Don't Look Back in Anger

Saint Etienne, Foxbase Alpha Heavenly September 1991

One legacy of the 1990s that remains with us today is the elevation of a shallow sort of eclecticism as an ideal, a move perhaps inspired to the decade’s emphasis on diversity and multiculturalism, or the saturation of ‘post-modern’ into the mainstream. Being properly hip, whether as a listener or a band, meant having mélange of tastes, with high marks for the ‘exotic’ or ‘kitschy’, as if to say one were advanced enough to find ‘coolness’ even in the likes of lounge music. (Remember Combustible Edison and the Ultra-Lounge compilations?) It wasn’t necessary to have any real appreciation  or knowledge of these genres; a token Esquivel record was enough. 

The internet, giving us easy access to vast swathes of music, has cemented this trend so that it is de rigueur today; where a site like Pitchfork would once be entirely indie-focused, it now covers hip hop, electronic, pop and experimental. I recall eyes being rolled at Paste magazine’s year-end list, which I found curious—why expect many hip-hop record placements from publication focussed on indie music? No one balks at Kerrang! omitting country music. To listen primarily to, say, punk or indie and have no interest in Lady Gaga or rap is to be hopelessly provincial.

If it sounds as though I am against having a wide-range of tastes, I’m not. What I dislike is that shallow eclecticism, that sense of merely keeping up, and how its influence results in a number of bands whose music is merely sonic lists of the records they enjoy. 

Saint Etienne, early champions of the eclectic approach, illustrate how it should work. As Simon Reynolds wrote in Melody Maker:

I can't figure the Saint Etienne aesthetic out, and that's the fun of it. This the name of the game in 1991: constructing your own alternative pop universe, hallucinating the hybrid styles that should have but never did happen. As such, Foxbase Alpha is the perfect companion to Screamadelica: both albums are examples of pop scholars transcending their record collections. No single element on either album is ‘new’, but the coagulated composite of all that warped taste sounds breathtakingly fresh and unforeseen.

‘Nothing Can Stop Us Now’, above, perfectly illustrates that. One wouldn’t think that twee songwriting, club production and 1960s pop would fit together, and yet the it does in a way that sounds utterly original, yet retains that sense of instant recognition that the best pop invokes.

Primal Scream, Screamadelica Creation 23 September 1991

With hundreds of blogs and downloading options, it is easy to forget how separated the American and British music scenes were just twenty years ago. If an Anglophile pop fan was lucky enough to live in a college town or large city, a record store would stock pricy import albums or even overseas weeklies suich as the NME or Melody Maker; the less fortunate had to settle for glimpses in the hipper mainstream press such as SPIN, or what MTV would play on 120 Minutes. Thus, though unusual today, in the early 1990s it was commonplace for an album to have a huge impact in Britain but scarcely leave a trace in the US.

This is precisely the case with Screamadelica. In its homeland, the album’s 20th anniversary was celebrated with numerous tributes placing it alongside Nevermind and Loveless in the ‘90s canon; here in the US, though, it remains overlooked and obscure.

One of the album’s most impressive achievements is that it works at all. As we have seen from previous entries, the concept of rock bands making club music was tired ground at this point, yielding increasingly lazy and mediocre music. One could therefore be forgiven for fetching a deep sigh at the prospect of another seeming cash-in, particularly as Primal Scream’s then-current incarnation took the form of unpopular MC5 hard rockers—not exactly the sort to embody the ‘feel good vibes’ of the acid house scene. Yet despite being so late to the scene, Screamadelica is a perfect expression of the fusion, surpassing anything that Madchester or baggy came up with.

 A vital element of its success is that Primal Scream were willing to give themselves up completely to the project, discarding any egotistic impulse to be the stars of the LP. Plenty of groups describe their works as ‘all about the music’, but this is a rare case of it being true. Here, ‘Primal Scream’ is more of a collective label than a band, as the album leans heavily on contributors. Indeed, Screamadelica is as much DJ Andrew Weatherall’s effort as the band’s. He provided the catalyst for the band’s new phase by introducing them to Ecstasy and clubs, and for the album itself by transforming their previous album’s ‘I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have’ into the first single, ‘Loaded’ (which reached #19 on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks chart). 

This isn’t to downplay the band’s contributions, but to say that an important contributions was—paradoxically—a willingness to remove themselves and let others take over. An indicative anecdote comes from a BBC making-of documentary:

Andrew Innes [Primal Scream bassist]: When he first did [the remix that became ‘Loaded’] , he was kind of too polite with it and too—even he’ll tell you—he didn’t want to ruin our song.
 Weatherall: Innes came in, listened to it—visible disappointment—and he was like, ‘No, man, fucking destroy it.’ That was his very word. ‘Don’t even give a fuck’.

The Stone Roses, ‘I Wanna Be Adored’ Silvertone 2 September 1991

I debated including ‘I Wanna Be Adored’ because, despite its release date, it isn't actually a '90s artefact, having been taken from the Roses' 1989 debut. I'm uncertain as to why singles were still be released after so long, but I suspect it was to keep their name in the public, as a lengthy legal battle with the label held up any new material.

Slowdive, Just for a Day Creation Records 2 September 1991 Much of the best shoegazing material can be found on EPs rather than albums—I rate My Bloody Valentine's You Made Me Realise over Isn't Anything, for instance. Likewise, I find Just for a Day to be a disappointment compared to the Slowdive EP. That record had a presence—a muscularity—that the album lacks, which can be attributed to a preference for creating texture using guitars rather than Just for a Day's over-reliance on synthesisers to create atmosphere. When balanced, as in ‘Catch the Breeze’, it can give a track a beautifully lethargic quality, a sense of unfurling space; listening to ‘Spanish Air’, one can see what Melody Maker meant when it wrote, ‘closer to left-field film soundtracks than Lush or the Boo Radleys’.

She adds: "The decade was all about extremes, and that is what we are seeing again now. Where Versace were bringing out the supermodels and sending them down the catwalk in neon, at the same time Marc Jacobs was focusing on grunge, with flannel shirts and beanies.