Customer Reviews

Xtrmntr

5 star:		(40)
4 star:		(17)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Yeah, it's full of processed sounds, production, and sampled beats, but this is, in both sound and mentality, a full-on rock and protest album. Every moment of this album is harsh and abrasive, and all the more enjoyable for it. It's like one strong tow-line that drags you along at its end. "Kill All Hippies'" driving beat and heavy bass will draw you in from the get-go, and pulls you through the white fire of "Accelerator," the pulsing rhythm of "Swastika Eyes," the crunchy beats of "MBV Arkestra," all the way to the final fuzzed-out blasts of "I'm 5 Years Ahead of My Time." Rarely in this decade have we heard music so alive, so angry, and so caustic. Not even Nirvana's music had such a unifying sense to back it. This kind of music will make you happy to be alive, to be able to raise your voice and make it be heard, to be able to take action. Turn on, tune in, rock out.

I haven't heard any other primal scream albums, although from what I understand this album is pretty unlike their previous material, which is unfortunate because this album is very good. Indeed, this one of few wholly integrated rock/electronic bands I've heard that pulls the trick off well (Cornelius is the only other one that comes immediately to mind). There are electronic bands that use rock moves (Chemical Brothers); there are rock bands that pretend to be electronic by throwing in burbly synth noises. But Primal Scream have created an album that rocks, which you can dance to at the same time. This is more difficult than it sounds. It helps that they're all over the map on this one: Kevin Shields (formerly of my bloody valentine) adds production to accelerator that makes the song sound, unsurprisingly, like a my bloody valentine song (albeit faster & angrier). This is a good thing. Shields also contributes to the aptly-titled MBV Arkestra, a very impressive dance rave-up complete with horns and random swirling noises. There's also neo-hip-hop sounds here (Pills, aided by the Automator's fine production); big beat (kill all hippies), and other meldings of electronic moves into rock stylings. Primal Scream have also generously included two entertaining versions of the song Swastika Eyes: the first version melds a satisfying electro riff with impassioned vocals, while the second version is a remix by the Chemical Brothers that sounds like a Chemical Brothers song; imagine that. One other thing to note is that the track listing on Amazon is wrong: the listing above is the track listing for the uk version of the record, but the American version of this album also contains the bonus track "I'm 5 years ahead of my time." Unfortunately, I bought the import version of this album a couple of months ago, so I'm missing that track. In fact, I'm seriously considering buying the album a second time to get that song. Yes, the album is that good: hype is rarely dead on (remember the Beta Band?) but in this case, I'd say you can believe the hype.

The year was 1991, the location was Britain, and the bands were Primal Scream and MBV amongst many other marvelous bands. Primal Scream released their `Screamadelica', MBV released their `Loveless', being the best two albums in 1991 and two of the best albums in the 90s, both of them immediately became touchstones for any album that was going to come. The latter is still unparalleled and without a follow-up while the band that made the former became one of the most influential bands in the last decade, whose names, together with Massive Attack and Radiohead, are representative of the entire decade, not even names like Oasis and Manic Street Preacher came close to. It looked like a battle between MBV and Primal Scream at that time, a competition for the album of the year. We also saw strong contenders like Nirvana's `Nevermind' and Massive Attack's `Blue Lines'. At last, quite a number of albums released that year became classics, I mean real classics. Then which album is the album of 1991? To me the answer is still MBV's `Loveless', which eventually became my album of last decade. Why do I have to talk about history? Consider this: `Xtrmntr' is released at the dawn of year 2000, a new millennium, the location is Britain, where some of the best music was made in the last decade, the band is Primal Scream, together with a whole team of veterans, including MBV's brain Kevin Shields, David Holmes, who is arguably one of the best DJs in terms of creating innovative sound consistently (just listen to his latest album `Bow Down...'), Dan the Automator was one of the most important figures in the hip-hop world...and many others, you might call this a collaboration between all the talents. The impact of this album is still unknown, but I have to tell you, this is going to be another benchmark album. Well, instead of calling this a collaboration effort, I call it a battle, collaboration is just the form of this battle, a battle that decides who is creating the best NOW. Just listen to the first track, `Kill All Hippies', the lyrics goes something like this:' You Got the Money, I Got the Soul', another battle? A battle against consumerism? A hate letter to the commercialized world? Definitely! The second track comes in, the abrasive guitar is typical of Kevin Shields, Bobby's vocal is angrier than ever, now he really is waging a war against consumerism, "Come On, Come On". Yes, it must be a hate letter then! The title track `Exterminator' is semi-industrial, an ominous track which talks about the devastating effect of our modern technology and again...consumerism. `Swastika Eyes' is simply the most danceable track here, the effect is immediate, ultra-dynamic, it feels like a roller coaster the sound brings up you to the sky, then it makes you fall down, then bring you up again. If you are into stuff like Chemical Brothers, you will definitely find yourself in love with this in no time, despite the fact that the original version of the song is better than the Chemical Brothers' remix version. `Pills' is angry, abrasive and vulgar, a song will make DJs who play it lose their jobs. `Blood Money' is an instrumental track, produced by David Holmes, it is long, complex and hypnotic. My favorite track on the album, it might not be extremely catchy at first listen, but dedicate some time and patience to it, and you will love this. `Keep Your Dreams' is probably the last part of the `Star' trilogy which starts with `Shine Like Star', followed by `Star', now the trilogy ends with `Keep Your Dreams'. Dreamy, comfortable and...politically correct, this is obviously the most easy-listening track on this horrendously noisy album. `Insect Royalty' should have replaced `Soul Auctioneer' on Death In Vega's `The Contino Session' album, a track that Death In Vegas are too bloody-minded to make. `MBV Arkestra' , the MBV remix of `If They Move, Kill Them' is simply the centerpiece of this album, yes, you didn't get it wrong. I know the original version appeared on `Vanishing Point', it is a great song , but this remix typifies the sentiment of this album: A BATTLE. What Kevin Shields did was to lock the Primal Scream sound into an forbidding cage of hardened steel, the tiger struggles to go out, he tried everything, from attempting to destroy the cage to roaring, but everything he did was in vain, finally, he succumbed... What appeared on `Loveless' as the transparent curtain of gold leaf has eventually become a steel cage here, clearly, this sounds more like Jeuse&Mary Chain than MBV in 1991. Does this mean that the line between shoegazer noise pop and rock is not so clearly drawn? `Shoot Speed-Kill Light' is the finale of the war-like symphony, providing an impractical and extremely idealistic `solution' to the problem: fly away. The idea sounds a wee bit like what `OK Computer' was trying to say. The song, with Bernard Summer playing guitar like he has abstained himself from playing it for ages and Bobby crooning in great frustration like he has all the anger and angst in the world, is a fantastic way of ending the battle, though idealist. To sum it all up, this album is momentous, it signifies the death of Britpop, also this marks the beginning of a new era in rock, the form may differ, but the core remains unchanged. If rock music has to progress, it has to depend external forces, yes, other forms to music, I am sure that electronica will be a huge influence on the Rock `N Roll in the next century. The future is not bleak if we are not dumb enough to believe the words of some `rock purists', the future is not bleak if we don't always stick to our lame old ways, the future is not bleak if we try hard enough.

Primal Scream.....Okay, the band may not sound familuar to all of us Americans out there, but in Britain, this band is a zenith in the present scene. Besides acts like Radiohead and Travis that get much radio and magazine time on both sides of the Atlantic, this band has yet to cross-over to our East Coast shores, and believe me, when it does come on some future date, it'll probably be a massed invasion ready to destroy everything in its path.

That's exactly what Bobby Gillespie wants--destroy the over-confident, over-rich, glubbed capitalist Yankees. But for a group of this caliber to be speaking on such a shouting social movement would of been unimaginable 10 years ago. Back in the early 1990s, when the rave and house scene were sweeping Europe and the UK by storm, Primal Scream, as well as fellow acts like the Stone Roses, Erasure, etc...were one of the first acts to jump into that bandwagon, ready to be at all-night raves, smoke hard, drink hard, take E seductively. Then it was hedonism, pure free love; songs like "Slip Inside This House" and "Don't Fight It, Feel It," gave off that giant-smile faced European house beat where everyone feels in love.

Times have changed.

Instead of remaining in that clubby clique, they have evolved into a ferocious monster that will eat anyone in a gulp. With enough bite and political terrorism, we now have a new, (although-slightly techno)enhanced band that should be the trans-Atlantic cousins of Rage Against the Machine. Not only their lyrics have changed, but also their sound. With the introduction of Manny (from their old rave cousins, the Stone Roses) they have successfully moved away from the sound of the club to the sound of war, and have appropriately named the album "Xtrmntr."

"Xtrmntr" starts with "Kill All Hippies," beginning with a muffled sound of a little child, speaking over a communications radio, claiming, "Destroy, kill all hippies. Anarchy. Disco Sucks." A steady drum beat sets in, setting the tempo of the album, stacked with looping guitars, computer bleeps and whines, and Gillespie's soulful voice, decreeing, "You got the money/I got the soul." The song slowly morphs out into crunching silence; the child over the communications radio goes silent.

But the album explodes like a fireball instananeously in the next song, "Accelerator," abrasive guitars thanks to Kevin Shields (ex-My Bloody Valentine) fill the air so violently that you have to turn the volume down to keep sanity still in control. Gillespie continues to take no prisoners, screaming "Come on! COME ON!!!!" in the background, like a battlecry for frightened listeners.

That tempo is continued in the next track, "Exterminator," perhaps the best song on the album, and truly addicting to listen to. "Exterminator"'s thumping marching beat and abrasive guitar define Primal Scream's evolution from rave to revolutionary industrial. "Gun metal skies/Broken eyes/Claustrophobic concrete English high-rise/ EXTERMINATE the underclass/EXTERMINATE the telepaths...No Civil Disobedience," goes Gillespie to its hypnotic beat and guitar. (I remember they played this song before NIN took the stage in San Francisco during the Fragility Tour, and all the people were nodding their heads to it, wondering who the hell was this).

It's safe to say that these guys don't like the way the world is run, espeically by the West. Much like the symbolism that Rage had when they were still together, "Xtrmntr"'s art work is basically a damming look at what Primal Scream feels to be American Imperialism--fighter jets and helicopters--all ready to attack, ready to take over. "Swastika Eyes," mixed my DJ Jagz Kooner is an intense bout of house beats mixed with industrial guitars (one can't help start to notice the major "industrial" influence on this album). It's dancable and utterly political, "The illusion of democracy," cries Gillespie at America, noting its military and corporations as the world's new fascist elite.

Eat your heart out, George W Bush!!!

The album slides into into hip-hop briefly with "Pills," with help from Dan the Automator (Handsome Boy Modeling School) joining this frenzy. Gillespie sings briefly about how un-true people have become before he ends the song by shouting "Fuck, Fuck, Fuck, Fuck, Sick, Sick...." no less that 40 times, before descending into the pure acid jazz of "Blood Money."

Throughout the rest of this album, Primal Scream refuse to let up their unrelenting assault on the listener. They briefly give up their revolutionary zeal in "Keep Your Dreams," but before it becomes too peaceful, the song decends back into their fire with "Insect Royalty," a stab at the British monarchy and how they still to this day don't pay taxes for the State.

By all means, this album is an extremly schizophrenic listening, and should be taken causiosly at first for its assaults. Once you understand it's meaning, you realize many of the truths and contradictions Primal Scream hold in their philosophy. And like Radiohead's recent "Kid A," this is a dense album to explore, although maybe more accessible than the latter. Yet unlike "Kid A"'s sense of quiet decay, "Xtrmntr" is on fire and hard to touch without putting mittens on. It doesn't suprise me one bit that Spin has named this one of the best albums of 2000, and a must for any lover of the alternative scene truly looking for an "alternative."

buy this, tape it, put on headphones and then go throw rocks at the bank.

God it's been a long wait this,but finally Primal Scream have managed to make a really good follow up to Screamadelica.And boy this is some follow up.Firstly it's very different to the previously mentioned album-it's dark,confrontational,noisy and it will exhilerate every listener!

On this c.d. they have enlisted the help of many well known figures in the music scene over here.Kevin Shields-ex My Bloody Valentine,Bernard Sumner,The Chemical Brother's and of course David Holmes to name but a few.To me though the star of the c.d. is ex Stone Roses bass player,Mani.This is the best album of bass playing I've heard in years.

Right from the start this c.d. utters the words "aggression" and "destroy" and this is musically what this c.d. does.Never going slower then 100 m.p.h. the first song "Kill All Hippies" sets this c.d. in motion.It isn't dance music like we used to know it.There is no huge over-dub.Musically it's so similar to the c.d.'s by Death In Vegas and David Holmes himself.The rhythm is positively vibrating,the bass throbs out a fast,furious and heavy beat.The synths are noisy,distorted,full of swirling effects and sound very like The Chemical Brother's.The guitars are full of distorted and again noisy feedback.Bobby Gillespie's vocals have never been that great in my opinion but on this c.d. he sounds excellent and perfectly suited as a backdrop to all the music going on around him.That's the beauty of this c.d.-they haven't stripped the music down to simple bare bones,there is always something or some new sound to focus on and listen to.This c.d. is just never boring and it's longevity is also another reason why I would recommend people to purchase it.I've had this c.d. for nearly a year now and it still sounds as good to me now as the day I bought it.

It is virtually impossible to single out any track here.The album is best suited to one continuous playing.That's probably why most of the singles from it bombed and also why it's received such poor radio coverage.Both versions of "Swastika Eyes" are about the most radio friendly this gets and they are both suitably different to be included twice.Track 6;"Blood Money" has a touch of Orbital's The Box,with a little more guitar though.I also like the track "Keep Your Dreams" as it differs in tempo,volume and mood.It's quite atmostpheric and full of vast synth chords.This also gives you a vital rest before track 9 "mbv arkestra" which is a near 7 minutes that will test out your ear drums to the max.At first I thought it was just hopeless noise,but once you give this track a chance you find yourself trying to imagine what are the sounds so heavily disguised by Kevin Shield's mixing.

This is a loud and yet always interesting c.d.It will be a challenge to many listeners as it was to myself-you could not really describe this as easy listening.If you give it a chance though,the rewards are spellbindingly brilliant!

Everyone puts 1991's "sceamadelica" on every "classics" list but this 2000 release surpasses it with all the style. Theres no trace of the band who recorded the lame "give out but dont give up", its almost as if they pick again their dance-rock combo from screamadelica and infused it with a dark, punk-angry attitude, and the result was a total bomb! So say goodbye to the rolling stones impressonators...
Try to imagine the stooges, my bloody valentine and new order all mixed up on a car crash and you get a somewhat vague clue of this record, this is the kind of sound that puts itself on the border between masterpiece and pointless annoying noise, and eventually falls on the right side of the fence. Its the kind of music suited for our era, noisy, agressive and explosive, everything orks fine in here, even bobby gillespie's rapping on "pills"! No weird sound turns to be superfluous in the songs, theyre all necessary to their structure, as weird as cut-up as it may sound on a first listening. So, if you liked the give out but dont give up-period primal scream, keep away from this record, this is the punk rock version of scremadelica. Some of the lyrics may sound a bit clicheed but they suit the sound like a glove, mr gillespie isnt reaching for no gospel "movin on up" kind of thing, this is the dark and dirty side.

And, Kasabian, i bet you guys loved to be Primal Scream...but you cant.

Lets face it, aggression in music has somewhat disintergrated during the last 10 years. The last time it took it's course, albeit in a very effective way, was with grunge. New punk was a joke, rock n' rolls revival sounded dull and ploddy, and any attempts made by electronic artists to mix the former 2 together with techno sounded miserably contrived. Wonder why most guitar bands these days only ever write ballads? Wonder why the charts mostly contain manufactured music of the most mundane kind? Wonder why trite music like Limp Bizkit and Lincoln Park are only ever appreciated by the most bubbly brained skater/adolescent, and you'll pretty much realise why aggression in music is so ardently avoided. A renaissance of this kind of music has never been more vital.

Aggression in music is more important that you can possibly imagine. You don't want to sit around all day listening to ballad bands like Travis and manufactured pap like Britney, you need something to hype you up, some form of release. So who would have guessed that Primal Scream, of all bands, who started off as a wimpy indie band, who made the feel good classic Screamedelica, would be the ones to nail it? Not me, thats for sure.

Primal Scream's XTRMNTR is aggressive music reinvented for the new ages. It mixes elements of rock n roll, hip hop, heavy dance, free form jazz, punk and well, Primal Scream, all in the best possible way.

DESCRIPTION OF ALL TRACKS:
Opener 1. Kill All Hippies is loud, kind of funky, and like many tracks on here, you can only sense and feel the aggression, it's quite subtle.
It follows with 2. Accelerator, and here you most certainly CAN hear the aggression, this is one hell of a startling track. Layers of guitars pile on top of one another, an aeroplane sounds like it's gonna take off in the studio, some whirling sound effects, bobby yells COME ON! Quite an amazing song, its one of the heaviest on here, and also one of the heaviest and inventive songs I've heard in a long while.
3. Exterminator follows, another track that, like kill all hippies, is quietly aggressive, with its fuzz bass and synth noises, random guitar playing, unpredictable shifts in tone, it creeps up on you and becomes an album highlight. It also becomes apparent that nothing like it has never been recorded.
4. Swastika Eyes, version 1, is adrenaline in it's most purist form, it comes off as a cross between Prodigys Firestarter and something by Underworld, but Primal Scream make it their own.
5. Pills follows, and sounds cheesy at first with it's old school hip hop theme, but what elevates this is Bobbys rant, which is about anyone trying to hog the lime light who is a complete fake (almost everyone these days).
6. Blood Money, whoa, mad free form jazz and punk, eery xylophones, the fastest drumming I've heard in a while, random screaming, very hard, angry, scary even.
Then 7. Keep Your Dreams, the albums only ballad, a little dull at first, but great lyrics about avoiding the pressure in life to stop you, from, well, keeping your dreams, makes it clear what the albums concept is about.
8. Insect Royalty is what follows, and the worst track here, it's remniscent of early 90's baggy, sounds only a little aggressive with its pounding drums, but is a track your most likely to skip past.
9. MBV Arkestra comes next, perhaps the maddest single piece of music I've ever heard, it starts of kind of exotic and nice, but climaxes with whiter than white noise, and will certainly test your ear drums.
Next we get 10. Swastika Eyes remixed by the Chemical Brothers, very dancy, funky and loud, it's hard to distinguish if it's better than the first version, as both are excellent, but just different.
The albums awesome finale, 11. Shoot Speed Kill Light, is very very heavy psyechedelic, a pounding bass enters the frame, Bobby sounds all dalek like when he mutters shoot speed kill light, then when the track finally climaxes, you could have sworn you were having an out of body experience, it's mind blowing. The perfect track to subside the prevailing madness, and let it drift away from your conciousness (until you play the album from the start again).

XTRMNTR is one of the most (effectively) vitriolic albums released in a long, long time. Primal Scream have revitalised angry music, made some important points about the current state of (British) politics, rocked real hard in the process, and have managed to avoid every cliche in the book. There is not a single track that feels contrived, nothing that doesn't sound inventive, and certainly nothing that wouldn't make an impact on the more open minded, chart hating, cliche detesting music listener. If you appreciate music that steers clear of these things in music, and miss hard rock music with an inventive spin, buy this now. If you don't, go listen to Travis, Britney, Oasis, Limp Bizkit, whatever.

This album is stunning- an absolutely "important" work and their best ever. The album has such a unique, dynamic sound, as striking as My Bloody Valentine (whose Kevin Shields' drops his brillience on two of Extrmintr's songs). Primal is angry, beautiful and brillient. From the opening sample to the trandescent Shoot Speed/Kill Light (the actual last track is a fun cover of a cool late 60's era psychedelic song)this album exudes pure power. While it's pretty much all "electronic", for me this is a classic rock n' roll. Buy this, you really should.

this is something everyone tried to do and they found the best way to do it. still better than anything else available out there. just amazing.