Primal Scream . Webadelica

Music for a burned out Generation.

After a long stint in the rock 'n' roll wilderness the hedonistic band behind acid house classics 'Loaded', 'Come Together', 'Higher than the Sun' and 'Screamadelica' are back on our side with two new stunning albums. Paul Benney Joining them for orange juice. Bobby shots:RIP

Like it or not Primal Scream and acid house have been interlinked for longer than this magazine has been in existence. Ever since that has seminal seven minute blissed out instrumental with its 'We want to have a party, we want to have a good time' sample presented itself to the world in the form of 'Loaded' Primal Scream have always been more than just another rock band. The envidence? Well after 'Loaded', came 'Come Together' - an E anthem if there was one. And then 'Higher than the Sun' (possibbly one of the best singles of all time) which Bobby explained was inspired by Sun Ra and Miles Davis and everybody else thought was inspIred by ecstasy. Then there was the more uptempo dance floor staple 'Don't Fight it Feel It' and then what no-one could have even hopedfor: the definitive acid house album in the form of 'Screamadelica'. With a bright red sleeve feauring what looks like a child's drawing of the sun and large dilated pupils on its 'face' even the sleeve somehow summed up the time. When Bobby was asked in The Face what was.better out dance music compared to rock he quite beautifully just said "Better music. Better drugs. Better Women."

Six years later and 'Screamadelica' and acid house are history but Primal Scream are well that can't be dismissed simply as 'rock'. After a and truly back at the forefront of something destrucflve and disastrous journey to the heart of America and Americana, involving a support slot with Depeche Mode, a stabbing and bad drugs Primal Scream are looking forward again. Whhereas 'Give Out But Don't Give Up' was a trip to the roots of rock n roll (they were labelled by Screamadelica fans at the time as 'dance traitors') and the sound of a band falling apart the latest album 'Vanishing Point' and soon to be released dub version 'Echo Dek' sounds like a band with a mission for the next millenium. And other than the electronic 'sound' of the new album there's a number of signifiers that the band are back on our side again.

Here goes; their debut live gig this year was on a Heanenly Boat Party with Armand Van Helden and The Chemical Brothers joining them on the bill; they chose to play in the dance tent at Glastonbury as opposed to the main stage; Dr.Octagon's The Automator, The Chemical Brothers and Andrew Weatherall have remixed their last couple of singles; Roni Size's Reprazent recently supported them at their London shows; Bobby was spotted at London'sBloodsugar a couple of weeks back; Adrian Sherwood has just done a dub version of their album that he feels is one of the best things he's ever done; Kowalski. ("We knew Kowalski had to be the single because it was the first sin-gle back after three years. We went to Alan MeGhee and said this is the single and he said 'This sounds like my nervous breakdown'. So I said 'Good!'") That's the other coo] thing about Primal Scream - they give good quote.

It's the Wednesday after Princess Diana's death and Bobby Gifilespie is pacing around his press company's office Heavenly - and shouting. A news item about Primal Scream cancelling their mini-tour has appeared in the morning's music press giving the reason for the shows' cancellation as being 'out of a mark of respect for Diana'. The band are not happy.

"How do you explain that to your fans in Glasgow, Belfast and Dublin?" reasons Innes (doing his only British interview this year with Jockey Slut).

"Working class people who have nothing are still feeling sorry and still looking up to the Royal Family, that's a peasant mentality says Bobby sipping an orange juice in the pub that him, Jockey Slut, Martin Duffy and Andrew Innes are now sat in round the corner. "I thought we'd got over that, but apparently not. They should hate the Royal Family, they should have no sympathy for any of them. I like it actually because it's like the Falklands War where people that you thought were Socialists you realise are really jingoistic, patriotic, flag waving peasants. It's like 'Hey I used to like that guy'. I like crack cocaine for the same reason, because it brings out the truth."

"It shows people up for being no good fucking dogs," adds Innes on the subject of crack rather than Diana. "A pack of hounds behave better than a group of people with one rock between them."

"It's beautiful" smiles Bobby imaginlng the scenario.

(Eventually the band issue a statement that reads: "We have no respect whatsoever for Diana Spencer or any member of the English Royal Family. We are totally opposed to the monarchy. With regard to the London shows, the Police refused to police the event which meant the council would revoke the license. We wanted to play. The subsequent statement was issued by the promoter (Metropolis Music) and we are glad that people care enough about the band to be offended by that statement. We are." I think that 5 that cleared up then.)

But enough about Diana. How are things with the band generally?
INNES: The band's just getting better and better and now we've got nothing to do for a week We just want to keep working because if we get left with nothing to do we inevitably get up to no good."
BOBBY: We were supposed to be doing a film soundtrack thing for The Avengers but we're moving studios and the new one's not ready yet. But the new studio will be twice as big and we've got a long term lease on it."
INNES: "It's great having your own studio because you can just leave all your old socks lying about. In your own place you open the door and you get on with it instead of waiting about for hours while they tell you they've got to line up the tape machines, sort the mixing desk out, plug everything in. I mean we don't even do demos anymore because what's actually our demo ends up as our record. When you do your demo you get the spark and then you have to try and re-create it in a big studio and most of the time it just does nae' work out. Whereas the way we work now, the initial idea is what goes down on tape. This album sounds like the spark's there whereas the last one we spent tbree months trying to get a guitar overdub right and it fuckin' sounds like it. You end up with all the life taken out of the record and there's quite a lot of life in this record. The last album should've sounded more like that but we let it get tarted up and made presentable. If you hear the actual original tapes that we scrapped you'd just think 'They need hospital'. You hear a group that is fuckin' dead. It's a shame that we didn't just leave it that way."
BOBBY: "It should've sounded really fucked because the band was really fucked. It was falling apart and the record should've sounded like that but it didnae and that's why it's not a good record It just sounds too clean."

Eighteen months before the release of Vanishing Point' the buzz was that Andrew Weatherall was working with the Scream again. This meant to most people a return to 'Screamadelica' style Primals rather than the retro rock outfit who had made 'Give Out But Don't Give Up'. The Primal's best record in years 'Trainspotting', made for the Trainspotting soundtrack, was the evidence of this rekindled relationship. A smacked out, dubbed out, urban blues soundtrack it was a return to Primal Scream's inspired, indefinable best (and now incidentally a back-room classic). And through no fault of his own it was flippantly credited maybe a little more to Weatherall than it was to Primal Scream. But rumour has it that 'Trainspotting' was actually more an Innes record than a Weatherall one. In fact it's general- ly believed that the new Primals sound is more down to limes than anyone else.
BOBBY: "We did everything ourselves this time. We did one track that Andy (Weatherall) remixed called 'Stuka'."
INNES: "The thing with this album is...I call it a drum and bass record because normally the hardest thing to do is to get the drums and the bass right and this time we got it right so...we just didn't want our drums and bass taken off the record."
BOBBY: "We wanted this record to sound like we made it. We recorded everything in our studio and Innes programmed and engineered everything. I like the drums. No I do! I'm really proud of them. I think they're fucking perfect."
INNES: "We've learnt a lot over the years. If you work with people like Andrew Weatherall, Hugo Nicholson, Jimmy Miller, George Clinton and Adrian Sherwood and you don't learn anything then you just need shooting."

So the truth of the situation is that other than the 'Stuka' remix, Weatherall was only involved in one track- Trainspotting'. But that's no secret - it's down in black and white. As Innes says; "People should read the fuckin' sleevenotes!" In fact the major collaboration this time is with On-U Sound's Brit dub legend Adrian Sherwood.
INNES: "We were making a football record and we phoned him up and he said 'I know how to make football records, I've made loads of them'. And he has - he's made loads of West Ham records. He makes about four a year I think."
BOBBY: "He said 'What Glasgow team do you support? It's not them is it? Celtic? Good because there's something not quite right about that other lot.' I used to go to see him mix people like Jah Wobble live and the bass would be trying to tear your chest apart it was so fuck- mg heavy. So, the dub album was an experiment. Me and limes would go to his studio every day and just sit there. He said he couldn't get motivated to mix a record privately. When he was doing the dub mixes we had to be present, he was working off our reactions. He likes his light refreshinents as well. He was like 'I thought this was Primal Scream, Bobby can you bring me something to cheer me up?"' 'Echo-Dek' is awesome. Whereas at times on 'Vanishing Point', with tracks like 'Medication' it seems the band are having to make concessions to their 'Rocks' obsessed fanbase 'Echo-Dek' is uncompromising. It stands up as one of the best albums this year on its own, not as a remix album, just as a Primal Scream/Adrian Sherwood dub album.

But what of 'Vanishing Point' itself? What have the Scream been listening to that drew them away from straight up rock n' roll and into making fucked up paranoid, edgy, electronic, end of the millemum dub?
INNES: "I listen to a lot of hip hop, Jeru the Damaja, Dr Octagon - that's my favourite record of last year. It just sounds so simple. I also listen to a lot of Miles Davis and Stravinsky. That's what I've been listening to lately. People say that rock 'n' roll is like 30 years old but most techno was made in the thirties and forties by these experimental guys making real strange far out techno noises. Techno's about fifty years old."
BOBBY: "The thing with us is that when we go in that studio we're discovering new things all the time, Andrew's experimenting with sounds. And a lot of times there's no precedent for what he's doing. It's fresh and it's new because it's not influenced by anything but his imagination."

What do they think about people saying Vanishing Point' is a return to Screamadelica' era Scream?
INNES: "I don't think there's anything in the sounds maybe there's a bit of dub, but listen to the difference betweeen 'Come Together' and 'Burning Wheel' or 'Stuka'. Because this country is a lot more third world now than it was in '91. People will shoot people for 100 it's that desperate out there."
BOBBY: "'Screamadelica' was more euphoric, 'Vanishing Point' is more dark and edgy. When 'Screamadelica' came out Thatcher was still in power but it was also the time of acid house. You never thought the world was going to get to be a better place but it seemed a better place for six months. A lot of people made connections that they'd never made before. People came out of themselves and became DJs and writers and musicians. Andy (Weatherall) became a DJ and then a producer and then made his own records and then he had his own record label- so a lot of people found a creative voice through acid house. Us included. And you mix that with the drugs and it was a very euphoric time. And the drugs were better."
INNES: "But ten years on the sound of house music it 5 beginmng to sound like rock music. You ve heard it."

Although Bobby, Innes and Duffy seem to get on extremely well and are very positive about the band they're not enthusiastic about the constraints of the traditional rock band line-up, tour duties etc etc They're enthusing about a more modern Scream a band not held back by the antiquated rock music industry. In fact they refuse to let anything or anybody hold them back.
BOBBY: "We just used to sit and jam with five musicians in the room and it was painfully slow..."
INNES: "...and you have to wait for everybody to turn up...which with us lot could be weeks."
BOBBY: "No, no really..."
INNES: "We'd be just like, where is he? There was a whole suminer in '92 where we'd open up the rehearsal room at 2 0' clock and shut it up at six and nobody would have turned up. People used to turn up to score...and then leave again." Had everyone lost interest? INNES: "No people had other interests!"
BOBBY: "The great thing now is that if people don't turn up the record's still get made."
INNES: "Yeah I think people are a bit more keen now...they turn up because they think they might miss something." It's quite a modern way to make music.
BOBBY: "The way we work is almost like the way that hip-hop collectives work, that's how we've got the band working." Like the Wu tang Clan?
BOBBY: "Yeah or the way that Parliament would work or Funkadelic where you'd have a huge pool of musicians rather than just four or five. We've got a central core but outside that there's other people we can call on. We're always collab- orating with people like Jaki liebezeit from Can,we've done records with Jah Wobble and George Clinton and Kevin Shields and there's other people we'd like to work with and it just makes it new and strange and different."
INNES: "If we just made the same record every time then we'd just sack it. The reason that we're still enthusiastic about the group is because we're still making records that even we're thinking 'God, this sounds mental!"'
DUFFY: "One person can be brought in and it can completely inspire the whole band."
BOBBY: "Yeah it's more open and more free and hopefully people's approach to their instru- ments will be influenced by that. That's what you always hope for, that you learn something from the people that you are collaborating with in terms of sound and space and style and just the attitude I guess. I think musicians get lazy, they learn how to play and then if they get successful playing in a certain style then they just stick with it."
DUFFY: "Jazz groups used to have constantly changing line ups and formats, they didn't just form a quartet and then make the same record over and over again."
BOBBY: "Because they were more about music than money, most rock 'n' roll bands are more interested in money. It's like get a style, be suc- cessful, stick to it and make the money. Whereas with the jazz groups they were more concerned about seeing how far out they could take the music."

And it's not just the rigid structure of rock bands that the Primals are rebelling against it's the speed, or lack of it, that the industry works at. It's another aspect of the dance music scene that they admire.
BOBBY: "We do want to go on tour but we're trying to keep the dates as short as possible so that we can go back into the studio and keep making music. If you go on tour you cannae do it, especially the way that we write music. We've never sat in hotel rooms with guitars trying towrite songs."
INNES: "We don't normally even see the inside of our hotel rooms!"
BOBBY: "We've written a couple of new tunes that we'd love to put out next week but it's impossible with the machinery at Creation. It takes Creation twelve weeks from delivering the DAT to them putting it out. It's too long, it's too boring. We're going to start doing stuff under different names and putting them out - Enforcer, Paranoid 3000, Outbreak '68 - we've got a few different ideas. The whole dance thing is single orientated and rock is album orientated because singles don't sell. They want you to put an album out every two years so that's the life expectancy of a record whereas with the dance thing it 5 six or seven days. I think that's exciting It 5 a total mod thing."

We're back at the Heavenly office and the Primal's video of 'Burning Wheel' is on the telly. Looking like a cross between the Velvets, Clockwork Orange and Apocalypse Now it sums up the Scream in three minutes of celluloid. Ex Mary Chainer and friend of the band Douglas Hart is the man behind it. Unsurprisingly Innes isn't in it he had a stand in. After eleven years in one of the biggest bands in the country he's just not interested in all the fluff that goes with being in a band anymore. He just wants to make music. And so naturally this is what the conversation turns to. While Innes is trying to think of what Stockhausen records to recommend Duffy is writing down a shopping list for me of obscure sixties psychedelic bands. Then they play me their two new tracks. One's called 'Insect Royalty' and it sounds like the Aphex Twin if he played guitar. The production is so free and raw that it could be appropriately labelled as 'experimental' without ever simply being avant garde - the Scream are thankfully always accessible. Before everyone disappears they enthuse about Tricky's last album ("People don't like that album because it's too dark, but we love it"), their recent stint in the studio with My Bloody Valentine's Kevin Shields ("He plays in a style that nobody else does, be plays notes that you just wouldn't think of") and their planned collaboration with The Jesus and Mary Chain's William Reid (Because we've never made a great feedback record and he's the king of feedback) Then it's time to go. Duffy has a Hawaiin theme party to get to.

The next time I see Primal Scream, they re on stage at Manchester Apollo, with massive projections of political demonstrations and urban uprisings behind them. 'Burning Wheel' opens their set in true style followed by a handful of tunes from Vanishing Point' like 'Get Duffy', 'Star' and 'If they Move Kill 'Em' that work as a fantastic declaration of intent from the new improved Primal Scream. But when 'Rocks' comes in, despite being an awesome pop record, the momentum is lost a bit and the vibe doesn't really return until 'Kowalski' kicks in. 'Higher than the Sun' still works but it's telling that for their final encore they actually play Burning Wheel' again. Proof that even they know that their new stuff is as strong as almost anything they've ever done.

Three final questions: Are Primal Scream about to split? Is the band really suffering from ill health? Are they all fucked up on bad drugs? Well as far as them splitting goes, not on the evidence that I saw. What struck me about Bobby, Innes and Duffy was how excited they were about making music again. When asked whether they were about to split, Bobby said "We've just made a brilliant album, why would we want to do a thing like that?" It's a fair point.

Health? Well I don't know if it was just me but as far as I was concerned Bobby was looking healthier than ever. He certainly looked better than I did. As far as Innes and Duffy are concerned, well they looked like they enjoyed a party, but doesn't everybody. Compared to some people I see in clubs every week they looked positively radiant.

Drugs? Sure they take drugs, they stay up all night sometimes, sometimes they go too far. But so do a lot of people in this country. The reason rock journalists go on and on about Primal Scream's drug consumption is because it's not a part of their culture in the same way that it is a part of club culture. While the NME are going on about the Scream still being in the hotel bar at FOUR! in the morning, twen- tysomethings all round the country are diving off sofas in their mates' front rooms after being up for two days. 'It's just like having a cup of tea' as someone once said.

But when the subject does come up, just for the hell of it, I ask them whether they feel like spokesmen for the so called 'chemical generation'. To this Bobby replies "No, we're spokesmen for the burned out generation." Beautiful.

'Vanishing Paint' is out on Creation now. 'Echo Dek' is Out October 27th.

Dek Skils!
On-U-Sound Brit dub legend Adrian Sherwood is the man that moulded 'Vanishing Point' into the dub symphoney 'Echo-Dek'

HOW DID THE ECHO-DEK PROJECT COME ABOUT? "Welt I've known Bobby for a number of years and last year I met the rest of the lads and we spent two evenings up at On-U making a football record with Irvine Welsh, which isn't the best record on earth but it was quite amusing. And we all got on really well and had a good crack so when they made 'Vanishing Point' they sent me a tape and said 'what do you think about doing a proper dub album?'. And I listened to all the tracks and there's loads of space in it, it wasn't all 'get your rooks off' or anything like that - there are a couple of tracks on there which are more rocky which we didn't even attempt.. there's a version of 'Motorhead' that is completely mad but at the end of the day it sounded a little bit too novelty to make the record."

WERE YOU FAMILIAR 'WITH PRIMAL SCREAM'S MUSIC BEFORE HAND? "I'd heard 'Screamadelica' and I'd heard things like 'Rocks' - the more visible stuff. You can't help hearing some tracks from a band like Primal Scream. Was I a fan? I wouldn't say 'fan' was the word, I respected them and I appreciated what they did but I'm basically a little bit set in my ways, old school reggae is my kinda background and I do play other things at home, old bluesy stuff and weird noise things but in the past I wouldn't have been sat home playing 'Screamadelica', no."

APPARENTLY THEY SAID THAT YOU WANTED THEM TO BE PRESENT WHILE YOU MIXED THE TRACKS. WHY WAS THAT? "Well in the past I've done quite a few remixes for people but generally it's commisioned by somebody at the record company and they go 'wouldn't it be cool to get. Weatherall or Sherwood to do a 'remix' and usually the band don't come, But I find that if you get one powerful member of the band, somebody who's steering the direction of the group or a couple of the lads, if you get their energy as well and everybody's leaping around you get a fuckin' great record. So when this came up I thought, this is a little bit intimidating, I want to do a good job for them and I don't want to look a wanker - myself or make them look stupid. So I said to them 'I'll do it but I'd like you to be around to make sure we get the fuckin' business'. You can see when everybody's heads are nodding and they're laughing and having a crack you know you've got a good record."

HOW MUCH FREEDOM DID THEY GIVE YOU? "They let me do. but whatever I wanted, but obviously if it sounded rubbish there would be somebody going err...'I'm not sure about that', So there was freedom to get it to the stage where I was happy and they re as well."

ARE YOU PLEASED WITH THE RESULTS? I think 'Echo-flek' is going to stand up for years, it's that good. The old dub albums derived from existing songs so this album is like a proper traditional dub album with none of those ingredients. Steve Barker who runs Radio Lancash who I have the greatest respect for, he said this is one of the he things I've done for years simply for the fact that it sounds like a proper dub album in the true sense of the word. I play the album at home which I don't with a lot of my own things. I actually put on over the weekend with the kids around, They like it. I played it to Style Scott (Dub Syndicate) to show him what I've been doing lately and he was blown away by it. So you've got people like that from the Jamaican background saying Fuck me that sounds proper'. I also played it to Steve Barrow who Os Blood & Fire and he said This is the fuckin' bollocks'."

WHAT DO YOU THINK THE PRIMAL SCREAM FANS WILL MAKE OF IT? "I don't really give a fuck to be honest with you. I made it for me and for the boys - I don't mean it disrespectfully to Primal Scream fans, I'm sure they're going to love it. But it's not a guitar thing and I think a lot of their fans from what Ive lust experienced on tour would ther they were doing rock 'n' roll something. Thank God they're not."

THEY'VE SAID THAT THEY LEARNT A LOT FROM WORKING WITH YOU. WHAT DID YOU LEARN FROM WORKING WITH THEM? "I did in terms of attitude yeah. They've got a very punk rock attitude - their approach is one of the best of any of the people I've ever worked with. Innes is very much his own man, when he thinks it's n'ght he feels comfortable but until that time you can see him wriggling. But when he feels it's right you'll see that sick smurk on his face and he'll go 'That sounds proper'. And he's usually right."

PRIMAL SCREAM HAVE QUITE A REPUATION FOR PARTYING. HOW DID YOU FIT IN? "They don't do any of that any more. I was very disappointed. I thought it was going to be really wild..I'm only joking, they're a really good laugh. All the stuff from the past with the bad gear and all that, there's none of that present anymore. They're like anyone else, they like having a party but they're not reckless 'Let's kill the crew' types anymore.

HOW WAS IT MIXING THEIR GERMAN AND DUBLIN GIGS LIVE? "I thought Dublin was stunning, I was a little bit away from having it sound absolutely brilliant but then I had to miss some dates and I got replaced which I think is a bit sad because the show's more rock 'n' roll now, Unfortunately I couldn't make all the dates so the decision was made that they needed more stability I think and it's now kinda more traditional what they're doing."

ANY PLANS TO DO ANY OTHER THINGS WITH THEM IN THE FUTURE? "That's down to them, I'd happily work with them anytime in the studio or live. l think that if I'd have stayed on board then things would have been much more exciting live. As far as studio work is concerried I'd like to make a follow up to 'Echo-Dek', yeah. I think that record is something that in years to come will be held up and will he something that people will be seeking out. I think it's one of the best dub things I've ever done - perhaps even better than that and I've done a few very good dub albums. I think they're a really important band - they should just keep going."
PAUL BENNEY

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