The Five Marks

by Jesse Coffey

Rating: teen
Tags:
Length: 2350

The Five Marks embark on an accident-plagued tour of Europe.

Meet the supposed R&B group The Five Marks, consisting of Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom, Button Mash, Babs Seed, and Scootaloo. They once had 5 huge R&B & Pop chart-toppers. Now they find themselves with the task of living up to their lost glory as they embark on an accident-plagued European tour.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2014-07-24 18:08:03 UTC

How It All Started / The Opening Night Party

Yes, I wonder how you started this group.

APPLE BLOOM

Alto

Why yes, we can tell you how we started. See, we originally formed as the Manhattans, only to discover that a group in New Jersey already took that name, and then, we ourselves came up with the Five Marks name.

SCOOTALOO

Tenor

Originally, we thought it was so lame, but then we decided, Oh, what the hell, let's give it a try. And it worked great for us. And, uh, do you remember our first TV appearance?

SWEETIE BELLE

Falsetto/Soprano

Fondly.

"POPLAND, EQUESTRIA"

(Equestrian Television; 1965)

You've got a smile so bright

You know you could've been a candle

I'm holding you so tight

You know you coulda have been a handle

The way you swept me off my feet

You know you could have been a broom

The way you smelled so sweet

You know you could have been some perfume

Well, you could have been anything that you wanted to

And I can tell the way you do the things you do

Ah baby

The way you do the things you do

The way you do the things you do

Who was your first, uh, baritone?

BABS SEED

Bass

Uh, my guess would be Prince Blueblood, who you would see in that clip, except that he treated us the way he treated Rarity, and then we were like "OK, this guy does not belong in this group", and we fired him. Then we came across little Button Mash here, and he had a GREAT singing voice on the same level as Sweetie Belle's.

OPENING NIGHT PARTY

London, England

Hi baby. How are you sweetie? How do you do?

Who's that young boy over there?

Wonder who that could be?

Well, girls, this is Dio Belmont.

Come here. Come here, that's it. So yes, my name is Dio Belmont! Call me hostess, comrade, chum, buddy, pal, whatever.

DIO BELMONT

Artist Relations, Mareista Records

Now why don't we all meet Large Cigars, who is the head of the Mareista label.

We know that!

Come here, come here, come here. Let's all meet the Five Marks.

LARGE CIGARS

President, Mareista Records

Meet him now. Large Cigars, this is The Five Marks, there they are.

Hi Apple. Hi Scoots. Hi Babs. Hi Sweetie. Hi Button.

Hello!

OK, let's all try to get a photo here. Come on, get my photographer, we'll take a group photo.

Everybody at Mareista is looking forward to a long and fruitful relationship with the Five Marks. We wish them the greatest of all successes on their European tour. So now, everybody say, WE MAKE OUR EUROPEAN MARKS!

*Cheers and applause*

The Concert in Glasgow / Reviews

*When a man loves a woman,

he can't keep his mind on nothing else

He'll trade the world

for the good thing he's found

If she is bad, he can't see it,

she can do no wrong

Turn his back on his best friend*

if he put her down

(Audience cheering)

*When a man loves a woman,

spend his very last dime

Tryin' to hold on to what he needs

He'd give up all his comforts,

sleep out in the rain*

If she said that's the way it ought to be

*Well, this woman loves a man

I gave you everything I had

Tryin' to hold on to your high class love*

Baby, please don't treat me bad

(Audience continues to cheer, lights begin flickering)

*When a man loves a woman,

down deep in his soul

She can bring him such misery

If she plays him for a fool,

he's the last one to know*

Lovin' eyes can't ever see

*When a man loves a woman

he can do her no wrong

He can never own some other girl

Yes, when a man loves a woman

I know exactly how he feels*

'Cause baby, baby, baby, you're my world

(Applause)

Very quickly, I would like now to talk about your reviews. For Life of Love, "The group can't even write their own songs. Never in one million years have they seemed to come up with anything original."

For God's sake, I mean...

For Disco Gospel, "Lacks in almost any sacred or tasteful field." And that's from the Legion of Decency in the United States.

Whoa, now THAT'S a good album. THAT'S a good album.

Well, I'm a Catholic, so, um, least you could say is, they didn't ex-communicate me for this.

The merely three-word review for your LP, World of Harmony, just says "World of Shit."

Whoa there. The reviewer really said "Shit?" You can't even print that word! No way! Uh-uh! No, can't get away with printin' that!

Whoa, that's going too far. You can't print the word "shit" in your review!

You can't print that! You can't print that! There's just no way on earth you can print that!

Promotion Talk

RECORDING INDUSTRY CONVENTION

Atlanta, Georgia, USA

There may, there may, there may indeed be talk about you being too white or your music being too black or yourselves being too old or something like that.

Very quickly here, why don'tcha talk about the album?

Yeah. Yeah, you know, how can you talk about something non-existent?

Nothing is really important about that except that Mareista's trying out some new packaging materials for your record. Hold on. Let me get the door. Oh, and another thing. We cancelled your Oslo gig.

What the hell youze talkin' about?

Let's not worry 'bout that now. That city ain't really all that big enough for you.

HOSPITALITY SUITE

OF MAREISTA RECORDS

So, heard you have a new album.

Yeah. Yeah. Dat's gonna come out, I think it's coming out...

Estimated date is August 1988.

And dat album would be Love, Don't War, if I'm not mistaken.

Very provocative title. I like it.

And if you REALLY like it, you should see the cover art we came up with for it.

Yeah, I might want to talk to you about the cover artwork, uh, for this particular record.

Yes.

We feel, as much as does everyone else here, that the record company REALLY is going against this cover

Ah yes. They don't like the cover and find it very offensive and inappropriate and, um, sexist too.

What do you find offensive about it exactly?

Well, um, the group put in various photos of them having sex set against a backdrop of a war-torn area, and in the middle of it, there are men and women walking with male penises and female vaginas and breasts sticking out. Do you find THAT offensive?! Do you find THAT sexist?!

But this is 1988!

I know that it's 1988! Get out of the '60s! Nobody has that type of mentality anymore!

Go look at the cover that they wanted to do.

Nobody gives a SHIT about what they wanted to do. Go talk to your Five Marks about this cover. I don't think that the whole things I described are answers to why an album either sells or doesn't. Go tell me. What was The White Album? What was The Black Album? Nothing was on the fucking covers of either. 'Scuse me. I have a call to make. I'll talk with you later.

ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ring

Hello. Yeah. Yeah, OK, let's have YOU tell them. YOU tell them. OK? It's Large Cigars. He wants to talk to you.

Yeah, hello. Oh, my fucking god! Well, it's not really all that offensive dear. Come on now. OK, I'll phone you absolutely first thing in the morning.

Mareista is not gonna release the album since they decided that the cover is sexist and offensive and inappropriate.

Well, what the hell was wrong about being sexy in the first place?

OK, listen up. For such a long time, I wanted to tell you this, and was holding back 'cause I didn't know what the decision of Large Cigars was gonna be. Yet at this point, both Sears, Kmart, and Asda stores have refused handling of the CD, cassette, and LP. And it's only because of the cover for each version that they're boycotting each version.

And if that company is behind that album, it can shove it right up their fucking ass!

Money talks. Bullshit walks. If Album No. 1 was a fuckin' hit, then we could have pressed on the label. And then we could have told them YES WE CAN!

Look, here, look here missy. If we were serious and we said, "Yes, they should walk around the little area naked," THEN you would have a point. But it's all the biggest joke on earth, isn't it? Yes. We're just satirizing it! Not like we're repeating it on and on and on and on...

The thing is, we could probably work something out. You know. I'll talk to the CEO of the company, and then maybe we can come up with a compromise, and then maybe a brand new design concept we could all live with.

Scene One / Scenes from an Austrian tour

Hi. My name is Twilight Sparkle. I am a filmmaker and a librarian. I have several books on film that you can borrow anytime. Yes, even "The Golden Turkey Awards."

In 1968, I went down to a local record shoppe in Canterlot called The Record Shack. Don't look for it. It's not there anymore. That day, I bought a record by a group that for me, brought Equestria some good, old-fashioned, real R&B. Remember how I was noting their style. Their grace. Their sophistication. Their true power. Punctuality. And most of all, their ability to get the boys (and, for one of them, the ability to get the ladies). I would like to now call this band Equestria's now-legendary *Five Marks. After 19 years and 16 albums to count, **The Five Marks continue to exist. They've earned a distinguished place in R&B and soul history as one of the most attractive groups around. So, in the late fall of 1987, when I heard that this group is gonna come out with a new album titled "Love, Don't War", and was planning their first European tour since 1977, well, needlessly, I jumped into the opportunity of a lifetime: making the documentary -- er, soulumentary, that you're about to see. I want to capture the sights, sounds, warmth, especially, of a hardworking R&B group on the road. I got that, and I got a whole lot more. Hey, let's stop yakkin'. What do you say? Let's boogie!*

TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX PRESENTS

THE FIVE MARKS

A Soulumentary by Twilight Sparkle

They're loving, they're caring, they're warm-hearted, and that boy's got everything that'll get a lady!

Those would be the songs you could wrap arms around ladies like me to.

Yeah, they got everything missing from this genre today.

VIENNA, AUSTRIA

Nov. 16, 1986

You are my only love

Whoa, yes you are

You are my only love

Oh, yes, baby baby

You are my only love

Girl, girl, girl

You are my only love

And I need you more than ever

You bring me many nights of heaven

You keep me satisfied

Lord knows how much of showing "I love you" I have tried

You are my only love

Whoa, yes you are

You are my only love

We're from Equestria!

You are my only love

This must be Austria!

You are my only love

I want you to know how much I love you

I've got things that I want to give to you

You are the happiness in my life

And I don't wanna lose you in all my trouble and strife

Oh!

You are my only love

Whoa, girl, yes, baby

You are my only love

Baby baby baby baby

You are my only love

Woman, woman

You are my only love

(Applause.)

Limo Conversations

We see the interior of a big, giant limo, containing the Five Marks, Dio Belmont and Twilight Sparkle. It is being driven by Rainbow Dash.

Attention. You're reading the book Little House on the Prairie?

Of course! Have you ever read it?

Yeah, by Laura Ingalis Wilder?

Yeah.

You know what the title of that book should be? Little House on the Prairie with Michael Landon Watching Us Real Closely! 'Cause Michael Landon's behind that TV show. Did you ever get to the part in which that little family move in and then they go and build their little cabin in the woods?

The window slides up behind the driver. It closes tightly at the top.

These kids, eh, what the hell you gonna do with 'em?

Well, yeah, that whole wild west atmosphere, it just feels other-wordly to them.

These people, yeah, they get what they want, so they don't really understand too much about, uh, the situations in the west at that period in time.

Yeah, you know, the difficulties of farm life, the, uh, the even dangerous ones, you know, life is promising that way.

But dat's not, dat's not the point here. The point is, when are we gonna get dis album released? Ya know.

This coming March, we're gonna put this album right in the Scottish market.

Ooh, I like Scotland, yeah, you can just put the album there and everything will be fine.

And yes, I really hate to tell these kids that, but, their act's gonna go all out of style soon.