One might say that audiophiles are out, hotly in search of the last great rock album as the entire notion of a shiny disc containing music for individual purchase seems to becoming archaic. We're dinosaurs, those willing to leave the iTunes store, go out into the sunshine, down to the record shop and flip through discs and actually deign ourselves to actually cut through plastic to hear something we might truly adore. Does this sound bitter? Sure it does, because lost in all of this is the tangible joy of a well crafted, honest album as the ethereal digital format looms.
Will there be such an album pressed in plastic? Or will the hopes fade into the dusty desert sun like a western protagonist? Nothing in this search will fade, that is, if Primal Scream can help it.
The strength of this new album from across the pond, Riot City Blues is its ability to combine exciting musical elements into a concise package. It is the best parts of American blues, tantric eastern sounds and energetic modern rock, all of which meld together with surprising effortlessness. The opening song and first single "Country Girl" comes out like a flash with hip shaking guitars and sneer filled vocals. Singer Bobby Gillespie plays the jilted poor boy rock star, a role that reprises on "Nitty Gritty" and "Suicide Sally & Johnny Guitar", among others. These aren't the most interesting songs on Riot City Blues, but they are ten cent radio songs in a nickel rock market. The album becomes a little more engaging in the middle, pulling out surprises with the apocalyptic, siren song "Little Death" and the pure blues "We're Gonna Boogie." The ten track blend turns out to be sensational. It sounds as though Primal Scream is still in tune with that classic sense of album balance -- that well intended sprinkling of sounds that makes a 40 minute album engaging all the way through.
The global recognition of Primal Scream's career seems to be something of a niche understanding. They have fit conveniently into the ever narrowing layman's scope of modern British Pop, found an early peer group in the Stone Roses and Jesus and Mary Chain, and even as they've outlasted the aforementioned groups, they are still often compared to one another. A more challenging connection now might be to the Rolling Stones - a band eerily still active, as the bluesy, daring life that exists on Riot City Blues is testament to continued evolution.
Their ten albums have all registered as better than average, with some acclaim for 1991's Screamadelica as a minor classic; perhaps there is ample argument that this effort, ten years into an odyssey, is their second, with nothing minor in it. |