Neil  We decided we were going to do these concerts in a theatre in London in June 1997, and we also decided that we should bring out a new single so that we had something new to coincide with the concerts. Chris suggested that we did 'Somewhere' from West Side Story.

Chris I love 'Somewhere'. I've always liked it. And I thought it had disco potential. I just like the line: 'A place for us.. somewhere a place for us...' It's all about promised lands. It's like 'Go West', really. The same theme. I also like 'hold my hand and I'll take you there'.

Neil  At one point we were going to do an EP called Show tunes. Our EP ideas are always good, but we always get talked out of them.

Chris The record company always asks the question 'why?' when we have these ideas. They stop us from doing them. 'Why?' Because we want to. As Billie so rightly said.

Neil  My way, we worked on the single with Pete Gleadall and Bob Krausaar. We did a basic sort of high energy version and then got Richard Niles to do an arrangement with a brief that it was like a film. So the orchestra shows Richard Niles at his most insane. And we used the film samples because we wanted to set the song - which comes from West Side Story, which is Romeo and Jullet in the ghettos of New York

- in the Los Angeles riots. We said to the tape op, 'Are there any gangster films here?' and Menace II Society was lying around the studio. So we took the dialogue at the beginning from that: 'You want to live in this lousy world?' 'When the riots stop, the drugs start'. I've never even watched Menace II Society.

Chris I've watched it.

Neil  The Leonard Bernstein estate weren't very keen on us putting that dialogue on, and in fact we had to write and explain it to them. They refused at first, but eventually they agreed. Doing a big record is always really difficult, and we weren't happy with the rhythm track. The Trouser Enthusiasts had done two remixes for us and so we got the Trouser Enthusiasts in at the last moment and he did some work on the seven-inch at Sarm West. The seven-inch version starts with 'One Hand, One Heart' which is my favourite song in West Side Story and it ends with 'I Feel Pretty', which is another West Side Story song.

Then, in the studio, we did a long mix-the version here-which was intended specifically to be the music for us to come on stage to at the Savoy Theatre. Chris did this whole long introduction, and then there is the big fanfare where we walked onstage. We wouldn't actually perform the full song until the end of the show. Consequently, when I listen to this track, lam standing backstage at the Savoy Theatre waiting to go onstage, and it makes me feel slightly sick.

Chris We're at our best when we're doing a show tune. What's better than a show tune combined with high energy?

Neil  On the long introduction you can hear Chris saying the lyrics from 'One Hand, One Heart'. That's my favourite bit of the record. He sounds like Uam Gallagher. He goes Manc again, one of his range of accents. It was my idea for him to say it but he did it uncomplaining and unflinchingly, in one take, and he didn't even throw everyone out of the studio.