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Monday 15 November 2021

Monday's Long Song

In 1986 Spacemen 3 released their first album, The Sound Of Confusion. It's very much the sound of a group not quite there yet, the main duo of Pete Kember and Jason Pierce feeling their way towards the sound that they'd perfect over subsequent records. Money had been spent on new guitars and amplifiers and at Pat Fish's insistence they went into a studio in Birmingham to record a bunch of songs that were from the older, heavier end of their repertoire. Pat Fish wasn't able to produce in the end and both Pete and Jason were unhappy with Bob Lamb's production. It's a low key, Stooges influenced album, seven songs (four of them covers) with the emphasis on repetition. They'd go on to make much better albums, honing their stoned psyche sound on The Perfect Prescription and the blissed out revolutionary texts of Playing With Fire. That's not to say that the Sound Of Confusion isn't good, it just doesn't sound confident or finished. 

On this song, album closer OD Catastrophe, the four members of Spacemen 3 find inspiration in TV Eye (a Stooges Funhouse classic) and having found a two note riff they like, that's fun to play and to listen to, they lock in and bludgeon it. For nearly nine minutes. 

OD Catastrophe

3 comments:

The Swede said...

I woke with a bit of a thick head this morning, but following two jugs of coffee soundtracked by this wonderous cacophony - lo, I am cured!

Swiss Adam said...

The soothing power of caffeine and Spacemen 3.

Artog said...

I was listening to some audio from the Martian rover the other day, and there was a bit that sounded just like the noises at the beginning of Losing Touch with my Mind.