Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds
About the album
Track listing
Side A
Side B
Side C
Side D
Compact disc
Disc one
Disc two
Additional musicians
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About the album
The War of the Worlds stars Richard Burton as the narrator-protagonist, Justin Hayward (of The Moody Blues), and David Essex.
"Forever Autumn", "Thunder Child", and "The Spirit of Man" were some of the individual songs. "Forever Autumn" was a UK Top 10 single, and was credited to Justin Hayward. Most of the lyrics to the songs were written by former Elton John lyricist Gary Osborne.
To promote the 1978 release an abridged album containing "Radio edits" was distributed to Radio stations. Special intros and endings had to be added to certain tracks because they simply weren't written with radio in mind. The "air play" album turned out so well that in 1981 CBS decided to release it commercially under the unwieldy title Highlights from Jeff Wayne's Musical Version of The War of the Worlds.
The repetition of "Ulla!", the cry made by the Martians, and certain musical refrains throughout the musical pull the musical into a tight coherent whole.
The official album comes with several paintings by Peter Goodfellow, Geoff Taylor and Michael Trim that help to illustrate the story from beginning to end.
Despite being a self-contained rock album in its own right, rather than an accompaniment to a film or show, the album is frequently and erroneously to be found in the "Soundtracks" section of record shops.
Two Spanish versions of the album were released in 1978, one featuring Anthony Quinn in the role of the journalist.
A German version was also released in 1980 with Curd Jürgens taking the part of the journalist.
A 1995 special edition of the album featured additional remixes of some tracks and additional concept art.
The 1998 computer game based on The War of the Worlds (the original book) not only featured remixed music from the album and Martian war machines based on the illustrations throughout the album booklet, but was actually called Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds. It also included some of Burton's dialogue as the journalist in the opening scenes.
In 2000, a collection of remixes of tracks from the original album - including several used in the computer game - was released as a double CD titled The War of the Worlds: ULLAdubULLA The Remix Album. While most of the contributors are relatively unknown, the album includes two versions of a remix of "Dead London" by Apollo Four Forty.
On 23 June, 2005 the album was re-released in two forms: one in a remastered 2-disc Hybrid Multichannel Super Audio CD set; another in a 7-disc "Collector's Edition" featuring many bonuses such as various remixes, outtakes, and the actors reading from the unabridged script as well as the seventh disc being a DVD showing the making of the album.
Whilst the original ULLAdubULLA album had a very limited run and has since gone out of print, following the huge success of the 2005 re-release of the original album, ULLAdubULLA II was released on 17 April, 2006. This single CD release was largely made of tracks from the original remix album, with some additional new remixes.
In addition, it was announced in late 2004 that production had been commissioned for an animated CGI film version set for a 2007 release. Test footage of some of the Martian machines has been released to War of the Worlds online *.
A live tour occurred in the UK and Ireland in April 2006, based on the album. A 'virtual' Richard Burton performed as the Journalist, and Justin Hayward recreated his vocal performances from "Forever Autumn" and "The Eve of the War". Other artists who appeared include Russell Watson as Parson Nathaniel and Chris Thompson who sang "Thunder Child" as "The Voice Of Humanity" on the original album. A full sized Fighting Machine featured centre-stage. Also presented was a short animated 'prequel' to the story in the style of the upcoming feature-length film detailing the Martians' ecological destruction of their own world and their preparations to invade Earth, and including a short remix of "The Red Weed". The show was produced by Damian Collier and Jeff himself, who also conducted the 48-piece ULLAdubULLA Strings and 10-piece Black Smoke Band.
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Track listing
All dialogue written by Doreen and Jerry Wayne, based upon H.G. Wells's original text. Music and lyrics by Jeff Wayne except as noted.
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Side A
"The Eve of the War" – 9:06
"Horsell Common and the Heat Ray" – 11:36
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Side B
"The Artilleryman and the Fighting Machine" – 10:36
"Thunder Child" – 6:10 (Wayne, Osborne)
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Side C
"The Red Weed (Part 1)" – 5:55
"Parson Nathaniel" – 1:55
"The Spirit of Man" – 9:46 (Wayne, Osborne)
"The Red Weed (Part 2)" – 6:51
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Side D
"Brave New World" – 12:13 (Wayne, Osborne)
"Epilogue (Part 1)" – 2:42
"Epilogue (Part 2) (NASA)" – 2:02
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Compact disc
Same as LP, reorganised as a double CD. Original CD release date October 25, 1990:
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Disc one
"The Eve of the War" ( – 9:07.25) (Wayne)
"Horsell Common and the Heat Ray" ( – 11:35.32) (Wayne)
"The Artilleryman and the Fighting Machine" ( – 10:27.70) (Wayne)
"Forever Autumn" ( – 7:55.28) (Wayne, Vigrass, Osborne)
"Thunder Child" ( – 6:03.52) (Wayne, Osborne)
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Disc two
"The Red Weed (Part 1)" ( – 5:51.50)
"The Red Weed (Part 2)" ( – 6:19.25)
"Brave New World" ( – 12:36.75) (Wayne, Osborne)
"Dead London" ( – 8:36.45)
"Epilogue (Part 1)" ( – 2:42.55)
"Epilogue (Part 2) (NASA)" ( – 2:01.95)
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Additional musicians
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