| Kilimanjaro | |
| Type: | studio |
| Artist: | The Teardrop Explodes |
| Cover: | Teardrop Explodes - Kilimanjaro CD album cover.jpg |
| Recorded: | Summer 1979–summer 1980 |
| Studio: | Rockfield Studios, Rockfield, Monmouthshire, Wales |
| Length: | 37:05 |
| Label: | Mercury |
| Next Title: | Wilder |
| Next Year: | 1981 |
Kilimanjaro is the debut album by the neo-psychedelic Liverpool band The Teardrop Explodes, released on 10 October 1980.[1] It contains versions of the band's early singles "Sleeping Gas", "Bouncing Babies", "Treason" and "When I Dream"; reissues of the album also include their biggest hit, "Reward". The album also includes the song "Books", originally a song by Julian Cope's previous band, The Crucial Three; it was also recorded by Echo & the Bunnymen (as "Read It in Books", released on the B-side of their debut single, and featured on some versions of Crocodiles). In 2000, Q magazine placed Kilimanjaro at number 95 in its list of the "100 Greatest British Albums Ever".
The original working title for Kilimanjaro was Everyone Wants to Shag the Teardrop Explodes; this title was later used for the CD release of demos for the band's never-finished third album. When originally released, the album featured a shadowy photograph of the band on the sleeve; when the album was reissued in 1981, the album artwork was changed to a photo of zebras in front of Tanzania's Mount Kilimanjaro, the mountain after which the record was named. Subsequent CD reissues feature either album covers.
In 2000, Cope gave his blessings to re-release Kilimanjaro with a selection of bonus tracks (mainly single B-sides), original artwork, a remastered sound, and full lyrics and essays. A deluxe 3-disc edition followed in 2010, including original singles, B-sides and radio session recordings.
The original release did not include "Reward", which was added to later pressings after it became a hit single early in 1981. The reverse of the LP album sleeve had a running order different from that of the record itself.
The album was reissued with a new sleeve (known as the "Zebra" or "Mountain" sleeve), with "Reward" added as an extra track following "Second Head" in the running order. This reissue of the album was also remixed – most noticeably on "Went Crazy" and a longer version of "When I Dream".
This version of the album dropped "Second Head" and "Bouncing Babies" from the UK track line-up, but included "Suffocate" and "Reward" – the latter featuring a 12-second instrumental intro not included on the various UK releases of the song. This U.S. version of the album was reissued in the early 1990s on CD, LP and cassette by the New Jersey-based independent label Skyclad (LUCKY 7), but featuring the "Zebra" sleeve.
On 12 July 2010, the album was re-released as a remastered 3-disc deluxe edition with the "zebra" cover artwork.
The contents of disc 1 and most of disc 2 were previously released on other issues of Kilimanjaro: the remainder of disc 2 is taken from the compilation Piano. Disc 3 is mostly taken from The Peel Sessions release, "Suffocate" is a bonus track on the 2000 release of the band's second album Wilder and the other tracks were previously unissued. However, not all tracks from the parent releases are found on this release.
Julian Cope, despite authorising the release of the deluxe edition, later wrote on his website that he felt that the release had a low sound quality and forced fans to buy a vast majority of tracks which they already had while only offering a few newly released rare ones.
with:
Disc 1 (Kilimanjaro)
(same credits as for original album release, but remove "Reward" from track listing)
Disc 2 (Bates Motel)
Disc 3 (BBC Sessions)