Catherine Wheel continue to not give the people what they want, but at least they’re giving the people something. The band’s first three albums -1992’s Ferment, 1993’s Chrome, and 1995’s Happy Days – were all reissued on heavyweight vinyl last week by Proper Records. Sure, they’d all been been given Music On Vinyl pressings in the last few years, but those are already out of print (and completely redacted from the label’s website) so having these three releases in regular print (for a while at least) is a good thing for the world at large. And Ferment comes with a bonus live 12″, and Happy Days another bonus track. Chrome has no extras.
“Crank” was the first single from Chrome, released in 1993, and as the song’s video entry in Wikipedia notes, there are “2 versions: towards the end of the original version Rob is spinning on a spiked wheel while the censored version cuts away to shots of Brian and Dave”; both clips are available online and the scene in question happens – or doesn’t – at 2:55. I’m not sure why that scene needed to be censored, as the scenes with Rob Dickinson in both a red velour shirt and no shirt at all while leading the band through their version of Elevator Action is far more scarring.
Happily, Dickinson’s sartorial choices are a little more conservative in this August 1993 clip from MTV’s 120 Minutes.