The Carnival of the Animals and xylophone. From the beginning, Saint-Saëns regarded the work as a piece of fun. On 9 February 1886 he wrote to his publishers Durand in Paris that he was composing a work for the coming Shrove Tuesday, and confessing that he knew he should be working on his Third Symphony, but that this work was "such fun" (). He had apparently intended to write the work for his students at the École Niedermeyer, but it was first performed at a private concert given by the cellist Charles Lebouc on Shrove Tuesday, 9 March 1886. A second (private) performance was given
Electricity (Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark song) of avant-garde musical scores which he'd come across. Andy McCluskey said that he sometimes wrote down the tunes he composed in a similar shorthand. This led to the unusual graphics that feature on the sleeve. Saville suggested to use shiny black ink on black paper. Neither OMD nor Tony Wilson believed it could be done, but Saville persuaded a printer to do the job. The thermographic printing was a success, but the place set on fire three times, so eventually only 5,000 sleeves were printed. The reissue sleeves were standard white on black printed sleeves. Electricity (Orchestral Manoeuvres in the