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Artist News Releases Top Stories
Stars line-up to ‘record’ silent John Cage piece for Christmas
By CMU Editorial | Published on Friday 3 December 2010
Organisers of the Cage Against The Machine campaign to get John Cage’s silent piece ‘4’33”’ to Christmas number one have announced the line-up of musicians who will ‘record’ a new version of the track, before it is released for sale by Wall Of Sound via download stores in time to take the festive top spot, with all proceeds going to charity. The announcement comes as Ladbrokes slashes the odds of the track achieving its goal to 8/1.
Producers Paul Epworth (Florence & The Machine, Bloc Party, Friendly Fires) and Clive Langer (Madness) will oversee the recording at London’s Dean Street Studios on Monday, while film maker Dick Carruthers (Oasis, Manics, Rolling Stones) will capture all the (in)action for the official music video.
Standing in silence for four and half minutes will be: Mr Hudson, UNKLE, Pete Doherty, Enter Shikari, Fenech-Soler, The Big Pink, The Kooks, Coldcut, Orbital, Heaven 17, John Foxx, Dan Le Sac, Jon McClure, Penguin Prison, Crystal Fighters, Does It Offend You, Yeah?, Monarchy, Alexander Wolfe, Infadels, The Loose Cannons, Dub Pistols, Man Like Me, Teeth and South Central, with more still to be announced. Billy Bragg will also be on the track, but can’t make it to the studio so will instead phone in his silence.
It’s also been announced that Alex Metric, Adam F, Hot Chip, Herve and Mr Scruff will create remixes of the finished track as B-sides for the single release. The ‘remixes’ will actually be four minutes and 33 seconds long audio snapshots of each remixer’s life. Plus, artists, including Banksy, are donating blank sheets of paper to auction off in aid of the charities who will benefit from the Cage project.
Writing in his CMU column this week, Eddy Temple-Morris, one of the people behind the single release, said: “I’ve never been so busy, and so stressed, but it’s all coming together in the most brilliantly chaotic way. Unfortunately, last week we found ourselves in the position of losing both the amazing venue we were led to believe we had been given to record this cover, and the potential label, who, having previously blown so hot over it, decided to blow cold”.
He continued: “Joe from Ou Est Le Swimming Pool and I turned up at Wall Of Sound with no label and no venue. It was clearly about to go down the crapper and our heads were low. My estimation of Mark Jones, my favourite label’s talismanic figurehead, was already unfeasibly high, and by the end of this meeting, I wanted to marry him: he’d committed himself, his staff, his label and distributor because he believed in the idea so much. He also, with a single phonecall, secured us a studio with incredible rock heritage”.
The single will be released by Wall Of Sound on 12 Dec. All proceeds will be split between five charities: The British Tinnitus Association, the Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM), Nordoff Robbins Music Therapy, Youth Music and Sound And Music. There will also be a launch party at Madame Jo Jo’s in Soho at the White Heat club night on 14 Dec.
Stay up to date with all Cage Against The Machine goings on at www.facebook.com/cageagainstthemachine.
