Tag Archives: Spiritualized

Eclectic Mainline 5th March 2014

Hype about this year’s Record Store Day (sorry, Record Shop Day as Phil Cope keeps reminding me) is building.  The only thing I’ve actually heard so far that’s coming out on 19th April is a new tune by Spiritualized from a compilation LP of music incorporating sounds from Voyager space probes:

Also in this week’s Eclectic Mainline was this by Nothing:

And this by Todd Terje:

You will find the full programme on the BCB Listen Again service. Here is the track list:

Nothing – Endlessly (LP – Guilty of Everything) (Relapse) Soundcloud
Kangding Ray – Evento (LP – Solens Arc) (Raster Noton)
Poemss – Ancient Pony (LP – Poemss) Soundcloud
Mestre Cupijó e Seu Ritmo – Perereca (LP – Siriá) (Analog Africa)
Ringo Deathstarr – God’s Dream (LP – God’s Dream)
L-Vis 1990 – Flash Drive (Dance System EP) (Clone Jack For Daze) Soundcloud
We Are Catchers – Tap Tap Tap (single) (Domino)
Samantha Crain – Never Going Back (single and LP – Kid Face) (Full Time Hobby)
Quilt – Mary Mountain (LP – Held In Splendour)
Guerilla Toss – Club Kids (LP – Gay Disco)
Family Fodder – Savoir Faire (LP – Monkey Banana Kitchen) (Staubgold) Soundcloud
TVS meets AudioArt – Pax (featuring Speng Bond) (LP – AudioArt Presents Op’Ra Dub Style) (One Drop)
Todd Terje – Delorean Dynamite (Olsen) Soundcloud
Spiritualized Mississippi Space Program – Always Forgetting With You (The Bridge Song) (LP – Space Project) (Lefse) Soundcloud

You will find the full programme on the BCB Listen Again service. Here is the track list:

Don’t look back, but there’s a band over there playing a whole album

In Phil Cope’s recent review of the ATP Festival we attended, he expressed an aversion to the modern trend of artists performing a seminal album in its entirety at a gig. Phil’s objection was prompted by Spiritualized performing their 1997 album Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space at the festival. I would like to defend this increasingly popular phenomenon.

J Spaceman at ATP: which song shall we do next, band?

J Spaceman at the ATP Festival: "which song shall we do next, band?"

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ATP Festival curated by Matt Groening – Day 3

Matt Groening introducing Daniel Johnston as his favourite songwriter

Matt Groening introducing Daniel Johnston as his "favourite songwriter"

Sunday dawns and Jim becomes my hero twice in ten minutes by making me a fried egg sandwich and telling me he once saw Spike Milligan in a pub in Manchester. Simon rather coyly reveals his affection for Spear of Destiny and I resolve to play the excellent “Do You Believe in the Westworld” on the radio for him, only to forget later and feel like a dick for doing so.

We race to the Centre Stage to see Boredoms again, just to reassure ourselves that we weren’t victim to some kind of mass hallucination yesterday and they are once again, amazing. We then decamp to Reds, the smallest of the Butlins venues to see Viv Albertine’s Limerice who are excellent. Continue reading

Spiritualized – Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space

I look back on (or listen back to?) 1997 rather fondly.  In no particular order, the following artists released memorable albums in 1997: Elliott Smith, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Blur, Mogwai, Radiohead, Tindersticks, Super Furry Animals, Robert Wyatt, Cornershop, Teenage Fanclub, Primal Scream, The Verve and Spiritualized.  Top of my list though is Spiritualized‘s Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space.  Now, 12 years on, the album has been remastered and expanded.  This is the first occasion I can think of where an album has been given a makeover when I already thought it sounded as good as an album ever could.  So, unlike this year’s Big Star, The Stone  Roses, Neil Young and The Beatles remasters, the appeal here wasn’t for a better sound, but the inclusion of the rare original version of the title track, and a host of studio outtakes (on the two new expanded versions of the album)….and of course, an excuse to write about the album!

Ladies and Gentlemen pill pack re-issue

Ladies and Gentlemen... pill pack re-issue

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