X and Tj sing the songs in JFs office and he says which ones he likes... its like a movie...  we do Hippy Ship, The futures on fire with Rock and Roll (written with degville), Heartquake Hotel and Youth juice... a song X and i had written for some Aerosmith type band..... we pull great favours to record and Whitfield street studios to mix... Novak brings in his partner Robin Williams (unfortunate name) to play keys/program although we use our friend John Green who is now with Manic Street Preachers and Sleeper to program/keys... everything is done in 3 days...  these were wild days with Priscilla the beautiful American model hanging out and Anton Micheal Rock the Fin de Siècle prospective Singer... Novak sings great... everything goes so easily, even Derwood the old Generation X guitarist comes by to play Guitar, Mick Jones comes in to do a mix of one track...

JF loves the demos and we do a deal on the spot on a handshake... EMI will front the money to record the album... we are go...or are we... lets talk Nightmares and a story of how someone can Sabotage their careers.....

Here's the deal --use the sputnik history but make your own way, X and TJ will produce and write the songs... 

Christipher Novak suddenly is a star in his head and immediately feels he's being exploited by the evil sputnik!... wants to record his own songs which X and I hate!...  we spend hours and hours negotiating with him...  he's like a spoilt girl...  its a nightmare, why cant he realise what a break he's getting??? we agree to do 3 of their songs in desperation to get the project off the ground... studios are booked...  Hotei who is a Japanese superstar and big big SSS fan will play lead guitar on the record, and write a song with us...

In the studio everything is going great and quickly although Robin and his silly dancing like an electric triangle becomes house joke...  Christopher sings so easily its hard to believe the agony we went thru with DEGVILLE (though the agony is what makes him great and Novak lightweight!) Hotei flys in from Japan inscrutable as ever, plays brilliant and we even write a song with him "Cyberspace party" his version in Japanese goes to number 1 in Japan, I write new English lyrics on the way to the studio with a pad taped to the dashboard of the Mercedes...  Christopher adds 2 words and we have endless arguments later over the publishing. (this boy wants a piece of everything already)...  it doesn't bode well... X and I hate their songs which seem like lightweight dance to us but hey lets just get on...  Novak begins to hate TJ who seems to just waft in and out with the girls telling everyone else what to do...  Hotei rocks on guitar...  one day we'll do a real SSS record with him...We decamp to Whitfield to mix...  Tj does all the movie clip bits but spends more time in the south of France phoning in instructions on his digital mobile, it even works from the beach...  but it goes greeat... if a little lite... 

Tj celebrates his birthday with a surprise party in the studio till all these weirdoes turn up... uh uh its the pink haired friends of novak who by this time is a seething mass of paranoias... how times change... mixing continues ,this time the Cindy Crawford plays on the studio monitors on a continuous loop, not the terminators then... Tj is loosing interest and spends the rest of the mixing with his girlfriend and the American model in tow. watching TV in the other studio... 

Like there's no tomorrow... a freewheeling motor cycle song opens, new song by tj and X... solo from Hotei...its a bit er... spingsteemish

Hot Stuff... Novak idea which i hated... marc almond sings the backing vocals

Hippyship... TJ wrote the verse on his old Gen X rickenbacker, X finished it off... its TREX dance and sounds a sure hit, kinda hippydippy lyric... gave Robin a song credit for his bassline (cant think why)

Dream City and Energise Me were their songs and Space Age Journey... I hated all of them and would have nothing to do with them!

Youth juice was a sorta stomp X and I wrote 3 years earlier in our Aerosmith period!

Mona LIsa Overdrive, title of a William Gibson Book... great Sax by Gary Barnacle...  recorded at the time of the second sputnik album but degville just could not sing it in this key but we couldn't change it cos of the sax!... Novak sang over the original backtrack replacing the vox of degvilles

This is terrorvision was to be the title of the third SSS album, id designed the sleeve already...  long time before the group of the same name appeared...

Baby wonderful... was Atari Baby part 2 an old SSS idea called Horny Porno Terror Thing... written at the same time as a song called BiBi love... great vocal by Novak

King of planet love was again discarded SSS material with a new lyric, originally called Miss Universe from the Orgasm period...

HeartQuake Hotel was SSS do glitter and elvis

Futures on fire started as a loop of 5 years the bowie track and became the big builder, our Purple Rain... we'd recorded it 5 years earlier along with Razz Crazy another SSS Prince inspired track

The mixing finished up with a huge argument between X and Tj when tj went to a Bowie party with Roger Taylor from Queen instead of coming to the studio, arriving at 1am alittle..... worse for wear... things didn't bode well

...the group were meanwhile on their third manager, hating everyone as Novak got more crazed that I was trying to rip him off... yet the album had hits on it and EMI were up for it... bringing in great people in promotion and ready for a big push... remember JF Cecillion was the head of EMI and had broken Eternal and was a real fan, it was partly his idea and he would show the company it would be a hit... we finished the record at the end of April, 3 months after the conception, EMI would release 4 singles one a month for 4 weeks... they would be hits , followed by the album... this was an incredible opportunity for the boys..... so they just fucked it up! they pissed about, hating every manager...  Novak now didn't even want me involved! me who gave him this life... they fired another manager, used their own stupid ideas for the record cover pictures... missed the release dates... got more paranoid... unaware that their new manager was taping their telephone calls and sending them to me... its all madness now I look back on it...

So they missed their chance in the uk, missed the summer and missed the boat... it did get released in Japan where is incredibly sold 50,000 copies! they were just about to depart for Japan on a promotional tour which would have made them huge when EMI found Novak had no passport and worse he was an "illegal alien" ooooh the irony...and it all just faded away

Novack is back down the wine bar from whence he came, and probably collecting state assistance again...boys it was all there and YOU blew it

For us and EMI well 50k sales meant we all recouped and well it was a great idea... never as good as the real thing... see the post Sisters of bosss on the sleeve in the Chanel sunglasses with a wry smile... 

.....now about this new idea of mine, all female Jap cyberpunk shemale rockband called SHE SHE SPUTNIK... well we've already started writing the songs...first one was called yesterday, tomorrow today.....

No..its not a girl , its
Christopher Novac and
Anton sharing a drink
at Whitfield street studios during the mixing of the
next generation record