Screamadelica: the poll

What scares me is, there was a point when I would have cared. There was a point when I would have cared a lot.

Now this news makes me cringe.

Sounds quite fun, tho I don't know what PS are like live these days (I have never seen them live)

They are no longer the Battersea Dogs Home For Lost Shoegazers, they are now a perfectly competent gang of session men propping up what is left of Bobby G's ass. It will be perfect for the nostalgia trippers. I am perfectly sure they will do an adequately good job of performing this album.

Which is really, truly odd, as the band that actually recorded this album were *not* actually capable of doing so.

im not usually up for this kind of thing but this one is tempting

"adequate" and "competent" are never words I thought I'd type about Primal Scream.

i dunno, last time i saw them (TEN YEARS AGO... fuck) they were boringly competent

i have no idea who actually played what where, on record or off btw

Not a tour, or indeed a big selling point, but Suede also did this with their five albums in five successive nights at ICA. I wonder just who went to the final gig?

I'd probably be more interested in this one if they got a session guy in to replace Bobby G himself.

Suede also did this with their five albums in five successive nights at ICA

amazed i missed news of this. did they change line-up midway through?

I suppose "indie nostalgia band plays their big album" is a guaranteed way of saying "we promise they won't bother you with any of that post-success experimental nonsense or come-back albums." Also a way of screaming to casual fans THERE WILL BE NO SONGS YOU DON'T KNOW. HONEST!!!!

I'd really rather see Primal Scream do a "greatest hits" show of the sort they've been touring recently than shit all over an album they actually had very little to do with the actual making of.

about five of those greatest hits are from 'screamadelica' though

there aren't that many people out there aching to hear 'kowalski' iirc

and i sure as hell don't want to hear anything they've done since exterminator at the latest

Yeah, I remember they were one of several bands that were all "our next album is going to be all IGGYness" until the 'dance remix' took off and suddenly all those bands were all "ah, there's always been a dance element to our music"

(for newer readers, that last quote was from The Soup Dragons, who were about to release their new Iggyalbum but withdrew it *just* in time (cassette versions escaped) for a dancey makeover)

I'd prefer them to do a "history" gig, like Motorhead did once, where all their past members come and go in chronological order, and they start off with "All Fall Down / It Happens"

yeah?

how much of 'pet sounds' was played by the beach boys?

Ah, the old "there's always been a dance element to our music" escape clause. I liked that Soup Dragons album, for shame.

I don't remember anything past XTRMNTR at the "greatest hits" type show, it was pretty much monster hit followed by monster hit with the occasional ballad to go to the bar. Which is how greatest hits shows should be. I was surprised how much I enjoyed it, there was a lot of nostalgia notes that they managed to hit quite well.

Of course I'd be unlikely to recognise anything past that one album that came out after XTRMNTR whose title I conveniently forget but it had Autobahn 66 and that awful cover of Some Velvet Morning on it?

i can't remember either. all their 00s albums have similar auto-generated titles.

I had to look it up. Evil Heat. ::shudders::

yeah, "Evil Heat Shudders" would have been better.

What I always liked about them was that after paying people to make their records good, they would learn to play them live. So most bands would have left Loaded as a remix of I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have, rather than turning it into a mainstay of their sets (although the bit where he starts singing A Love Supreme over it live is embarrassing - or is that over something else?). At Reading 94, maybe, they played a live version of the Dust/Chemical Bros remix of Jailbird, which was just great, exhilerating (rather than a bit shit like the actual song).

Fave ever Scream gig was after Vanishing Point came out in the old train station in Barcelona. They opened and closed with different versions of Burning Wheel and played Five Years Ahead of My Time. Awesome.

Or like the MBV Arkestra remix of If They Move, Kill 'Em.

I was vaguely aware of Riot City Blues, but Beautiful Future, WTF? I didn't even know they had done another. Was at a party last weekend with a bloke who theorised that for every band, whenever it was you stopped following them, they *always* had one more album you were not aware of. This seems to bear this out!

x-post

So most bands would have left Loaded as a remix of I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have

Pretty sure this was the work of Creation and/or Radio. My copy has the song as the main track, followed by the remix.

I have a ton of CDs that a mate who went to China left with me, and I still haven't dared put Evil Heat on ...

Uptown (Long after the disco is over mix) is aces, though. Highly recommended. They probably do a live version of that, too.

Evil Heat's wank. Riot City Blues is worse, though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=238EnhfrmLg

re. the poll. amazed im comin down got no votes and damaged got two. damaged is the only one id skip.

Jesus, I didn't even mean Evil Heat; I meant Beautiful Future. That's how shitty Primal Scream are outside of Screamadelica, XTRMNTR, Vanishing Point, and a handful of other singles.

rubbish lyrics and everything, but im surprised 'im coming down' got naaathing. prefer it to damaged any day.

― FREE DOM AND ETHAN (special guest stars mark bronson), Tuesday, March 31, 2009 1:45 PM (10 months ago) Bookmark

well at least im consistent

beautiful future was hilariously reviewed by petridis*

*yeah i actually typed that

there is a special reason why it was funny to me neway

Evil Heat got 8/10 from NME.

(just googled to check the tracklisting: Autobahn 66 was alright in it's neuness...)

Someone in or around that band was incredibly good at Zeitgeist chasing and getting on the bandwagon at just the right time. Signs would point to Andrew Innes or someone at Creation as the obvious culprit.

It's quite curious how you can have a band who seem so easily led and give the impression of being too drugged up to care what is done to their music - and it ends up being exactly the *right* thing to get them credit for being on top of the wave rather than drowned behind it. But it all gives the impression of being astute business direction or luck rather than any calculated effort.

It's probably just nostalgia that makes me retain any element of affection for them. But the last time I saw them, last year, it was such a trip down memory lane of mine own musical experience that it was hard to hate them.

How to do a frankly BRILLIANT remix of PRML SCRM every time:

-Grab the bass riff. That will always be brilliant. Loop it and boost the sub-bass.
-Grab the guitar riff. Run it through a huge amount of delay and reverb so it's really psychedelic
-Add some wibble and sparkly psychedelic noises
-Erase as MUCH of Bobby Gillespie's voice as you can possibly get away with. The occasional "woo!" or "alright!" is OK but you do not want to allow him anything even approximating a tune
-Add some melodica to remind everyone how much they'd love to be New Order, if they were really from Manchester, maaaaaan
-Add some samples that scream "LSD!" - biker flicks or Indian strings or free jazz noise and sprinkle them in liberally

Now you're done. Stand back and watch the indie disco floor fill up.

Evil Heat's not a BAD record per se, just lacklustre after XTRMNTR.

Evil Heat is OK

It's utterly brilliant compared to Riot City Blues ha ha.

Actually just put on Evil Heat and I had forgotten Deep Hit Of The Morning Sun was on this and not XTRMNTR. Oops.

The more I listen, the more I'm convinced that if this album were released a no vocals dub version I'd love it. But we're still on singles and haven't got to the album tracks yet.

DHOMS is pretty excellent, aye. The lead single was alright, too.

At MBVATP I left the actually-a-bit-boring Yo La Tengo to watch PS and they played XTRMNTR which was great but then they played something off one of the last two albums and it was awful, and then followed it with something else post-Evil Heat so I left.

They were awesome live when Kevin Shields was playing with them though.

I actually just had to check that the last song was Bobby G whinging semi-soulfully and not Jason Pierce. That isn't a good sign.

The more I listen, the more I'm convinced that if this album were released a no vocals dub version I'd love it.

suspect i am the only person who listens to echodek more than any primal scream proper album ?

I really really like Echo Dek, great little underappreciated semi-album!

absolutely not, Echo Dek is by far my favorite Primal Scream disc. Head and shoulders above the other PS albums and one of the best 'dubs' of any album i've ever heard.

'Vanishing Point' is the one for me. Some of the best and most inventive stereo panning I've heard, which is good because some of the songs are quite weak.

Seen the Scream plenty of times throughout the years. The best was probably on the 'Evil Heat' tour, despite the fact I'm not a huge fan of the album, it was great to see Kevin Shields. Thought it would've been the only chance to see him back then.

Too bad we can't count on stereo panning to save more bad albums...

Kate's remix summary* pretty nicely describes the recent Weatherall Uptown version

*bar the bemusing melodica line. Pablo was on the OG Star, and how much did New Order use melodica?

Saw them a year ago last weekend and they were good except a) everything off the last two and b) EVERY SONG had to turn into a blues jam at the end, even Higher Than The Sun

from twitter :

jagzkooner Oh and just to reiterate, the primal scream "screamadelica live" gig at earls court is a 1 off only, and WONT be repeated ever again.

(those five Suede gigs I mentioned were in 2003, I just found out to my horror when I read the flier for their upcoming reunion)

whoever picked that photo wants shooting.