The Judge
RAVES!
Date: 18/12/10
Mike Batt - "Love Makes You Crazy" (1982)
You were expecting something seasonal? Well, as Slim Pickens once nearly said, "Piss on you, I'm with Mel Brooks!"
There is a slight Christmas connection here though, because when I was in Sainsbury's last Tuesday afternoon I was assaulted by The Wombles' Wombling Merry Christmas playing over the PA. All it did for me was to induce a spasm of hard-core misanthropy which lasted the rest of the day.
Mike Batt was the man behind - and inside, if you see what I mean - The Wombles (and the nearest I ever came to meeting a pop star was sharing a house at University with a guy - hi, Tim! - whose brother-in-law had been their bass player), but he had done other things before, and went on to do many another thing thereafter. What follows is one of them.
The Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) had asked Batt to produce a piece for a live concert to celebrate its fiftieth birthday. Instead, Batt came up with the idea for an actual concept production - sets, costumes, graphics and all - while yachting from the US to Australia.
The video production - which cost the equivalent of televising two operas - was fraught with problems, and was eventually screened in two versions; one with Batt in the lead rôle (for the international market), and one with an Australian actor playing that part (for Oz). It was the international version which I first saw in the early months of Channel Four in early 1983 as far as I can recall.
There was also an LP - rare as hen's teeth, I finally picked up a copy in a record fair in Chester about fifteen years ago. From the sleeve, here is the beginning of the tale:
"Long, long ago, far into the distant future there is a civilisation called System 605, where the diseases of love and emotion no longer exist to complicate our lives..."
The protagonist, Number 17 ("But you can call me Ralph / My friends do"), falls in love with Number 36, and ends up being committed to an establishment called Zero Zero, an 'Emotional Decontamination Centre', to be 're-orientated'. With predictable results.
The video is very much of its time, and seems somewhat unsubtle by more recent standards, but at least I can be sure that it won't be pulled by YouTube, seeing as it has been put there by Mike Batt himself via his production company!
