Primal Scream's 1986 B-side Velocity Girl is a perfect piece of guitar pop- bright, spindly, quickly strummed guitars rushing all over the place and Bobby Gillespie's tribute to the girl with 'vodka in her veins'. The song is short, just eighty eight seconds long, but has had a huge influence. It was a cornerstone of C86 and on hearing it John Squire went away and rethought how he played guitar and wrote songs (Made Of Stone being one obvious result).
Primal Scream are about to release another best of compilation and unlike 2003's Dirty Hits which took Loaded as the starting point the new singles album , called somewhat depressingly Maximum Rock & Roll, goes back to their roots with Velocity Girl, Gentle Tuesday, Imperial and Ivy Ivy Ivy all included this time around. Velocity Girl is to be put out as a 7" single too so if you missed out first time around, time to get down the record shop and pick a copy up. Douglas Hart has made a video for Velocity Girl, combining footage of Edie Sedgwick with Bobby miming to camera in 2019 (I think I would have been happy with more Edie and less Bobby or at least Edie and a 1986 Bobby). Velocity Girl, it goes without saying, is a fucking fantastic song.
In July 1986 Primal Scream did a session for Janice Long and recorded this version of Velocity Girl, a version which has an extra verse that just about takes it to the two minute mark.
Velocity Girl (Janice Long Session)
It is indeed a fucking fantastic song. I'd not heard the Janice Long session version before, so thanks for that SA.
ReplyDeleteAn absolute genius slab of perfect pop.
ReplyDeleteI concur with the above two statements. Have bagsied a copy at Monorail earlier.
ReplyDeleteIt's the earliest songs from Primal Scream that set them apart for me.
ReplyDeleteThe extra verse is welcome, but not needed. What a perfect record!
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