1987 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Jim Beattie aka Jim Navajo - Lead Guitar
Robert 'Throb' Young - Bass
Martin St. John - Percussion / Tambourine
Tom McGurk - Drums
Paul Harte - Rhythm Guitar.
TV - January 1987 - 'Down The Line' TV Programme, Channel 4, Studios
Gentle Tuesday / Imperial
Notes: Alan McGee and Primal Scream are interviewed. First ever Primal Scream television appearance. Drummer Tom McGurk and guitarist Stewart May had been fired a few weeks prior following the abandoned Rockfield Studios Sessions so former guitarist Paul Harte is on drums as a replacement hadn't yet been found.
Video Bootleg: Creation Years Various TV Collection From 80's-90's also featuring Jesus And Mary Chain with Bobbie Gillespie (Footstomp, FSVD-153, NTSC) DVD-R
1987 - Jeff Barrett becomes the band's press officer
Notes: Jeff organised newspaper articles, media, radio sessions, press coverage, TV spots and more.
198? - Derek Ridgers Photo Session
Notes: Garden photo shoot. Overgrown, Bobby in tight black pants with large belt buckle, red jumper and black black leather jacket. Jim, Robert and Martin were also in the photo shoot. Some colour photos were used in the media too. Circa 1987.
1987 - Stephen Street Sessions, Rockfield Studios, Wales
Produced by Stephen Street.
Imperial / Gentle Tuesday
Notes: During the sessions Tom McGurk was asked to leave. The band brought in session drummers and the sessions lasted four weeks before Stephen ended the recordings. Imperial was officially released on the 12inch b-side to Imperial.
Guitarist Stewart May was apparently fired during the recording sessions.
Official: September 1987 - Imperial
1987 - Sonic Flower Groove Sessions
Produced by Clive Langer & Colin Fairley
Imperial
Notes:
Official Release: 1987 - Sonic Flower Groove
1987 - Sonic Flower Groove Sessions, London
Produced by Mayo Thompson & engineered by Pat Collier.
Gentle Tuesday / Black Star Carnival / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover)
Notes: Produced by Mayo Thompson & engineered by Pat Collier. This was the second and final attempt of recording the LP. By the time the album was complete, it had cost Elevation Records £100,000. When Bobby heard Felt had split he called up Martin Duffy to join the band for the sessions, playing keyboards and piano.
Official Release: 1987 - Sonic Flower Groove
1987 - Paul Harte leaves the band and is replaced by Andrew Innes.
Notes: Andrew Innes former The Drains guitarist. The Drains. Bobby and Alan had joined the punk band back in 1978 with Andrew.
24 April 2013 - Drowned In Sound web article by Dom Gourlay, Bobby Interview: DiS: It's interesting you start from Screamadelica rather than the band's first two albums Sonic Flower Groove or Primal Scream. Do you see that record as being something of a year zero as far as Primal Scream are concerned?
Bobby Gillespie: Yeah, I mean even with the first two records; it's a fucking common thing with us; we never had a drummer. Robert Young played bass on the first album with no drummer. We borrowed The Weather Prophets drummer. The band that started our first album, we sacked halfway through making the record. I sacked the drummer, I sacked the rhythm guitarist, and then we sacked the producer. We were on Warner Brothers at the time, and then Innes joined the band so it was just him, me, Jim Beattie on guitar and Robert (Young). And so we re-recorded the album with Dave Morgan from The Weather Prophets on drums.
1987 - Tom McGurk officially leaves the band and Gavin Skinner joins.
1987 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Jim Beattie aka Jim Navajo - Lead Guitar
Robert Young - Bass
Martin St. John - Percussion / Tambourine
Gavin Skinner - Drums
Andrew Colin Innes - Rhythm Guitar.
June 1987 - Masters Of Ceremony - Danny Kelly article
MASTERS OF CEREMONY: PRIMAL SCREAM - are they arrogant? Are they, in their own words, a "great group"? Or both? DANNY KELLY talks pop finesse with the stylised beat wonders of Glasgow. "I'll tell you 'bout the magic that'll free your soul/ But it's like trying to tell a stranger 'bout rock 'n roll/ Do you believe in magic?.. - The Lovin' Spoonful
A year ago they stuck out from the effervescent hammer-it-down-and-turn-it-up of their C86 contemporaries by having the emerity to attempt something that was carefully constructed, lovingly polished. And now their insistance that whatever it is that turns Rock to Magic can be found in crafted quietness, in harmony and melody, puts them at Odds with the Cult Missionairies On Acid Will Eat Themselves, and the designer dandruff brigade.
On stage, too, they're downright strange, the nervous static intensity Of guitarists Jim Beattie and Robert Young, and singer Bobby Gillespie (his fringe a hiding place, his mic-stand a crutch) contrasting With the eyes-front arrogance of Martin St John..a tambourine-flaying skeleton in leather gloves, Primal Scream, truly, are the sore thumb of British pop.
And yet for those who, like me, still cling to the battered belief that guitars, bass and drums can 'free your soul' this uncomfortable, unpromising mixture has been the subject of a prolonged act of faith, of a blind investment of hope. Based on just two slivers of evidence (their 'All Fall Down' debut and 'Velocity Girl"). Primal Scream have been landed with the 'Most Likely Too' albatross. Mind you, there have been plenty of others who see them as little more than a joke, an over-developed sense of pop's past grafted onto the body of a musical jellfish.
This week sees the issue, on Warners' Elevation outcrop, Of their third single, 'Gentle Tuesday', Which will be followed by another. 'Imperial', and a late-summer, as yet unnamed, LP. For Primal Scream, the moment of truth is just 'round the corner, the moment when we'll see whether the last laugh will rest with the believers or the belittlers... Whether or not they cah fulfill them remains to be seen, but if any band were ever equipped to understand the expectations of fans then it is Primal Scream.
They are pop fanatics. Their early interviews were characterised by a Stalinist credo that excluded all but a sainted few (The Beatles, a handful Of American garage-punks, Cope, you know the names). They've widened their net since
then, but the passion remains. The band's key word is 'master'. "It's difficult to define", Bobby Gillespie's soft Glasgow tones maintain, "'but for us it's all about having a certain spirit. All the best things I've seen this year had it. The Weather Prophets in Edinburgh... Neil Young the other night at Wembley. He was total genius, and Chuck Brown on The Tube — What a-man!- Those snakeskin 'boots! It doesn't matter about, you've either got it or you haven't...
Notes: Article includes a photo by Derek Ridgers. Bobby in black leather coat, red top and the rest of the band in an overgrown abandoned building. Andrew and Gavin do not feature in the printed photo.
June 1987 - Gentle Tuesday U.K. Release Date
Gentle Tuesday - Written by Jim Beattie & Bobby Gillespie. Produced by Mayo Thompson & engineered by Pat Collier.
Black Star Carnival - Written by Jim Beattie & Bobby Gillespie.
I'm Gonna Make You Mine - Written by Bayer, Carr, D'errico
7inch Vinyl Elevation ACID 3 - WEA - 248319-0
Gentle Tuesday
Black Star Carnival
12inch Vinyl Elevation ACID 3T - WEA - 248318-0
Gentle Tuesday
Black Star Carnival
I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover)
Notes: A Spanish Gentle Tuesday promo from 1988 noted the release date as June 1987.
22 June 1987 Monday - Pavilion Theatre, Brighton
23 June 1987 Tuesday - Burberries, Birmingham
24 June 1987 - Primal Scream Unconfirmed Advance Promo
Cassette (Chrome Cassette 24/6/87 The Tape Gallery, 28 Lexington Street, London, W1)
Side 1
Imperial
Gentle Tuesday
Tomorrow Ends Today
Aftermath
SunShine Bright (May The Sun Shine Bright For You)
What's The Matter
Side 2
Rock
Country (Sonic Sister Love)
I Love You (Love You)
Silent Spring
Leaves
Notes: Unconfirmed Advance promo or a live bootleg? Different running order to the released LP. Unconfirmed versions, sleeve noted as including Tomorrow Ends Today which remains unreleased (apart from the BBC Session, see 2023 - Reverberations (Travelling In Time) 1985-86.
Unconfirmed titles for What's The Matter, Rock. Sonic Sister Love was sometimes known as 'Country'.
Unconfirmed if Treasure Trip or We Go Down Slowly Rising feature on the album under the alternate song titles.
25 June 1987 Thursday - The Jangle Club Presents...Primal Scream, Old Vic, Fletcher Gt., Nottingham * Doors Open: 19:30-00:00 * Ticket Price: £3.50 (Advance) £4 (On The Door) * Support Act(s): Loop, The Electric Cowboy
26 June 1987 Friday - ULU, University Of London Students Union, Student Central, London * Support Act(s): Phil Wilson (of The June Brides) / Electric Cowboy / Loop *
Treasure Trip / Sonic Sister Love / Gentle Tuesday / Silent Spring / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial / I’m Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows Of Knight cover) / Imperial
Notes: Part of the Elevation Records (Alan McGee's Warner Brothers umbrella label) Tour.
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
Bootleg: Amateur Video Recording - VHS / DVD - Treasure Trip / Sonic Sister Love / Gentle Tuesday / Silent Spring / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial / I’m Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows Of Knight cover) / Imperial - 23 July 1987 - BBC Scotland, TV - Imperial / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday
Bootleg: Tape () (IAWS I Am Without Shoes / stoneroses.net (Will Odell). Priced: £7) - London ULU 26/6/87 + Southampton Joiners Arms 1/9/89
Bootleg: Bubblegum Glass ('London '87 and Italy '89' '100% Pure Sugar Pop'. Label: Cracker. Cat. No. CR-20. Disc Matrix: 22168M1 CR-20 IFPI L602. The rear of the sleeve even has the cheek to include 'Warning: Unauthorized Reproduction Of This Recording Is Prohibited'.) Factory Pressed CD ("Tracks 1-8 Live London 1987" could be 26 June 1987 Friday - ULU, University Of London Students Union, Student Central, London with tracks 6-8 in the incorrect running order) May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial / I’m Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows Of Knight cover) / Sonic Sister Love / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday ("Tracks 9-16 Live italy 1989" but I believe it is actually 06 October 1989 - Friday - ULU, University Of London, Studen Central or it could even be 20 December 1989.) - Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teeenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power / Imerpial / Lone Star Girl
27 June 1987 Saturday - International 1, 47 Anson Road, Manchester, M14
Notes: I presume The Stone Roses attended the show, they played the same venue on the previous night.
29 June 1987 Monday - Haper's Bizarre aka Underground, Bristol
30 June 1987 Tuesday - The News, Leeds
Treasure Trip / Sonic Sister Love / Gentle Tuesday / Silent Spring / May The Sun Shine Bright for You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial
Notes: Bobby dedicates Gentle Tuesday to Jimmy Page.
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
M - 11 July 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 28, 55p
Notes: Primal Scream feature inside. Record Mirror was a British music newspaper published between 17 June 1954 and 06 April 1991. Launched two years after the NME, Record Mirror was founded by former Weekly Sporting Review editor Isidore Green. During the 1980's Record Mirror was the only consumer music paper to carry the official UK singles and UK albums chart used by the BBC for Radio 1 and Top of the Pops, while also carrying the equivalent US Billboard charts. Record Mirror closed on the same day, 02 April 1991, as the sister paper Sounds with the last issue, dated 06 April 1991.
23 July 1987 - F.S.D. Full Scale Deflction TV Show, BBC Scotland, TV
Imperial / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday
Notes: Unconfirmed date, sometimes noted as 'June 1988 F.S.D.'. Possibly recorded 23 June 1987.
Bootleg: TV Broadcast - VHS / DVD - (Amateur Video Recording) 26 June 1987 Friday - ULU, University Of London Students Union - Treasure Trip / Sonic Sister Love / Gentle Tuesday / Silent Spring / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial / I’m Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows Of Knight cover) / Imperial - (TV Broadcasy) 23 July 1987 - BBC Scotland, TV - Imperial / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday
24 July 1989 Monday - The Monday Club, The Hacienda FAC 51, 11-13 Whitworth Street, Manchester * Doors Open: 20:30 * Ticket Price: £4 (Advance)
or 1991?
29 July 1987 - Fat Sam's, Dundee, Scotland
Bootleg: Tape () (IAWS I Am Without Shoes / stoneroses.net (Will Odell). Priced: £7) - London T&C 7/8/88 + Dundee Fat Sam's 29/7/87 + Nottingham 25/8/86
1987 - Stephen Parker Photo Session
Notes: 'Sex Pistols Numbered' poster in the background.
1987 - FSD TV Show, Scotland TV
Imperial / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday
Notes: The tracks were split by interview snippets. BMX Bandits also appeared on the same episode.
Broadcast: 1987 - Repeated June 1988 - FSD, BBC2
Video Bootleg: VHS
29 August 1987 - Primal Scream feature in Melody Maker Magazine
Notes: Simon Reynolds interview and article, Bobby is 25. Photos by Tom Sheehan.
September 1987 - Imperial U.K. Release Date
Imperial - Written by Jim Beattie & Bobby Gillespie. Produced by Clive Langer & Colin Fairley.
Star Fruit Surf Rider - Written by Jim Beattie & Bobby Gillespie. Produced by Amanda Jones.
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) - Written by Pete Townsend. Produced by James Williamson.
Imperial (Demo Version) - Produced by Stephen Street.
7inch Vinyl - Elevation ACID 5 - WEA - 248225-7
Imperial / Star Fruit Surf Rider
12inch Vinyl - Elevation ACID 5T - WEA - 248 224-0
12inch Special Limited Edition Fold Out Poster Bag Sleeve - Elevation ACID 5TW - WEA - 248 224-0
Imperial / Star Fruit Surf Rider / So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Imperial (Demo Version)
Special Limited Edition Low Price 12inch
Notes:
From 03 October 1987 Saturday - Sounds Magazine, Article by Ron Rom. :
'IMPERIAL', The current single is another highlight, where Primal Scream's serenadings are majestically realised in this luxuriously textured track. Eloquent melodies cruise around Bobby's wispy vocals, with strings adding to the song's grand romance. Bobby has fond memories Of 'Imperial'.
" When we recorded that everyone was feeling so good and when we played it was such a brilliant buzz. When I hear that now, I still can't believe that I've
played on that record. I think we've got a human spirit - and there are so many songs now that haven't got that.
"Pop stars' songs now are crap, their metodies are crap, and the way they look
is crap. I hope charts because there's so much crap in the charts at the moment. All the crappy club music like Five Star and Hue And Cry, whose only ambition seem to be to meet the Queen mum. If I met the Queen mum I'd probably behead her."
There speaks the voice of reason. Why do you have such bitter contempt for modern pop.
"I think have good reasons be bitter about the current state of pop music in this country. "Bono may be an OK guy but I just think his lyrics are ridiculous and I think it's a sad state of affairs that U2 are the biggest rock band in the world at the moment when 20 years ago The Rolling Stones and The Beatles were."
Just recently Primal Scream were refused money for a video for 'Imperial'
and many believed it a sign WEA were losing faith in the band and the Elevation label's lack of commercial success.
So is Bobby under any pressure to have that elusive hit?
"No - and that's the truth." Bobby responds adamantly. "WEA like the group and they like the music we're doing."
So why did they refuse you a video?
"It was something about being cost effective. I thought that they might have
just as well done a cheap video for The Chart Show at least because that's the
only TV exposure we're going to get until we have we a hit record. "
WEA aren't about pull the plug out on Elevation then?
"'No, that's bollocks. Somebody somewhere tagged on to the fact that we didn't get the video and exaggerated the supposed implications"
23 September 1987 Wednesday - Rooftop, Glasgow * Support Act(s): The Thanes
24 September 1987 Thursday - Vikki's, Kilmarnock
25 September 1987 Friday - The Venue, Edinburgh
M - 26 September 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 39, 65p Notes: Housemartins on the cover, photo by Parker Price. Primal Scream and The Jesus And Mary Chain feature inside.
26 September 1987 Saturday - The Venue, Victoria, Aberdeen
27 September 1987 Sunday - Dance Factory, Dundee
28 September 1987 Monday - Riverside, Newcastle
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / Treasure Trip / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / I Love You (Medley) / Star Fruit Surf Rider / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / Imperial / We Go Down Slowly Rising (Careless Uncle) / Spirea-X (Never Want Nothing)
Notes: Sonic Sister Love often noted on bootlegs as 'Country', Treasure Trip is sometimes noted as 'Rock 'N' Roll', We Go Down Slowly Rising as 'What's A Matter' and Spirea-X as 'Never Want Nothing'. Bobby introduces We Go Down Slowly Rising as Careless Uncle.
Bootleg: Newcastle 28-9-87 (Tape) Audience Recording Side A - So Sad About Us / Gentle Tuesday / Country / Rock 'N' Roll / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / I Love You (Medley) Side B - Star Fruit Surf Rider / I Gonna Make You Mine / Silent Spring / Imperial / Whats A Matter / Never Want Nothing
30 September 1987 Wednesday - University, Manchester
Notes: Unconfirmed if The Stone Roses watched this show? I cannot find any gig info on a 1988 - Boardwalk show, was this dates venue changed to The Boardwalk?
From 06-19 December 1995 - Raw Magazine: The Roses were never really clubbers on the Manchester scene. I only ever saw them at one gig – Primal Scream at The Boardwalk in 1988. They used to stay at home writing songs the whole time...
01 October 1987 Thursday - Town & Country Club, 9/17 Highgate Road, Kentish Town, London, NW5 * Doors Open: 19:30 * Ticket Price: £5.00 * Support Act(s): The Motorcycle Boy, Biff Bang Pow & These Immortal Souls
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / Treasure Trip / May the Sun Shine Bright for You / Love You / Star Fruit Surf Rider / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / Imperial / Loose (The Stooges cover)
Notes: Years later the Town & Country Club would become The Forum. Nearest Tube 'Kentish Town'.
Bootleg: London Town & Country Club 10/01/87 (ARTISAN ART 7147)
Bobby
Robert
Andrew
Jim
03 October 1987 Saturday - Primal Scream appear in Sounds Magazine
Notes: Article by Ron Rom. Photos by Ian Tilton: beyond the fringe -
PRIMAL SCREAM leader. the long-fringed BOBBY GILLESPIE, has had to come to terms with being in an unfashionable pop bund while pop suffers one of its periodic depressions. Here he tells RON ROM of the long haul from indie-stardom to major label misfit. IAN T TILTON throws a wobbler.
PEOPLE SAY because we play this sort of music that nothing to with '87, which is shit. "It has a lot to do with '87 because we're living in it, right? And just because we don't have a beatbox or a synth, we're slagged down."
Bobby Gillespie - the vocalist with primal Scream - and his long black fringe aren't in the most popular band in world at the moment - and he's pissed off about that.
He has had to come to terms with being in an unfashionable pop band who rely on naked simplicity and frail melodies in a time when white pop music is
suffering one of its longest depressions. And Bobby had to take bitter criticisms about Primal Scream's contrary exsistence.
Simply put, Primal Scream no longer fit in anywhere. They're not heavy enough to jump on the grebo bandwagon, they're not funky enough to launch themsleves into clubland; and they're not dull enough to jump into the Top 40 unannounced
- much to their record cornpany's increasing disappointment.
Their poetic melodies, emotive guitars
and sheer bloody pop purity — a purity rooted in the late 60's - can't be catered for on Radio 's playlist where producers like Quincy Jones, Lewis And Jam and Stock, Aitken, Waterman gain greater acclaim than the average artists they remould. Meanwhile, the critics view Primal Scream as a regurgitated daydream that's lost in '60s hippiedom. It's not suprising that this usually mild mannered 25 year old has a bit of a chip on his shoulder.
"We do what we want to do. The attitude prevails in the music press now is like, We're not talking to that guy because he wears flares. They talk about
how bad apartheid is but within music they created the same sort of segregation. "It seems like if you're black and you come from the Bronx and you sing about Gucci watches and getting rich, it's OK. But if some guy from the East End of London was to do the same he be laughed at. "The critics are ashamed of rock music. They shouldn't be ashamed of it. It's just sick. We're all really into rock and there's so much more you can put back into it - even now"
It's that belief that has kept Bobby going. He is a music fanatic, a vinyl junkie, and he's keen to talk about his influences and the inspirations. Like the true red socialist he is, he also wants to give something back to the old horse rock.
In his father's empty house in a respectable Glasgow suburb, Bobby talks easily enough, contradicting the awkward, moody artist image that they have built around him. His bedroom tastefully decorated with erotic posters Of Beatrix Dalle, from Betty Blue, and an autographed picture of Neil Young .
I ask him how he managed to get Noil Young's treasured autograph. "I didn't." he laughs. "I signed it myself. I always hoped that someone would think it was authentic"
His record collection is vast, packed with all the credible influences of before and after the punk rock revolution. Nick Cave, Tom Verlaine, Bob Dylan and a band he to play drums for, The Jesus And Mary Chain, all rub sleeves together.
Since his amiable departure from the Brothers Reid, Bobby has concentrated his efforts on recreating pop perfection with Primal Scream. Although a few dodgy but irrestiable offerings on Creation Records, like 'Crystal Crescent', didn't help his cause too much, it showed enough potential to attract WEA. They've financed Alan McGee's Elevation label Which is to release Primal Scream's strangely titled debut album 'Sonic Flower Groove'. The LP has taken six months to materialise and even though it's no classic, it has enough good qualities, particularly the unblemished songwriting, to warrant your money.
There are rumours which suggest the album's long delay was due to Bobby's preciousness in the studio. Bobby is quick to deny them.
"If we were perfectionists we wouldn't be in a band in the first place as you can never achieve what you really want. With this album all the music was recorded live, except for the vocals, as we wanted all these songs to have a spirit to them." And that's a brave decision considering the current preoccupation with synthetic modern pop.
'Sonic Flower Groove' is as deceiving as it breezy. It strikes you with its reliance on the guitar and how it refuses to be tarnished by fancy techniques.
But Bobby is angry I suggest that Primal Scream offer a refreshing alternative - one based on naked innocence - to the sterile, style over content predictability that engulfs us.
"It's not so much innocence," he snaps, "because none of us are innocent to the world. I would say there's a freshness more than anythlng. " "Innocence always strikes me as being something completely ridiculous and I can assure you none of us have twinkles in our eyes. "
A track like 'Love You' on the album works because of the beautiful simplicity of the expression. Yet Bobby feels that song based more on frustration and
the confusion that comes when communication between two people breaks down.
"People are arguing and their get bigger and bigger, so relationships get f***** up and that song is a result of that sort of frustration."
'IMPERIAL', The current single is another highlight, where Primal Scream's serenadings are majestically realised in this luxuriously textured track. Eloquent melodies cruise around Bobby's wispy vocals, with strings adding to the song's grand romance. Bobby has fond memories Of 'Imperial'.
" When we recorded that everyone was feeling so good and when we played it was such a brilliant buzz. When I hear that now, I still can't believe that I've
played on that record. I think we've got a human spirit - and there are so many songs now that haven't got that.
"Pop stars' songs now are crap, their metodies are crap, and the way they look
is crap. I hope charts because there's so much crap in the charts at the moment. All the crappy club music like Five Star and Hue And Cry, whose only ambition seem to be to meet the Queen mum. If I met the Queen mum I'd probably behead her."
There speaks the voice of reason. Why do you have such bitter contempt for modern pop.
"I think have good reasons be bitter about the current state of pop music in this country.
"Bono may be an OK guy but I just think his lyrics are ridiculous and I think
it's a sad state of affairs that U2 are the biggest rock band in the world at the moment when 20 years ago The Rolling Stones and The Beatles were.
Just recently Primal Scream were refused money for a video for 'Imperial'
and many believed it a sign WEA were losing faith in the band and the Elevation label's lack of commercial success.
So is Bobby under any pressure to have that elusive hit?
"No - and that's the truth." Bobby responds adamantly. "WEA like the group and they like the music we're doing."
So why did they refuse you a video?
"It was something about being cost effective. I thought that they might have
just as well done a cheap video for The Chart Show at least because that's the
only TV exposure we're going to get until we have we a hit record. "
WEA aren't about pull the plug out on Elevation then?
"'No, that's bollocks. Somebody somewhere tagged on to the fact that we didn't get the video and exaggerated the supposed implications"
What about Bobby Gillespie, the boy wonder, what sort of person is he? What makes him tick or even tock? Well, Batman, he left school at 16 with a few 'O' levels, worked in a factory for a while, which he found totally demoralising, before retreating into his bedroom for a few years with his record collection. Now he is a bed-sit sex symbol of the kind Morrissey coyly epitomises, and he's a red socialist, which you'll discover if you unravel some of the lyrics on 'Sonic Flower Groove'. He likes football, forgets to eat and prefers to sit on a Saturday evening with his girlfriend rather than going out clubbing.
Is he a frustrated psychotic underneath?
"Come upstairs, Ron, and I'll show you my collection of guns and knives," he jokes.
What about the moody image that you've got for yourself? ....
03 October 1987 Saturday - Division 1, Aylesbury
05 October 1987 - Sonic Flower Groove U.K. Release Date
Gentle Tuesday - Produced by Mayo Thompson & engineered by Pat Collier.
Imperial - Produced by Clive Langer & Colin Fairley.
Sleeve Design by Helen Backhouse. Photography by Andrew Catlin.
Produced by Mayo Thompson except Imperial produced by Clive Langer & Colin Fairley.
Engineered by Pat Collier
Francis (Frank) Sweeney plays Viola.
Martin Bernard Duffy plays Piano.
Unconfirmed Advance Cassette, see 24 June 1987.
Vinyl LP Elevation ELV2 - 242 182-1
Cassette Elevation ELV2 C - WEA ?- 242182-4
Spanish Release - Vinyl LP Elevation - 242 182-1
Portugal Release - Vinyl LP Elevation - 1592411
June 1991 - CD WEA ?- 2292 42182-2
1994 Japanese Release - CD WEA ?- WPCR-64 Gentle Tuesday / Treasure Trip / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Sonic Sister Love / Silent Spring / Imperial / Love You / Leaves / Aftermath / We Go Down Slowly Rising / Black Star Carnival / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Star Fruit Surf Rider / So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Imperial (Demo)
Gentle Tuesday / Treasure Trip / May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Sonic Sister Love / Silent Spring /
Imperial / Love You / Leaves / Aftermath / We Go Down Slowly Rising
Notes: The album entered the charts at number 62 in the U.K. A Spanish Gentle Tuesday promo from 1988 noted the release date as August 1987. Tour poster noted the record label as 'Elevation'.
From 03 October 1987 Saturday - Sounds Magazine, Article by Ron Rom. : A track like 'Love You' on the album works because of the beautiful simplicity of the expression. Yet Bobby feels that song based more on frustration and
the confusion that comes when communication between two people breaks down.
"People are arguing and their get bigger and bigger, so relationships get f***** up and that song is a result of that sort of frustration."
From 29 May 2021 NME Article By Will Lavin: NME Article By Will Lavin: Primal Scream announce plans to reissue debut album ‘Sonic Flower Groove’. The revised version will include two unreleased tracks. Speaking in a new interview, frontman Bobby Gillespie said he discovered a newfound appreciation for the 1987 album while working on his autobiography Tenement Kid. He said because there’s still elements of the record he’d like to change, the group are discussing releasing a revised version of it including the addition of two unreleased tracks.
“I wrote a lot about that record and the experience of recording it – we recorded it twice – and our inexperience,” Gillespie told Uncut.
“I re-listened to the record a lot and had a new respect for it. We’re maybe going to reissue it.
“We’ll add two songs – there’s ‘Black Star Carnival’, which was a B-side, and also this unreleased track called ‘Tomorrow Ends Today’. It sounds like it could have been on the first Stone Roses record.”
He added: “I’m going to re-sequence the album and do a new record sleeve.”
Noting the album’s production, Gillespie said he plans to make a few changes and add some harmonies.
“At that point, everyone had the ’80s drum sound – the Bunnymen, The Smiths, everybody,” he said. “So, it would be good if we take the ’80s drum sound off it and maybe we could add some harmonies, because when I listen to it now, I think, ‘Why didn’t we do harmonies there?’
“So we might tinker with it, maybe we won’t. But ‘Tomorrow Ends Today’ sounds like a single. Why did we leave it off the album? It’s so good!
“The first side just runs like a dream – bang, bang, bang, bang. For some reason, we fucked it up.”
24 April 2013 - Drowned In Sound web article by Dom Gourlay, Bobby Interview: DiS: It's interesting you start from Screamadelica rather than the band's first two albums Sonic Flower Groove or Primal Scream. Do you see that record as being something of a year zero as far as Primal Scream are concerned?
Bobby Gillespie: Yeah, I mean even with the first two records; it's a fucking common thing with us; we never had a drummer. Robert Young played bass on the first album with no drummer. We borrowed The Weather Prophets drummer. The band that started our first album, we sacked halfway through making the record. I sacked the drummer, I sacked the rhythm guitarist, and then we sacked the producer. We were on Warner Brothers at the time, and then Innes joined the band so it was just him, me, Jim Beattie on guitar and Robert (Young). And so we re-recorded the album with Dave Morgan from The Weather Prophets on drums. Then Jim Beattie left so Robert moved over to guitar and we wrote and recorded the second album and we picked up a drummer and bass player; Toby Tomanov and Henry Olsen.
24 March 2016 18.01 GMT Thursday - The Observer, Guardian Dave Simpson Interview: Bobby Gillespie (vocals): “Primal Scream Mk1 were based around Jim Beattie’s 12-string guitar, and we played melodic, psychedelic pop songs, such as Gentle Tuesday. All the bands we loved – Ramones, Pistols, Love, Stooges – had made classic first albums, so our manifesto was: ‘Make a classic or kill yourself’. When Sonic Flower Groove wasn’t a classic, we were devastated. Then we moved from Glasgow to Brighton, and Jim didn’t wanna come with us, so we consciously did something different – high energy rock’n’roll like the MC5 or Stooges. Dirtier and debauched.
05 October 1987 Monday - University, Liverpool
06 October 1987 Tuesday - Warehouse, Leeds
08 October 1987 Thursday - Raffles, Port Talbot
M - 10 October 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 41, 65p Notes: Primal Scream feature inside.
10 October 1987 Saturday - Brunel University, Uxbridge
11 October 1987 Sunday - Old Five Bells, Northampton
12 October 1987 Monday - University, Sheffield
13 October 1987 Tuesday - Burberries, Birmingham
14 October 1987 Wednesday - The Garage, Nottingham
16 October 1987 Friday - Goldsmith's College, London
17 October 1987 Saturday - College Of Further Education, Humberside
? - Electric Ballroom, London
Bobby Gillespie
Jim Beattie – Guitar
Andrew Innes – Guitar
Robert "Throb" Young – Bass
Gavin Skinner - Drums
Martin St. John - Tambourine *unconfirmed if he went to Germany?
02 November 1987 - Forum, Enger, Germany
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / ''Falling Down'' / ? / May the Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / ? / Never Gonna Come Down / Loose (The Stooges cover) / ? - ?
Notes: The bands first tour abroad. A short German tour to promote Sonic Flower Groove.
08 November 1987 - Luxor, Cologne, Germany
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / Treasure Trip / May The Sun Shine Bright for You / Love You / Star Fruit Surf Rider - I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / Imperial / Spirea-X - (?) - Gloria (Them cover) / Imperial - White Riot (The Clash cover)
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
13 November 1987 - Logo, Hamburg, Germany
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / Treasure Trip / May the Sun Shine Bright for You / Love You / Star Fruit Surf Rider / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / Imperial / Spirea-X / Loose (The Stooges cover)
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
22 November 1987 Sunday - Town And Country Club, London * Ticket Price: £4.50 (Advance), £5 (On The Door) * Supporting: The Mighty Lemon Drops
Notes: The Motorcycle Boy were second on, (The poster makes it look like) House Of Love was first on.
26 November 1987 Thursday - ULU (University Of London Union), Malet Street, London, WC1 * Doors Open: * Ticket Price: £4.50 * Support Act(s): Dinosaur, The Boy Hairdresser
Notes: Nearest Tube 'Goodge Street'. Dinosaur would later become Dinosaur Jr. Members from The Boy Hairdresser would later form Teenage Fanclub.
26 November 1987 Thursday - ULU, University Of London Students Union, Student Central, London * Support Act(s): Dinosaur Jr, The Boy Hairdressers *
Gentle Tuesday
Notes: The Boy Hairdresser would later become Teenage Fanclub.
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
05 December 1987 Saturday - The Buzz Club, West End Centre, Aldershot * Doors Open: 20:00* Ticket Price: £4.00 * Support Act(s): Passmore Sisters, North Of Cornwallis*
Gentle Tuesday
10 December 1987 Thursday - Wembley Arena, Wembley, London * Doors Open: 19:30 * Ticket Price: £7.00 * Supporting: New Order *
So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / Treasure Trip / May The Sun Shine Bright for You / Love You / Star Fruit Surf Rider / I'm Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows of Knight cover) / Silent Spring / Imperial / Loose (The Stooges cover)
Notes: The bands' bigges show to date. Primal Scream's Bobby would develop a friendship with New Order, especially singer Bernard Sumner, over the following years. Bobby and Barney would collaborate together several times during their careers.
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
Bootleg: Wembley Arena 12/10/87 (ARTISAN ART 7148)
21 December 1987 Monday - The Rock Club, C. San Bernadrdo 5, Madrid, Spain * Doors Open: 22:00 * Ticket Price: 1000
Gentle Tuesday / Sonic Sister Love / So Sad About Us (The Who cover) / May The Sun Shine Bright for You / Treasure Trip / Velocity Girl (Slow Version) / Star Fruit Surf Rider / Silent Spring / Imperial / Spirea-X / Loose (The Stooges cover)
Notes: Unconfirmed if 1987 or 1988. The ticket stub indicates new lp Sonic Flower Groove and uses the band photo from the Imperial single, so I presume it is 1987.
Last show with Jim Beattie. Velocity Girl wouldn't be performed slowly again until 2019.
Bootleg: Tape (Transfer: ANA(Low) > Ariston WX-510 > WAV > FLAC(24/48). Transfer by nonstop.) Audience Recording
1988
1988 - Gavin Skinner leaves the band.
1988 - Jim Beattie leaves the band.
Notes: Long-term songwriting partner and guiartist Jim left the band. Critical reviews, poor show bookings and a breakdown in the writing partnership pushed the guitarist to leave.
24 April 2013 - Drowned In Sound web article by Dom Gourlay, Bobby Interview: Jim Beattie left so Robert moved over to guitar and we wrote and recorded the second album and we picked up a drummer and bass player; Toby Tomanov and Henry Olsen.
1988 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Robert Young - Bass
Andrew Innes - Rhythm Guitar.
1988 - Primal Scream move to Brighton.
Notes: The band move from Glasgow and regroup with another line up change. Robert Young switched from bass to guitar. The band start attending raves in the area.
1988 - Henry Olsen and Phillip "Toby" Tomanov join the band.
Notes: Both new members had played for ex-Velvet Underground's Nico's backing back The Faction. Henry on bass and Toby on drums. The new members would bring a harder edge to the bands sound.
1988 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Robert Young - Guitar
Andrew Innes - Rhythm Guitar
Henry Olsen - Bass
Phillip "Toby" Tomanov- Drums
1988 - Primal Scream re-sign to Creation Records
Notes: The band go back on tour with their new line up and Rock 'N' Roll setlist.
01 May 1988 Sunday - Rolling Stone, Milan, Italy * Doors Open: 19:00 On Stage: 20:00 * Ticket Price: L30.000
Notes: Date taken from stub. Approx 100 tickets were sold.
1988 - Robert Gillespie Senior represents the Labour party at the Glasgow Govan byelection
07 August 1988 Sunday - Doing it For The Kids - Creation Records Alldayer, Town and Country Club, 9/17 Highgate Road, Kentish Town, London, NW5 * Line-Up: My Bloody Valentine, The House Of Love, Felt, Primal Scream, The Jazz Butcher, Nikki Sudden, Jasmine Minks, Heidi Berry
You're Just Dead Skin to Me / She Power / Fire of Love / Imperial / Ivy Ivy Ivy
Notes: Felt, with Martin Duffy on keys, were third on the bill, above Primal Scream.
From August 1988 - Melody Maker magazine, review by Simon Reynolds:
...For Creation and its constituency--the sea of floppy fringes, black leather, suede and paisley gathered here today--rock is over, something that’s been and gone. Creation isn’t fixated on a particular Lost Moment, or a golden age with clearly defined boundaries, but it does have a canon of visionary outsiders, honoured tonight on the tapes played between acts. Tim Rose’s “Morning Dew”, Alex Chilton, The Seeds, Gram Parsons’ “Grievous Angel”, the Stones’ “Have You Seen Your Mother Baby”, Lee Hazelwood, all pretty incontestable, really, and close to my own ideas about the past, not least in the implicit rejection of punk’s long-term effects (New Wave and New Pop). It’s a canon that should be remembered, privileged even. The trouble is that the sense of upholding a legacy through the dark ages of plastic pop has bred a servile and lily-livered deference to the sources. Rewriting is unavoidable at this late hour, sure, but what’s needed is an approach that can inflame these traces rather than preserve them in aspic. Otherwise you become a living, breathing archive of rock gesture. A mere footnote. The fate that’s befallen too many of the bands at this event.
HEIDI BERRY is an admirably eccentric gesture for Creation. She harks back to the islet of troubled AOR occupied in the early Seventies by Sandy Denny and John Martyn, and indeed looks gloriously unfashionable in this context--her thigh-length suede boots, puce velvet jacket and boob tube jarring conspicuously with the (admittedly ravishing) ideals of female indie-style visible all around…
The reputedly “quite good” JASMINE MINKS get people jigging from one foot to the other with their moderately radiant guitar interplay, but the singer sounds like he’s gargling a sock, and ultimately theirs is a thin-lipped and ill-fitting appropriation of “the Sixties”. I never saw a band leave the stage so lackadaisical and unemphatic a manner.
Then the gaunt, scarecrow figure of NIKKI SUDDEN shuffles on for a couple of rather scrappy blues numbers. “Death is Hanging Over Me” would be affecting in its abjection if not for the camp effect of Sudden’s weak R’s. “Crossroads” is introduced as a song about Robert Johnson: “And he’s ultimately the reason why we’re all here today… even though you probably don’t know his name.” Well, yeah, no doubt that’s true, in the strict archeological sense: but a hell of lot has happened in the interim. For a lot of the kids here, the Mary Chain’s riot gig is almost prehistory.
THE JAZZ BUTCHER gains a point for sounding comparatively robust, but loses several for his Jennings-and-Darbyshire/Robyn Hitchcock Englishness, and for his session-standard saxophonist. Unclassifiable, clever-clever indie-bop, somewhere between Monochrome Set, The Woodentops and Jimmy the Hooever. Packed, bustling and void.
PRIMAL SCREAM’s moment has long passed. The talk of feyness and innocence has evidently riled them into aping the Stones. They’ve abandoned the gossamer fragility of “Crystal Crescent” and “Gentle Tuesday” for a blues that sags but never approaches the ponderousness and tumescent turgidity attained by various visionary white bastardizations of R&B. Bobby Gillespie and the drummer are the main culprits, the dragging vestigial limbs. Gillespie’s voice just doesn’t have the grain for raunch, can only sing ba-ba-ba Bay City Rollers tunes. “Fire of Love” is rendered impossibly lukewarm and lackluster. Gillespie crouches low, wigs out in that boneless, rag-doll manner of his, a flailing cod-dementia, willing it to be as good as the old days.
I’ll venerate FELT until the end of time for “Primitive Painters” alone. Like Durutti Column’s “Missing Boy”, it’s a classic defeatist anthem, a shamefaced confession of an inability to cope with life’s most rudimentary demands (like eating vegetables). Live, even without the stratospheric powerhouse of Liz Frazer’s vocal, it’s an irresistible, cascading surge, a contradiction of the vocal and its morose words. Laurence’s listless whisp must be the ultimate voice of deficiency and unrealized selfhood: a one note range, and even then he doesn’t sound in full command of that note. And there’s plenty more of Felt’s halcyon dappled sunlight and gilded ripple tonight, a sound perfectly complemented by the trippy back projections, including one that looks like rays of light convering on a retina and its burnt-out pupil.
What else to say about THE HOUSE OF LOVE? Nobody has a bad word for them. In the nicest possible way they are the Consensus Band of 1988, unimpeachably wondrous. Tonight, an incredible piece, like a whale song reverberating through the recesses of the galaxy, turns out to be Terry Bickers messing about while the others tune up. There’s the godlike glow and gazelle grace of “Destroy the Heart”, the vast cathedral resonance of “Christine”, the luminous aftermath of a personal apocalypse that is “Man to Child”. “Shine On” is all baleful gravitas and cold smouldering ascent, while “Nothing To Me” is one of these great Guy Chadwick lyrical inversions, like “Blind”: the title’s a monstrous fib as the sound tells you the singer’s minds eye is ablaze with the memory of her. Burgeoning axe hero Terry introduces sounds and effects that just don’t belong in this kind of pop. “Real Animal” leads into “I Wanna Be Your Dog” from the first Stooges album, which--impossibly--manages to be both bestial and celestial. Drowned, I tell you.
MY BLOODY VALENTINE are about to release a fabulous and quite extraordinary five-track EP [You Made Me Realise]. But live, the delicate melodies and the fine-tuning of chaos get crushed in the melee. “Cigarette In your Bed”, a most peculiar, unplaceable song on record (a Sonic Youth lullaby?) is a shambles live, Belinda Jayne Butcher’s bloodless vocal almost completely lost. The stop-start paroxysms of “Drive It All Over Me” and “You Made Me Realise” thrive better under the thrash approach, churning up foaming noise in the Husker Du/Dinosaur style. But they disappoint me by not playing “Slow”, the sex song of the year (along with “Gigantic” by the Pixies). With its colossal “Sidewalking” bass, disorientating drones, and langorous, enervated vocals, it conjures up a honeyed, horny lassitude of desire to rival AR Kane. This raven-haired thrash-pop has a sight more edges and secrets to it than any of its “rivals.”
The event peters out with a bit of malarkey involving a cut-out Alan McGee and Joe Foster attempting to lead a singalong of “We Are the World”. The “no encore” rule (to ensure each act doesn’t over-run) is observed even at the end, leaving the crowd restive and frustrated. Overall impression: a sense of “now” being eclipsed, drained vampirically by the past and its stature; the loss of the present moment through being made to seem impoverished next to the history it was umbilically bound to. Only The House of Love and My Bloody Valentine know that you have to torch the whole heap of pop signs and totems, rather than shuffle them about a bit. Only those two bands brought back the sudden quickening of “NOW” that eluded us most of the time today.
Bootleg: Tape () (IAWS I Am Without Shoes / stoneroses.net (Will Odell). Priced: £7) - London T&C 7/8/88 + Dundee Fat Sam's 29/7/87 + Nottingham 25/8/86
198x - The Boston Arms, Tuffnell, 178 Junction Rd., London, N19 5QQ * Supporting: Felt
Notes: Creation Records Night.
Bootleg: Primal Scream/Felt etc. - Creation Rec's Night, Boston Arms London (ARTISAN ART 3468 2CDr)
23 September 1988 Friday - Academy, Brixton, London * Support Act(s): Butthole Surfers
October 1988 - Gentle Tuesday / Imperial 7inch Spanish Promo
7inch Vinyl Promo Only WEA ?907
Gentle Tuesday
Imperial
Notes: Distributed to promote the Spanish tour.
10-01 1988 - Teatro Rivoli Porto, Portugal
"Fire Of Love" / Ivy, Ivy, Ivy / "We Love To Rock N Roll, Yeah...Be My Girl" / Imperial / No Expectations (Rolling Stones cover)
Notes: I presume the date should be 01 October 1988. Complete set probably included I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / She Power / Cold Turkey (John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band cover).
Bootleg: Tape () Audience Recording
17 December 1988 Thursday - Pacha (Auditorium), Valencia, Spain * Doors Open: 23:30 * Ticket Price: 1000 PTS (Advance) / 1500 PTS (On The Door)
19 December 1988 Saturday - Enbruto, Zaragoza
Notes: Date taken from a Spanish Gentle Tuesday promo.
20 December 1988 Sunday - The End, Vitoria
Notes: Date taken from a Spanish Gentle Tuesday promo.
21 December 1988 Monday - Rock Club, Madrid
Notes: Date taken from a Spanish Gentle Tuesday promo. Conflicting date with 1987 show?
1989 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Robert "Throb" Young - Guitar
Andrew Innes - Rhythm Guitar
Henry Olsen - Bass
Phillip "Toby" Tomanov- Drums
1989 - Primal Scream Sessions
Produced by Sister Anne.
Ivy Ivy Ivy
Notes: Martin Duffy of Felt joins the band for the sessions, playing keyboards and piano.
From 31 January 2011 - NME Magazine, article By Sarah Anderson: Bobby Gillespie took his first E – given to him by McGee – in April 1989. “If the first Primal Scream album was acid,” says the singer, “and the second one was speed, then the third phase was E.”
March 1990 - Melody Maker Interview: "When it came to the second album, we decided it was stupid to spend days and days working on a single song, so we recorded a lot of the tracks at the first take. We just wanted to bang everything straight down and concentrate on capturing the moment. But although we were really happy with it, the reviews were disappointing. Several journalists simply couldn't understand how we could do a rock song like Ivy Ivy Ivy one minute and a slow ballad, using just a voice and slide guitar, the next. Instead of being praised for our diversity, we were accused of being schizophrenic.
? 1989 - Martin Bernard Duffy joins the band ?
Notes: He played during the second album recording sessions. Unconfirmed when Martin joined the band for the live shows? Former Felt keyboard, piano, organ, snyth player started playing live shows as a teenager. Martin would play professionally in covers bands. Covering everything from country to pop in Irish dance halls across the Midlands and beyond. Martin said "I learned a certain craft back then..."
1989 - The Primal Scream is...
Bobby Gillespie
Robert "Throb" Young - Guitar
Andrew Innes - Rhythm Guitar
Henry Olsen - Bass
Phillip "Toby" Tomanov- Drums
Martin Bernard Duffy – Keyboards ?
09 May 1989 Tuesday - The Princess Charlotte, Leicester
Notes: Unconfirmed. See 05 September 1989.
24 March 2016 18.01 GMT Thursday - The Observer, Guardian Dave Simpson Interview: “We’d line up across the stage, six of us, like Dexys Midnight Runners, speeding like fucking Lemmy. The idea was to threaten the audience. We played an amazing gig at Leicester’s Princess Charlotte, full of kids, a proper rock’n’roll show. These bastards were spitting at me so I whipped two of them in the face with the mic, and whipped it back so I could carry on singing. I loved that period of the band. We didn’t have many fans, but we were shit-hot.
June 1989 - Alan McGee and Bobby go to a rave and meet Andrew Weatherall
Notes: 07 Jul 2020 06.00 BST Tuesday The Observer, Guardian, Joe Muggs article: Creation Records svengali Alan McGee remembers indie and dance colliding thus: “I took Bobby to a Shoom rave in the countryside outside Brighton. Weatherall found me on my hands and knees trying to see if there were any Es on the floor. Bobby was all in black in Chelsea boots like one of the Ramones, and Weatherall looked like some kind of Hell’s Angel. I think there was a spark there.”
23 February 2020 09.30 GMT Sunday - The Observer, Guardian, Bobby Gillespie Interview by Sean O’Hagan: My memories are vague, when it comes to that summer, but I do recall a bunch of us driving around the countryside near Brighton for hours trying to find an acid house party where he was DJing. We eventually met up with him at about five in the morning in a field in Sussex. All of us off our heads on E. We just got on right away.
20 July 1989 - Hummingbird, Birmingham
24 July 1989 Monday - FAC 51 The Hacienda, 11-13 Whitworth Street West, Manchester
25 July 1989 Tuesday - Duke Of York, Leeds
26 July 1989 Wednesday - Riverside, Newcastle * Ticket Price: £3.50 (Advance) £4.00 (On The Door) £2.50 (Members) * Support Act(s): The Telescopes
Notes: Venue often noted as 'Riverside 1'
27 July 1989 Thursday - Venue, Edinburgh
31 July 1989 - Hibernian (City Limits Week), London
31 July 1989 - Ivy Ivy Ivy U.K. Release Date
All songs written by Gillespie, Innes & Young.
Produced by Sister Ann (Primal Scream).
Ivy Ivy Ivy
You're Just Too Dark To Care
I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me
Spanish Release - Grabaciones Accidentales - GA-10358-1
7inch Vinyl Creation Records - CRE067
Ivy Ivy Ivy
You're Just Too Dark To Care
28 June 1989 - 12inch Vinyl Test Pressing (Mayking Records, MPO) Creation Records - CRE067T
12inch Vinyl Creation Records - CRE067T
CD Creation Records - CRESCD067
Ivy Ivy Ivy
You're Just Too Dark To Care
I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me
Notes: The test press was finished and produced by Mayking Records 26 May 1989. The initial release was due early September 1989 but was brought forward to 31 July 1989. Management by Alan McGee.
There exsists a handful of mispressed CD Singles featuring Hynotone. The 7 track 'Hynotone' album was accidentally pressed onto the Primal Scream single, the only way of telling is playing the disc or by looking at the burn time on the disc. The sleeve and design are the same as the correct pressing.
09 August 1989 Tuesday - The Dial Club, Derby
11 August 1989 Friday - Adelphi, 89 De Grey Street, Beverley Road, Hull, HU52RU * Ticket Price: £3 (Advance/Members) £3.50 (On The Door) * Support Act(s): The Gallery
12 August 1989 Saturday - Take Two, 54 Staniforth Road, Sheffield, S9 3HE * Support Act(s): The Mourning After
18 August 1989 - The Powerhaus aka Powerhouse, Islington, London * Support Act(s): The Telescopes
Ivy, Ivy, Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / ? She Power "Has Beach Boys California Girls style middle" / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / You're Just Too Dark To Care / Imperial / ? / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / ? / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 Cover)
Notes: The set lasted just over half an hour, as did most of their 89' sets. Guy Chadwick (House Of Love), Alan McGee, Kevin Shields (My Blood Valentine) amongst other Creation Records members were in the audience.
Bootleg: Audience Recording
26 August 1989 Saturday - Big Blyth Sound Festival,
29 August 1989 Tuesday - Moles Club, Bath
30 August 1989 Wednesday - T.J's, Newport
01 September 1989 Friday - Joiners Arms, Southampton
Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / She Power / ? (prowling) / "You're Just Too Dark To Care" / Imperial / ? / ? / Lone Star Girl / Did You No Wrong (Sex Pistols cover)
Notes: Date sometimes, incorrectly, noted as 11 September 1989. Bobby incorrectly introduces the unknown song before Lone Star Girl as Lone Star Girl, he corrects himself after playing the unconfirmed track.
Bootleg: Audience Recording - tuning ptA / tuning ptB / tuning ptC / tuning ptD / Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teanage Head / She Power / ...(prowling)...?? / ...(morning comes)... (You're Just Too Dark To Care) / Imperial / ?? / ?? / ?? / Lone Star Girl / Did You No Wrong
Bootleg: Tape () (IAWS I Am Without Shoes / stoneroses.net (Will Odell). Priced: £7) - London ULU 26/6/87 + Southampton Joiners Arms 1/9/89
04 September 1989 Monday - Panic Station, Dingwalls, Camden Lock, Chalk Farm Road, London, NW1 * Doors Open: 20:00 , On Stage: 22:30 * Ticket Price: £5.00 (Advance) £4 (Members) * Support Act(s): Something Pretty Beautiful, Pete Astor
Ivy, Ivy, Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / ? She Power "Has Beach Boys California Girls style middle" / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / You're Just Too Dark To Care / Imperial / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / ? / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 Cover)
Notes: Pete Astor, former Creation Records The Loft & Weather Prophets leader, was supporting the band.
Bootleg: Audience Recording
05 September 1989 Tuesday - The Princess Charlotte, Leicester
Notes: Date sometimes confused with 09 May 1989. Apparently the show was really bad and full of leather clad bikers.
12 September 1989 - Warehouse, Leeds
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
14 September 1989 - Crown & Cushion, Bolton
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
15 September 1989 - After Dark, Reading
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
18 September 1989 - Primal Scream U.K. Release Date
Sleeve Design by Jayne Houghton. Collage Photography by Jayne Houghton, Karen Parker, Luke Hayes.
All songs written by Gillespie, Innes & Young.
Produced by Sister Anne (Primal Scream).
Orchestrated By Henry Olsen.
Martin Duffy plays Piano.
Creation Records
Vinyl CRELP 054 * Initial Pressings included a free bonus 7inch Vinyl Creation Records - CREFRE 6. Sticker on front of sleeve: "Limited Edition with free 7" single".
Ivy Ivy Ivy / You're Just Dead Skin To Me / She Power / You're Just Too Dark To Care / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Lone Star Girl / Kill The King / Sweet Pretty Thing / Jesus Can't Save Me
Bonus 7inch Record: Lone Star Girl #1 / Split Wide Open #1
CD CRECD 054
Cassette C-CRE054
Spanish Release - Vinyl LP Grabaciones Accidentales GA-40358
Italian Release - CD CRECD054
German Release - CD Rough Trade ?- RTDCD 124, CD 1-308
German Release - Viny LP Rough Trade RTD 124, Creation Records ?L1 - 308
16 December 1989 Japanese Release - Creation Records VDP-1527
Australian Release - Shock SHOCK CD 1004
Ivy Ivy Ivy / You're Just Dead Skin To Me / She Power / You're Just Too Dark To Care / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Lone Star Girl / Kill The King / Sweet Pretty Thing / Jesus Can't Save Me
Notes: Lone Star Girl #1 & Split Wide Open #1 are both unique to the bonus 7inch record, they are both acoustic demo versions.
19 September 1989 Tuesday - The Mint, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
21 September 1989 Thursday - Arts Centre, Exeter *
Notes: Sold Out Show, Date From Tour Poster. Apparently touts were selling tickets outside for £15 a go.
Audrey Witherspoon aka Andrew Weatherall reviewed this show for the NME. Andy contributed to the NME in the 1980's and was an NME journalist for a short lived period too. Andy isn't a stranger to an alias either, he also goes by The Sabres of Paradise, Two Lone Swordsman Bocca Juniors and many others too.
It was this review and meeting with the band that eventually lead to him remixing and producing ‘Loaded’.
“I’ve not read the review since, and I’m not sure I want to,” Weatherall said in author Luke Bainbridge’s 2013 book The True Story of Acid House: Britain’s Last Youth Culture Revolution. “Hopefully it still had some naive charm”. That is certainly does. The review has been trapped in the NME archive for over 30 years, but here it is – as surreal and eclectic as the great man himself.
October 1989 - Audrey Witherspoon Review, NME Magazine - Sex, Lies and Gaffer Tape - Primal Scream, Exeter Arts Centre “Be young, be foolish… Be happy”.
Part One: “… and I’ll meet you at the station.” On the road with The Primals. Blinding. First a checklist. Leather Jeckyls back from Sketchleys – check two bottles of Jack Daniels – check. Away we go. First stop, Paddington newsagents with its extremely well stocked shelf. Gentlemens’ leisure magazines? Do me a favour, there’s bound to be loads of girlies wanting to snog the gonads off of anybody even remotely connected with the band, still a bit of train journey reading wouldn’t go amiss. A Guns N’Roses interview? Just the ticket. Even better. Pamela Des Barres confessions of a groupie. Nah, a bit tacky. This’ll do, Fred Dineage’s in depth look at the Kray twins (What next? Jack Hargreaves and the rest of the team look behind the scenes of the Brinks Mat security blag, and asks “How?”). Raunchy reading for a raunchy evening. On reflection, a suburban local paper and a bumper edition of The People’s Friend would have been more in order. The banter aboard the 14.15 Paddington to Exeter wasn’t particularly raunchy either, the words ‘Kick’, ‘roadie’, ‘arse’, ‘chick’, and ‘axe’ were never used. Instead, the conversations ranged from old soul boy stories to Jack Barron’s psychedelic anorak (not a new indie band but a very dodgy article of clothing). Several limp sarnies, piss weak tea and Stellas later, it’s ‘hello Exeter St Davids, get me a sherbert to the hotel’. Maybe we could start the rock’n’roll antics there. Not a hope. The Trenance Hotel, with its sticker bearing the words ‘As recommended by the Ramblers Association’, tends to conjure up images of Peter Storm waterproofs and stout walking shoes, not ideas about lobbing televisions from windows. Anyway, they were chained to the wall (a light-fingered lot these ramblers), and a Goblin Teasmade from the fourth floor doesn’t quite have the same impact (in every sense of the word).
Part Two: – “We’re gonna hit the town, burn it f––ing down – to a cinder”.: So go the lyrics to one of The Clash’s finest tunes, lyrics coursing through my mind as we stormed out into the Exeter afternoon in search of action. Thoughts of painting the town red, however, were shattered by the photographic portion of the posse when he uttered the words, “I must get some baby stuff”. That’s more like it, baby oil for a saucy love romp on a plastic sheet. But no, he was thinking more along the lines of a Tommy Tippee mug and matching romper suit for his kid. It was still relatively early, anything could happen, couldn’t it? A few drinks might liven things up a little. To the Arts Centre with all speed. What’s it to be chaps, 48 pints of lager, 10 pints of Brandy and Lucozade, 6 bottles of scotch and plastic bucket? “Two halves of lager, a Diet Pepsi, and an orange juice, please”. By now thoughts of on-the-road debauchery were fading fast. They flew totally out of control when Bobby Gillespie arrived, in his hands not a young floozy and a carrier bag full of associated narcotics, but a glass of milk and a carefully prepared cheese salad roll. We all exchanged pleasantries and sat next to what appeared to be the Arts Centre booking committee, earnest sorts with crew cuts, round glasses and courduroy kecks, and that was just the women. Several members of the Primals gang joined the table and at last on the road-type tales began to be told. Stories I couldn’t begin to tell on these pages, mainly because I wasn’t listening. The conversation on the committee table was far more interesting. An extremely young crowd was beginning to gather, rumours abounding that tickets for this sell out gig were changing hands for 15 quid. However, after witnessing several punters count out the price of half a Ruddies in very small change I couldn’t really picture any of them shelling out that kind of wedge.
Part Three: ‘Young Hearts Run Free’: Oh my word they were young. Young and polite, standing and watching, until Mr Gillespie reported “Well, dance then” to a heckler that shouted “Faster and Louder”. This was the cue for some furious but very good-natured leaping about. Very young girls watched the very young boys pushing each other over and pretending to be on drugs. I watched the whole palaver and wished I was at least eight years younger. In the ‘dressing room’ the chaps held court. The young girlies looked like they should all have names like Becky or Bunty, the young boysies looked at the band as if they were hip elder brothers. Oh yeah. It almost slipped my mind. The songs. One sounded like T Rex, one sounded like Gen X, one sounded like Big Star, one sounded like the Sex Pistols and one was the Sex Pistols. A great deal of energy channelled through a crap PA. Basically, Primal Scream pay homage to their heroes (what good pop bands don’t?) and inject a little of their own spunk (ooer, and all that)… This was not the best of gigs from a musical point of view, but that’s not the point. The point is that 200 very young people had a bleeding good night out, were able to talk to their heroes – and believe me these kids are heroes – ponce a drum stick of tow, buy a T-shirt from the world’s worst T-shirt salesman and wander back to their bedsits extremely happy. Far be it from me to be cynical about this kind of behaviour because, at the risk of sounding like a patronising git, I do like to see young people enjoying themselves.
23 February 2020 09.30 GMT Sunday - The Observer, Guardian, Bobby Gillespie Interview by Sean O’Hagan: I remember the NME asked him to review a Primal Scream gig and he came to see us play at Exeter University. He turned up in leather trousers with really long hair – he could have been in the band! (Weatherall wrote an enthusiastic review of the gig under the pen name, Audrey Witherspoon.) After that, we’d go and see him whenever he was DJing in London.
1990 - Andrew Weatherall mentions I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have in Boy's Own fanzine
23 February 2020 09.30 GMT Sunday - The Observer, Guardian, Bobby Gillespie Interview by Sean O’Hagan: I first heard of Andrew Weatherall back in the summer of 1989, when he wrote about his favourite tracks of the time in the Boy’s Own fanzine. To our surprise, he said that he loved all the ballads on our second album. No one cared about that record apart from diehard fans, but he really dug it.
24 March 2016 18.01 GMT Thursday - The Observer, Guardian Dave Simpson Interview: “It was completely unfashionable to be rock’n’roll at that point. Most reviewers pasted us. Then Boys Own magazine asked Andrew Weatherall to name his favourite records and he wrote: ‘The ballads on the second Primal Scream album.’ He particularly liked I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have, which I thought was the first great song we’d written. He was the hippest DJ in the hippest scene in the country, acid house, nothing to do with rock music. Perfect for us, because it was like, ‘Fuck you.’ We had to meet this guy. We did a gig with him and he played house music before we came on, and girls in Wonderstuff T-shirts were pleading with us, ‘Please, ask this man to stop playing this terrible music.’”
23 September 1989 Saturday - The Boardwalk, Little Peter Street, Manchester, M15 4PS
Notes: Promo advert noted the venue incorrectly as 'Broadwalk'.
The Boardwalk (Music Venue, Little Peter St., Manchester) ticket holders could get a £1 discount off The Hacienda club night entry on Fridays and Saturdays.
25 September 1989 Monday - Bierkellar, Bristol
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
01 October 1989 - Futurama, Leeds
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
04 October 1989 Wednesday - The Plough, Kenton, Harrow, London
Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power / Imperial / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 cover) /
encore: All I Have To Do Is Dream () / You're Just Too Dark to Care / Cold Turkey (John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band cover) / Did You No Wrong (Sex Pistols cover) - No Fun (The Stooges cover)
Notes: No Fun is incomplete on the bootleg recording.
Bootleg: Audience Recording
06 October 1989 - Friday - ULU, University Of London, Studen Central * Support Act(s): The Mekons, The Telescopes, The Impossibles*
Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power - Imperial / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 cover)
encore: Cold Turkey (John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band cover) / Did You No Wrong (Sex Pistols cover)
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
From The Independent (independent.co.uk) 07 November 2003 01:00 Friday by Steve Jelbert: "At that point we thought there wasn't much of a future for the band. We'd play in London and there'd be 80 people there. No one from the record company would even come and see us. Then we had a hit, we were on a wage and we bought a sampler and a studio, and that's where we started writing and recording Screamadelica...
Bootleg: Audience Recording - Tape () (IAWS I Am Without Shoes / stoneroses.net (Will Odell). Priced: £7) - London ULU 6/10/89 + Barcelona Sala 7/2/90 (FM)
Bootleg: Bubblegum Glass (Cacker? CR-20, Silver pressed CD) ("Tracks 1-8 Live London 1987" could be 26 June 1987 Friday - ULU, University Of London Students Union, Student Central, London with tracks 6-8 in the incorrect running order) May The Sun Shine Bright For You / Love You / Tomorrow Ends Today / Imperial / I’m Gonna Make You Mine (The Shadows Of Knight cover) / Sonic Sister Love / Silent Spring / Gentle Tuesday ("Tracks 9-16 Live italy 1989" but I believe it is actually 06 October 1989 - Friday - ULU, University Of London, Studen Central or it could even be 20 December 1989.) - Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teeenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power / Imerpial / Lone Star Girl
07 October 1989 Saturday - JB's, Dudley
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
09 October 1989 Monday - The Centre, Slough
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
11 October 1989 Wednesday - University, Manchester
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
12 October 1989 Thursday - University, Cardiff
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
13 October 1989 Friday - University, Swansea
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
17 October 1989 Tuesday - The Zap, Old Ship Beach, Brighton * Doors Open: 20:00 * Ticket Price: £4.50 (on the doors), £4 (advance)
Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power - Imperial / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 cover)
encore: Cold Turkey (John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band cover) / No Fun (The Stooges cover)
Notes: Approx 100 attended the show. Date From Tour Poster & Ticket Stub.
Bootleg: Audience Recording
18 October 1989 Wednesday - Royal Holloway & Bedford New College
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
20 October 1989 Friday - Jericho Tavern, Oxford, Oxfordshire
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
21 October 1989 Saturday - Buzz Club, West End Centre, Aldershot
Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power - Imperial / I Got You Split Wide Open Over Me / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 cover) / Kick Out The Jams (MC5 cover)
encore: Did You No Wrong (Sex Pistols cover) / No Fun (The Stooges cover)
Notes: Date From Tour Poster.
Bootleg: Audience Recording
01 December 1989 Friday - The Station Hotel, Aberdeen, Scotland
02 December 1989 Saturday - Moray House Student Union, Edinburgh, Scotland
09 December 1989 Saturday - The Pulse, Nottingham Trent University Student Union, Nottingham
December 1989 - Andrew Weatherall mixes I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have.
Notes: Social connections made through the media articles, raves and club nights led to DJ Andrew Weatherall remixing the Primal Scream ballad. Loaded was initially demo'ed here but the band sent Andy away for another go.
24 March 2016 18.01 GMT Thursday - The Observer, Guardian Dave Simpson Interview: Andrew Innes (guitar): “Alan McGee gave Weatherall – who’d never made a record – £1,000 to remix I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have, initially for a B-side. At first, he made a nice version, because it was his first remix and he didn’t want to ruin the song. But that’s what we wanted, so we phoned him and basically said, ‘Just fuckin’ destroy it.’ That became Loaded...
23 February 2020 09.30 GMT Sunday - The Observer, Guardian, Bobby Gillespie Interview by Sean O’Hagan: We’d already become good mates, when someone suggested that he should mix I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have. He said OK, but his remix was a bit low-key. He loved the song and maybe he thought we’d be offended if he really went to town on it. It was Innes [Andrew Innes, Primal Scream’s guitarist], who told him to do it again and “just fucking destroy it”. That’s how Loaded came into being, basically. We gave him free rein and he went for it.
20 December 1989 Wednesday - Kilburn National Ballroom, London * Doors Open: 19:00 * Ticket Price: £8.00 * Supporting: The Jesus and Mary Chain
Cold Turkey (John Lennon & The Plastic Ono Band cover) / Ivy Ivy Ivy / Gimme Gimme Teenage Head / Sweet Pretty Thing / I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have / Jesus Can't Save Me / She Power / Imperial / Lone Star Girl / Ramblin' Rose (MC5 cover)
Notes: It's been a while since Bobby and Mary Chain have shared the same bill. The show was recorded by the BBC but only The Jesus and Mary Chain set was broadcast.
Bootleg: Audience Recording