"Watching the Wildlife" is the seventh and last single by British

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

 pop

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

 band Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Frankie Goes to Hollywood were a British dance-pop band popular in the mid-1980s. The group was fronted by Holly Johnson , with Paul Rutherford , Peter Gill , Mark O'Toole , and Brian Nash .The group's debut single "Relax" was banned by the BBC in 1984 while at number six in the charts and...

. Released in early 1987, it is taken from the album Liverpool

Liverpool (album)

Liverpool is Frankie Goes to Hollywood's second album, released in October 1986 . It would be the band's final album of all-new material, and lead singer Holly Johnson would leave the band following the corresponding world tour, followed by a flurry of lawsuits from ZTT.The album was a commercial...

.

Of the singles culled from Liverpool, "Watching the Wildlife" is the most poppy and similar in sound to the band's early era material. However, the single only reached Number 28 in the UK singles chart and #23 in Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. It is also the only one of the three Liverpool singles not to have a CD single release at that time (a cd single identical to the first 12 inch was released in 2002).

The 7" packaging made reference to animal

Animal

Animals are a major group of multicellular, eukaryotic organisms of the kingdom Animalia or Metazoa. Their body plan eventually becomes fixed as they develop, although some undergo a process of metamorphosis later on in their life. Most animals are motile, meaning they can move spontaneously and...

s, with a panda

Panda

Panda or Panda bear most often refers to:*Giant panda, an animal in the Bear familyPanda may also refer to:*Red panda, the only living member in the Ailuridae family-In biology:* Species related to the Giant panda...

 and dolphin

Dolphin

Dolphins are marine mammals that are closely related to whales and porpoises. There are almost forty species of dolphin in 17 genera. They vary in size from and , up to and . They are found worldwide, mostly in the shallower seas of the continental shelves, and are carnivores, mostly eating...

 on the sleeve. The cassette single made more references to sex

Sexual intercourse

Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...

. To wit, the instrumental mix was dubbed "The Condom

Condom

A condom is a barrier device most commonly used during sexual intercourse to reduce the probability of pregnancy and spreading sexually transmitted diseases . It is put on a man's erect penis and physically blocks ejaculated semen from entering the body of a sexual partner...

 Mix" on the cassette single. The promotional condom that was to be distributed with each single would have stopped the single sales counting towards the UK charts as the official chart provider had introduced new rules to this effect.

The single also featured a brand new track, "The Waves" on the b-side.

7": ZTT / ZTAS 26 United Kingdom

"animal fur/animal smell"

1. "Watching the Wildlife" – 3:50
2. "The Waves" – 3:02

12": ZTT / 12 ZTAS 26 United Kingdom

1. "Watching the Wildlife" (hotter) – 9:02
2. "Wildlife Bit 1" [unlisted] - :38
3. "Wildlife Bit 2" [unlisted] - :37
4. "Watching the Wildlife" (voiceless) – 3:49
5. "The Waves" – 3:02

12": ZTT / 12 ZTAX 26 United Kingdom

1. "Watching the Wildlife" (movement 2) – 7:12
2. "Wildlife Bit 3" – 6:24
3. "Wildlife Bit 4" – 4:20
4. "The Waves" – 3:02

• "Movement 2" is a mainly instrumental mix, featuring a unique orchestration of the song by arranger David Bedford.
• "Wildlife Bit 3" is an extended mix by engineer Robert Kraushaar.
• "Wildilife Bit 4" is an instrumental mix without drums, guitar or bass, showcasing the orchestral arrangement.

12": ZTT / 12 ZTE 26 United Kingdom

"Beobachtungen im Wilden Leben" (roughly translated as "Observations in the wild life")

1. "Beobachtungen im Wilden Leben" (Die Letzten Tage der Menschheit Mix) (use a condom) – 10:16
2. "Wildlife Bit 1" [unlisted] - :38
3. "Wildlife Bit 2" [unlisted] - :37
4. "Watching the Wildlife" (voiceless) – 3:49
5. "The Waves" – 3:02

• "Die letzten tage der menschheit mix" ('The last days of mankind mix') was deceptively listed as mixed by Klaus Schulze
  Klaus Schulze
  Klaus Schulze is a German electronic music composer and musician. He also used the alias Richard Wahnfried. He was briefly a member of the electronic bands Tangerine Dream and Ash Ra Tempel before launching a solo career consisting of more than 60 albums released across five decades.-1970s:In...
  
  , which got ZTT into trouble with Schulze. It was actually mixed by Paul Morley, and features samples from an AIDS phoneline.

MC: ZTT / CTIS 26 United Kingdom

1. "Watching the Wildlife" (Bit 4) [aka "Orchestral Wildlife"] – 4:26
2. "Watching the Wildlife" (Hotter) ["Hotter Wildlife"] – 9:09
3. "The Waves" – 3:02
4. "Wildlife Bit 1" ["One Bit"] - :38
5. "Wildlife Bit 2" ["Two Bit"] - :37
6. "Watching the Wildlife" (Bit 3) [aka "The Condom Mix"] – 6:26

• Although the tracks were listed on the sleeve with unique titles ("Orchestral Wildlife", "The Condom Mix" etc), they are in fact the same tracks that appeared on the first two 12" singles.
• This cassette single was included on the 2011 deluxe reissue of the album Liverpool
  Liverpool (album)
  Liverpool is Frankie Goes to Hollywood's second album, released in October 1986 . It would be the band's final album of all-new material, and lead singer Holly Johnson would leave the band following the corresponding world tour, followed by a flurry of lawsuits from ZTT.The album was a commercial...
  
  , with a reordered tracklisting.

Chart performance

Chart (1987)	Peak position	Total weeks
Dutch Singles Chart	47	5
German Singles Chart	23	9
Irish Singles Chart	24	2
UK Singles Chart	28	8