LaserDiscs needed for replacing BD audio

[Moshrom]

Medium Cool (1969)

The film is famous in most circles for its use of Zappa's music from the We're Only in It for the Money era.

The Criterion and Masters of Cinema blu-rays, every DVD ever released, and (unfortunately) the Paramount LD all have the Wild Man Fischer song 'Merry-Go-Round' replaced with a whistling variant of Brother Bones's 'Sweet Georgia Brown'.

See:

In the case of Medium Cool, this affects one song, Wild Man Fischer’s “Merry-Go-Round”, which plays over the roller-derby scene early on. It’s replaced by a whistling rendition of “Sweet Georgia Brown” by Brother Bones. The final credit slide of the theatrical version (which incidentally misspells the singer’s surname as “Fisher”) has been remade to reflect this change. This is a regrettable change, not so much for the merits of the song but for its effect in context. Briefly, Fischer was a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic and acid casualty who played on street corners. Frank Zappa gave him a recording contract and produced an album, An Evening with Wild Man Fischer, of which “Merry-Go-Round” is the opening track. Fischer couldn’t sing, couldn’t play, his lyrics were childlike at best, and his recording career is little more than a callous joke on Zappa’s part – though to be fair he does have a cult following who praise his unique world view. But in context, “Merry-Go-Round” works perfectly: its shambolic rhythm and Fischer’s complete inability to stay on pitch only emphasising the show violence of the roller derby. (Violence as show, as comedy, as spectacle, and as excitement: Wexler is less than subtle in cutting from this to Forster and Hill having sex.) By contrast, Brother Bones’s replacement track alters the scene’s tone entirely. Fortunately, the other songs on the soundtrack, from the Mothers of Invention, are intact.

Previous VHS and the Paramount DVD replaced "Merry-Go-Round" with Brother Bones's whistling rendition of "Sweet Georgia Brown" over the roller derby scene. To say it changes the tone of that scene would be an understatement. This version also changes the final credits page at the end of the film. The original credits page misspells the singer's name as "Wild Man Fisher".

The music rights issue wouldn't have applied to theatrical screenings (I've not seen the film in a cinema, having missed the chance at a "Mavericks" season at the National Film Theatre in London a few years ago) or television showings, but the amended version has turned up on British television at least twice, the last two times it has been shown on BBC2. Previous showings on BBC1 and Channel 4 were of the "Merry-Go-Round" version.

The rights to Fischer's first album An Evening with Wild Man Fischer (of which "Merry-Go-Round" is the opening track) are held by Frank Zappa's estate, and they have declined to release it on CD after Fischer and Zappa fell out - both are now dead of course. But "Merry-Go-Round" was cleared for use in the documentary about Fischer, Derailroaded so presumably there would be no issue with it now?

I used to show Haskell Wexler's Medium Cool in my film classes and the 16mm prints have the song "Merry-Go-Round" by Wild Man Fischer during the roller derby scene. According to IMDB the song was the subject of a lawsuit when the film was released on home video because Paramount only had the rights for theatrical and television showings. I thought the rights issue might be resolved when Criterion released it since they usually try to present the film as originally intended, but the alternate music also was used on that release, and there is not even any mention of the film being modified from its original form. Tonight TCM is showing the film and since it is a television broadcast I thought the initial rights negotiation might apply and they would run the film with the original music, but they also are running it with the alternate music. So apparently the only way to see the film as it was originally released is on a 35mm or 16mm print, or perhaps on an old taped copy of a television showing (I seem to remember the USA network running the film years ago, but not sure what music they used).

> Reply:
There is at least one other way to see the Roller Derby sequence intact. The original Paramount VHS cassette of MEDIUM COOL, released circa 1982 or so, had the sequence with the original music/song. That VHS cassette was, I believe, the reason that Fischer sued.

Fischer was "wild and crazy," but he got it together to sue "The Man" when it came to his song.

So it seems all new TV broadcasts are presumably using the newer HD master from which the blu-rays were made, and therefore contain the substitution. So the ~1982 Paramount VHS or a capture of an older TV broadcast would be necessary to restore the audio for this scene...