Sometimes, we may diligently wait years before an expected album is in our hands. And that can be the best case scenario! There are other times that we can wait decades… up to half a lifespan, to have the musical fruits of a band’s labor eventually touch town in our ears. This is one such time, and B-Movie is one such band.

We first heard B-Movie in 1981 on a Flexipop flexidisc bundled with another Some Bizzare act, Soft Cell. Label head/manager Stevo understandably thought he had two hot ones in the pair but the commercial reaction was nothing short of extremely lopsided. As we found out, Soft Cell sold all around the world with a best selling single driving their fame and B-Movie released three singles and suffered the ignominy of having their debut album tabled by Phonogram [who were presumably too busy counting the money that Soft Cell were generating for the label in the UK.

This was very high contract to the very high quality of singles like “Remembrance Day” and “Nowhere Girl!” I’d include “Marilyn Dreams” in there too but for the salient fact that I’ve never heard it! But based on the impact of the former two, how could “Marilyn Dreams” be anything but fabbo? And now comes the new that the band’s own Wanderlust imprint have secured the rights to those three singles as well as the other seven tracks recorded for their album and have released it on LP, CD, and DL on May 30th.

B-Movie: Hidden Treasures – UK – CD [2025]

1. Citizen Kane 6:04
2. Remembrance Day (7″ Version) 3:42
3. Polar Opposites 2:56
4. Marilyn Dreams 3:40
5. Ice 4:40
6. La Lune Lunatique 2:51
7. All Fall Down 6:54
8. Nowhere Girl 3:42
9. Crowds 4:30
10. Beginning To Fade 4:00
11. Remembrance Day (Extended Version) 4:24
12. Institution Walls (Remix) 4:04
13. Marilyn Dreams (Extended Version) 6:04
14. Film Music, Pt. 1 3:08
15. Nowhere Girl (Extended Version) 6:33
16. Scare Some Life Into Me 4:27
17. Moles 3:31

The DL and CD packages come with the bonus tracks [in red] that collect 12″ A-side remixes with their B-sides as well as one track, “Moles,” from the infamous 1st edition of the “Some Bizzare Album” from 1981. in short, here’s everything we could possibly want from the heretofore unreleased B-Movie debut album! And the band saw this release a fortnight ago chart in the top 50 LPs on the UK charts, so good on them. The CD will set us back a decent £14.00/$19.03 with black vinyl LP only £22.00/$29.91.

I always took pains to buy any B-movie I ran across and though I have the Dead Good “Vol. 1 – Remembrance Day” CD from the early 90s, it remains to be see if either “Remembrance Day” or “Nowhere Girl” were the same recordings as on “Hidden Treasures.” I’m guessing “no” up front. I also ran across the band’s 2016 album, “Climate Of Fear” during my last trek to Amoeba Hollywood and it was certainly all that and more, so the band have remained potent across the decades. Only losing original keyboardist Rick Holliday recently wand replacing him with Keith Phillips.

BUT WAIT, THERE”S MORE…

The fact that the original debut album by B-Movie was unreleased until two weeks ago doesn’t change the fact that for almost everyone, back in the day, the band’s 1985 “Forever Running” album was effectively their debut. I bought a copy of this on LP when I realized that it was not hitting the silver disc any time soon around 1990 or so. So yes, I’ve had a copy on my racks for 35 years and have not ever played it. [sigh – I know how crazy this sounds] but I was always holding out for the CD to come. Apparently, a CD did come in 2009 on the shrinking violet reissue label Wounded Bird Records! But if you weren’t paying attention either, that disc is now selling for three figures! Enter Music on CD, the Dutch reissue label.

B-Movie: Forever Running – NL – CD [2025]

1. Forever Running 5:03
2. Heart Of Gold 4:09
3. My Ship Of Dreams 4:03
4. Just An Echo 4:34
5. Remembrance Day 4:06
6. Switch On-Switch Off 4:04
7. Blind Allegiance 5:00
8. Arctic Summer 4:47
9. Nowhere Girl 4:40

As we can see, it’s a straight reissue of the album with none of the 12″ mixes or adjacent singles I have in the Record Cell, such as “Letter From Afar” from 1984 or 1989’s “Polar Opposites.” With what we’ve heard of Music on CD’s mastering practices, I might imagine that this CD was simply remastered from the Wounded Bird disc. Once they pay Warners for the license, how it make it to disc is all up to them. Better that than than some dusty LP though. Like it or not, I’ll be putting this on the Infinite Want List as well. Unless the July 4th release turns out to be an utter horrowshow. No price or indeed, even a way to pre-order it on the label’s webpage. Meanwhile, the band’s Bandcamp page is better poised to help expand our always inadequately small B-Movie collections! DJs hit those buttons!

HIDDEN TREASURES CD/LP/DL

FOREVER RUNNING CD

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