Flying Marilyn

Flying was the Italo Disco project of Marzio Benelli and Andrea Venturoli from Firenze, Italy. Marzio specialized in sound engineering at various recording studios in Milan throughout the early 1980s. He opened Emme Studio where we worked with major national and international artists as Claudio Baglioni, Renato Zero, Venditti, Marco Masini, Pieces, Mia Martini, Litfiba, Mick Ronson. In 1984 he met Andrea, a sound programmer who knew his way around analog synthesizers. Their first collaboration was that same year on the song “Computer Sourire” for Alexander Robotnick debut album.


In 1985 the duo recorded ‘Marilyn’, the debut single for the project Flying that was released the same year on Sound Of Italy. Their basic set up for recording was a PPG Wave 2.3 Synthesizer, Elka Synthex, Roland Jupiter-8, Roland TB-808 and TR-909 and a Gibson Les Paul guitar. They recruited producer Nicola Serena to program the DMX Oberheim drum machine. On vocals was Stefano “Fly” Matteoli, a DJ at discoteques Concorde and Sombrero in Tuscany. Backup Vocals were sisters Antonella Bianchi (Plustwo, Belen Thomas) and Marina Bianchi (Plustwo, Sue Sadlow), who was Marzio’s wife. Stefano confidently sings a haunting love story, full of tragic doubts and cruel dreams. Hand played percussion leads the song complemented by the keyboards that complete the infectious melody, with catchy hooks, and 4/4 beats that clock in at 100 beats per minute. On the B-side, the dubbed out 8 minute “Remix Version” makes use of the Publison Infernal Machine, an innovative multi-FX processor that was the first sampler to change the speed of a song without affecting pitch. All songs have been remastered for vinyl by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. Each record comes in a full color sleeve featuring the original iconic cover with misspelling of the title art plus a postcard with lyrics and with notes.