gibb celebrating 30 years of the classic Saturday Night Fever soundtrack with help from the likes of indie kid Sam Sparro, Sharleen Spiteri, Australian singer Gabriella Cilmi, up-and-coming Brummie soul boy Bryn Christopher and Boyzone.

The electronica came from the godfathers of the mix, Coldcut, who had been let loose with a load of old BBC Radiophonic Workshop equipment and the result was remarkable.

As one half of the duo Matt Black said to the audience at the end of their set: "Thanks to the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, without whom we would not be here".

The BBC Radiophonic Workshop made its name in the fifties and sixties creating sound effects and soundtracks for the likes of Dr Who, including the voice of the Daleks, and comedy sounds for The Goon Show.

As Matt and Jonathan from Coldcut admitted to me before the show, being allowed to 'play' with the iconic equipment was an electro-geek's dream: "Some of the bits of equipment are really rare - like the vocoder they used to get the Dalek voice. We're actually going to get to speak through the Dalek voice. They're really sought after, so it's a real thrill."

"Getting the old equipment out was a bit like rediscovering the ark" - Dick Mills, Radiophonic Workshop

Just before the live show 6 Music's own Gideon Coe hosted a panel discussion with some of the old faces from the Workshop, including Dick Mills, who we spoke to just beforehand:

"Coldcut are attempting to recreate some of the old hits, if that's what you can call them, the problem comes immediately with our work, there is no written reference, the only reference is the tape itself!

"Getting the old equipment out was a bit like rediscovering the ark actually, because really I couldn't remember what it was what I did with it or whether I would be able to explain it to anybody," he laughed.

Andy Rogers and George Thomas are two BBC engineers who had been working with Coldcut for a couple of weeks in the run up to the show, and could be seen onstage twiddling nobs on some old retro equipment at the back of the stage.

It was a dream come true to be able to handle all the old equipment as Andy told me after the show, that it's all down to the Radiophonic Workshop that he wanted to work for the BBC as a young boy: "I wrote to the workshop at school", he says, "and someone wrote back and told me to go away and become a studio engineer, which is exactly what I did."

Whilst all this was going on downstairs at The Roundhouse, upstairs it was a disco fan's heaven. Hearing the BBC Concert Orchestra take on the classic Saturday Night Fever soundtrack was truly spine-tingling.

Robin Gibb took a turn onstage to sing More Than A Woman which had the crowd go wild early on - but it was the boys (men?) from Boyzone who got the biggest cheer of the night, which made me feel a bit like I was at a Boyzone concert. All that aside they did a decent job of singing Jive Talkin' and Words.

The biggest surprise of the night was Bryn Christopher, who lit up the stage with his performance of Disco Inferno. Compared to rather dull and lifeless turns from Sharleen Spiteri and Gabriella Cilmi, Bryn's voice did the classic Trammps’ track justice and he truly disco danced his way through both his numbers - Emotion too.

Special mention must go to Sam Sparro who took on the tricky falsetto stylings of Night Fever and Stayin' Alive and pulled them off admirably.

It was the BBC Concert Orchestra in their white dinner jackets though who stole the show, and got my biggest applause of the night.

Set lists:

Saturday Night Fever

Fifth of Beethoven
Stayin' Alive (Sam Sparro)
More Than A Woman (Robin Gibb)
You Should Be Dancing (Gabriella Cilmi)
Salsation
Night Fever (Sam Sparro)
Night on Disco Mountain
If I Can't Have You (Sharleen Spiteri)
Manhattan Skyline
Jive Talkin' (Ronan Keating & Stephen Gately)
Boogie Shoes (Gabriella Cilmi)
K-Jee
Disco Inferno (Bryn Christopher)
Words - (Ronan Keating & Stephen Gately)
Heartbreaker - (Gabriella Cilmi)
Emotion - (Bryn Christopher)
To Love Somebody - (Robin)

Coldcut vs The BBC Radiophonic Workshop

Jam Part 1
Step
Doctor Who
Radiophonic Funk
Radiophonic Workshop Vespucci
Hi Tek Effex

Ruth Barnes