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Screaming SecretsCan PRIMAL SCREAM, new-era popsters of distinction, bridge the gap to real success, and get another round of leather trousers in? DAVID SWIFT wonders aloud.... spring shot by KENJI KUBORADIO ON. It's Janice, being outmouthed on her Radio One evening spot by her guest Pete Wylie. What Pete really wants, he says, is a million quid or so. He'd then take £10,000 to the homes of each of his pin-ups and tell them to record something, anything, so long as they pressed up just one copy and gave it to him in return. Postman Pete planned initial deliveries to Patti Smith and Tom Verlaine. And what if Primal Scream took the cash around? To whom would it go, I wondered...but no, it's too obvious, I've seen their walls and their records; Malanga/Walker/Prince/Copey/Chilton. Sky Saxon? Well no...star Primal Bobby Gillespie met him recently and it was a bum trip, babe. Sky's still in orbit. No, it'd be best if they kept plenty to themselves. With their luck they'd need it. TO INTERVIEW the Primals is to interview Bobby. He says that the others realise they'd probably fuck up interviews. Primal Scream are prone to fuck-ups. Sometimes it's their fault. Take these last few weeks. They've realised an A-side that they dislike; nearly deleted themselves on a motorway accident; and even arrived late for one late-evening show at midnight. It was the van. A fuck up. Alan McGee is on the line from Creation. No, he says, you can't visit the Primals at their John Peel session, you know what they're like in the studio, he says. No I don't - what are they like? And who can tell? 'Crystal Crescent', the new single on Creation, is a mess. There's the sound of a head shaking in agreement. "Aye...do you know how much we spent on that single Dave? THREE AND A HALF THOUSAND POUNDS!" That's a lot of independant loot. No producer costs though, for the Primals opted to do that work themselves on this, the follow-up to last year's bedazzling 'All Fall Down'. In theory, a fair move, but... Bobby, shrinking in the face of a C90, nods. "It's ironic, we love Pop Music so much, but we can't even get the record right...I suppose it's good in some ways to make such a mistake, we're still learning." 'Crystal Crescent', like each of their songs, bleeds their shared experience as pop consumers. Each member of Primal Scream is fairly obsessed with the form. One the record it dies under fire from twiddled mixdown and a tacked-on horn section. It was a dogfight that I hope won't happen again. 'Velocity Girl' somehow survived intact, clear and fragile on the flip. (There's an 'Extra track' on the 12" but it's over before you can boil an egg. Ask someone at Creation about value for money...) 'Velocity Girl' shines on for two minutes or so, the cuts dead, just as it was taking me somewhere very nice. "It was just right to end that song there...there's no plan to write a two-minte song each time, it is instinctive where to end one. We may write a 15-minute one, if there's something good happening all the way through it." It's this interview. It's not an expletive in ascendency, but Bobby is worried. He keeps repeating - "do y'know what I'm sayin'?" He says it with a look of frustration, nearly desperation. Calm down, it's only an interview. "Aye, but it's still important to us..." Primal Scream's last appearance here was not a success. Quotes were (ahem) attributed to Bobby, and it prompted a brief war of independants between minor British and minor US interests. He wants to set that record straight, but stops short of saying anything on tape. He doesn't want to "whine". Bobby adores '1999', wants Prince to produce their album - is that contrary enough for everyone? There's six Glasgow Primals, 12 pairs of £27 winklepickers and wardrobes full of black polo-necks. Tam, Robert, Stuart, Jim and John - they seem to almost stand as one, a possee of likeable ruffians who dig being in a good group, and quite like getting pissed on the door money. Bobby has had words with them about this. Bobby is the Organiser, the one who sometimes has to kick ass in a very un-Rock manner. Bobby takes a lot of the responsibility. He does the interviews. He'd rather not, but someone has to. Organisation is not thier strong point. I have a few questions about attitude too. They need another kick, because they can produce some of the most instinctive sugared pop. But they always want to be desperately cool, and sound perfect, on stage, and if the PA man is not 100 per cent hip to the trip or if someone in the group thinks the 'gig' is crap, they'll meander limply through their songs, casting off their reason for existing as if they just want to get pissed again and go home. A lazy group...why get onstage if you're gonna plod along for ten minutes, as I've seen you do? "Aye...but..." Bobby squirms on a bench in East London. He parries with tales of bad promoters and PAs. The he stops. He repeats that he doesn't want to moan, making excuses. Primal Scream have been acutely aware of this point. Steps, they says, Have Been Taken. They must respond, they're picking up sponsors. Everything But The Girl and The Colour Field have requested their presence. But they can do better than that! And there's The Bobby Factor. When he swings round his mic stand, he leather spindles crossed at ankle-level, fringe flopping into his eyes and his limited but cherubic ("Well, there's only one Scott Walker...") voice floating out of their 31 sweeties, it's hard to believe that Smash Hits haven't picked up on the Primals. It will happen. During Bobby's stint as drummer for the Mary Chain, he sat on the California radio talkback. The cheerleaders rang in to say "We Love you, Bobby!" Jim Reid was forced to rejoinder with "Hrrrrummmppphhh...we love him too!", as if to say, Don't Forget Us! If you've ever sat down and died to 'Big Louise' or 'Tiny Children', maybe the Shangri-Las 'Train From Kansas City', you'd know us, argues Bobby. I have done those things. Will it happen with the Primals? I dare to hope but they've yet to convince us. Good disc collections don't cut it. "We're ruled by melody SONGS! I hear these groups on the radio and I think, 'OK, when's the tune coming?'. "I hate groups who are 'good' every night...sometimes we are playing rubbish, and I turn 'round to the others and think, what are we doing to THESE SONGS??" Bobby writes songs, on the bus, in his bedroom. He loves those songs; to him they're parallel to the craft of his pin-ups. He wouldn't dare admit to me that they're as good. Some of them are very fine. There is still that gap in Primal Scream, though, between theory and execution. Primal Scream are a Chart Group, says Bobby. He means that chart, for any other is quite meaningless today, if you want to be really "classic". "All our songs are totally commercial" - a quote that needs no context or apology. You must compete. "Exactly. If Warner's or anybody offered us...we'd go for it immediately...I'd like us to be like New Order though, I really respect them as a group, they've got total and complete control over everything they do." Bobby knows this would take some doing. He saw what pressure the Mary Chain were under. That is, before they started selling in America. The Primals are off to the States later this year... DON'T NEED a man in leather trousers to know which way the wind blows. Four out of five recent adverts in the "Musicians Wanted" on the wall at Rough Trade's London shop mentioned Primal Scream, influentially. This could make Bobby happy. But right now he's finished the interview, and he's still not happy. We walk to the tube and Bobby's explaining all the way, there's a dozen or two "do y'know what I'm sayin', David??" floating past. I'm forced to reassure him that he;s not fucked up here. But one thing must be said. Shape up, Primals, if you're here to COMPETE. Originally appeared in NME, 24 May 1986. Copyright © IPC Magazine Ltd. Back |
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