Next year, the UK will issue a series of stamps dedicated to the art of the British album cover. The Stones’ Let It Bleed, New Order’s Power, Corruption, and Lies, Primal Scream’s Screamadelica, and Blur’s Parklife will all be honored in this 10-stamp issue. If the US had a similar stamp issue, I wonder what albums would get the nod? You’d think Thriller would be a no-brainer, and Madonna’s True Blue would look kinda dynamite, but after that… ? (First person to shout “Merriweather Post Pavilion!” is fired.) The full issue of stamps after the jump. More »
The seminal cassette compilation C86, released by the NME back in 1986, has a lot of personal indiepop faves on its tracklist (Miaow, the Shop Assistants, the Close Lobsters), and it opens with Primal Scream’s “Velocity Girl.” It’s a slip of a song about a girl with too many indulgences and too many demands, and it has a guitar solo that can rightfully be described as sublime (you can hear echoes of it in “There She Goes” by the La’s). Somehow, I missed that the Swedish electro duo The Tough Alliance covered the track on their 2004 EP Holiday, with the original’s big, puffy clouds of guitar replaced by splayed-out synth lines. In case you haven’t heard the original, it’s after the jump.
During last week’s discussion of Marmite artists–those artists that are so divisive, they force people to take sides, with no one left in the middle–Idolator commenter moomintroll wondered if we shouldn’t try and find more ways to classify popular bands through their analogues to various condiments. Since we figured the safe space in the fridge inhabited by your ketchups, your mustards, and your molding bottles of Hidden Valley Ranch was as good a way to make sense of the current musical landscape as any, we invited her to flesh out her theory for us. It’s after the jump!
Alan McGee is certainly known for his ridiculous proclamations–it’s sort of his business–and his Guardian blog post today is no particular exception, considering he sort of compares the new Oasis album to the Beatles’ Revolver. Still, that’s the sort of thing he does all the time and with Oasis needing a little push for their new album, a headline like “Why the music world needs Oasis” should surprise no one. The first sentence of his extended press release seemed to be the real story, at least to me.
OK, listen, residents of the British Isles. When I, in my post about the UK’s Vodafone Live Music Awards last month, wrote “I don’t want to ask for too much, but if the Spice Girls could beat out Led Zeppelin [in the Best Live Return category] somehow, I’d be rather pleased.” last month, I wasn’t entirely being serious. Still, I appreciate that somehow, you all managed to pick up my joke and run with it for long enough to make Spice Girls greater than Led Zeppelin, at least in the world of British awards shows of dubious necessity. I can only imagine the disappointment Jimmy Page is feeling right now.
Blog world, you aren’t doing me a damn bit of good if you don’t, at the very least, alert me to new Primal Scream videos. “Can’t Go Back” is a precursor to next week’s UK release of Beautiful Future, the band’s ninth studio album. Despite a few missteps (a duet with Kate Moss?), I still get excited by the prospect of new music from the band, which is more than I can say for most acts formed in 1982 that are still kicking around (cough, cough, James). Also: A new Primal Scream video is a perfect opportunity to look back at other highlights from the band’s videography.
Freebass, a collaboration between New Order bassist Peter Hook, Primal Scream/Stone Roses bassist Mani, and Smiths bassist Andy Rourke, has had an album in the works since late 2005. But Hook swears they will put out an album by March, or he’ll guarantee its presence on the marketplace by killing himself. “It’s going to be out next March or I am going to fucking top myself,” he told Billboard, “I’m fucking sick of talking about it. I just want to give someone some music. I said to Mani and Andy Rourke: ‘It’s coming out and I don’t care how rough it is. Fuck it–let’s do some gigs.'” The album contains tons of alt-rock guest stars, including Mani’s once and former bandmates Ian Brown and Bobby Gillespie. Morrissey and Bernard Sumner, however, may not have even been called.
Idolator has already reported on Utah Saints’ recent run up the British Charts, but as far as I’m concerned, there’s no musical micro-genre more welcome for a comeback than Britain’s dance music of the early ’90s. I have a brightly colored striped shirt and a pacifier just sitting in box waiting to be used!
