From Loudersound.
Greg Lake‘s evergreen Christmas classic I Believe In Father Christmas is due to be re-released for Christmas 2020 thanks to the restoration of the original video to 4K. You can watch the brand new video in full below.
The song features on the recently released The Anthology – A Musical Journey which features music from Emerson Lake & Palmer, King Crimson, Lake’s solo career, 1967’s Don’t Go ‘Way Little Girl, recorded with The Shame and 1969 psych rarity Love recorded with The Shy Limbs.
Despite it’s strong anti-commercial message I Believe In Father Christmas remains a warm, catchy and enduringly popular Christmas song. The single was originally a hit worldwide in 1975, reaching Number 2 in the UK charts and selling over 13,000 copies in two days only to be kept from the UK number one slot by Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody.
Greg, who died on 7th December 2016, aged 69, co-wrote the single with Pete Sinfield. ELP’s keyboardist Keith Emerson had encouraged each member of the band to come up with solo material, so in 1975 Lake teamed up with lyricist Sinfield to create something out of a “Christmassy” chord sequence Lake had written.
The result was thoughtful, but melodic too: a humanist, Christmas song that also manages to warm the cockles. By adding a snippet of twinkling sleigh-ride music by classical composer Sergei Prokofiev at Keith Emerson’s suggestion, summoning the sparkle of Christmas, creating, as Sinfield has said, “a picture-postcard Christmas, with morbid edges.”
This new 4K version of the original promo video has been painstakingly and expertly restored from a recently discovered rare copy of the original film for I Believe In Father Christmas which was shot partly on the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and in the caves where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. The video includes previously unseen footage from the Vietnam War and was directed by Arnould Schwartzman who went on to win an Oscar in 1982 for his film Genocide.
The new video restoration included manually cleaning the film to remove the sticky residue from the sellotape joins to allow it to pass freely through the scanner, rebuilding the cuts to remove the jumps, recreating damaged frames based on those surrounding it, frame by frame dirt and scratch clean and eve repainting in camel legs!
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- Emerson Lake & Palmer - Pictures At An Exhibition - 1st - EX - UK - vinyl LP - £15.00, $16.65, €17.10 (New Item) (arrived 03-Oct-2022 08:30)on October 3, 2022 at 9:27 am
EMERSON LAKE & PALMER Pictures At An Exhibition (1971 UK first issue 11-track LP on the black with pink 'i' label, the prog superstar trio's first live album, gatefold picture sleeve with cover art by William Neal. The sleeve shows just light shelfwear & the vinyl remains in excellent condition with few sigs of play HELP1)
- Emerson Lake & Palmer - Brain Salad Surgery - 2nd - EX - UK - vinyl LP - £25.00, $27.75, €28.50 (New Item) (arrived 13-Sep-2022 12:43)on October 3, 2022 at 9:27 am
EMERSON LAKE & PALMER Brain Salad Surgery (Mid 70s UK issue of the 1973 8-track vinyl LP including the single Jerusalem. The H.R. Giger designed die-cut gatefold sleeve shows minimal creasing and shelfwear whilst the vinyl displays only lightsigns of play K53501)
- Greg Lake - I Believe In Father Christmas - Wide - UK - 7" vinyl - £8.00, $8.88, €9.12 (New Item) (arrived 17-Aug-2022 11:18)on October 3, 2022 at 9:27 am
GREG LAKE I Believe In Father Christmas (1975 UK wide centred 7" vinyl single, also including Humbug, issued in a Manticore company die-cut paper sleeve K13511)
- Emerson Lake & Palmer - The Anthology - UK - 3-CD set - £14.99, $16.64, €17.09 (New Item) (arrived 23-Aug-2022 15:30)on October 3, 2022 at 9:27 am
EMERSON LAKE & PALMER The Anthology (2016 UK 39-track triple CD compilation set which showcases the immense musical talents of Keith Emerson, Greg Lake and Carl Palmer; featuring tracks from all of their original albums including the seminal 'Emerson Lake & Palmer', 'Tarkus', 'Pictures At An Exhibition', 'Trilogy' and 'Brain Salad Surgery'. The three discs look barely played issued in the hardback book style packaging complete with the integral booklet which contains extensive sleevenotes and new band interviews)
- Emerson Lake & Palmer - Out Of This World: Live 1970-1997 - Deluxe 10LP Box Set - Sealed - UK - vinyl box set - £149.99, $166.49, €170.99 (New Item) (arrived 26-Aug-2022 14:35)on October 3, 2022 at 9:27 am
EMERSON LAKE & PALMER Out Of This World: Live 1970-1997 (2021 UK/EU limited edition Deluxe 10-LP Box Set celebrating 50 years of ELP, mastered by Andy Pearce & Matt Wortham. Containing the historic concerts: Isle Of Wight Festival 1970,California Jam 1974, Works Live 1977, Albert Hall 1992 and available for the first time Phoenix 1997. Housed inside a deluxe picture box with 32-page large format book containing notes by Jerry Ewing, and rare & unseen band photos. Metallic hype sticker & factory sealed)
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