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- They Removed All Trace That Anything Had Ever Happened Here
- Enemy of Time
- This is What We Do to Sell Out(s)
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This EP surfaces a whole 20 years after the last full album from this Coventry, UK-based quartet. These four songs are short enough to grace a 7" and the songs are of the same caliber of what made the group so popular 25 years ago. It's a brief teaser/taster of hopefully more punchy, catchy, sugar-coated pop to come.
An uncountable amount of British pop bands seem to have followed the same exact trajectory: become media darlings with a few singles; release an album; tour the world; release a second album; implode. The Primitives made waves worldwide with their first two albums, Lovely and Pure, and, like other contemporaries, their third album was such a commercial flop that their bloated record labels found it unnecessary to release overseas. Record labels blame artists for going over budget, biographers and artists blame fickle critics, but in reality, if the magic simply isn't there, bands can't continue very well. There wasn't a lot of magic in Galore, Primitives 1991 album: it didn't command attention like songs like "Crash" or "Way Behind Me" did on previous albums.
Never Kill a Secret thankfully doesn't "pick up where they left off," it's a return to the infectious jangly rock the band were quite good at for their first two albums. Whether the modern media outlets catch on to these pop gems seems unnecessary as it sounds like the Primitives are enjoying themselves.
"Rattle My Cage" is clearly the hit song despite not being the title track. It launches the EP with a pounding rhythm, is met with a bopping riff, and Tracy Tracy's voice sounds unchanged from when I first heard them. To me it's a success as it's hard not to sing along with the chorus by the second time it comes around and long after it's over it's still circling around in my head. This isn't a deep thought, a political statement, nor a comment on the mess the world has become (news flash: the world was a mess in the '80s too), it's not mopey or gloomy, it's a 3.5 minute slice of fun. Go ahead, watch the video and try not to crack a smile.
Side A ends with the Lee Hazlewood composition (recorded by Suzi Jane Hokom) "Need All the Help I Can Get," a fierce '60s girl pop should-have-been anthem. Side B opens with the fun-in-the-sun title track, and while it's not a bad song, it's dangerously close to that cheese border. Tracy Tracy's voice is so captivating and warm on this song that it's all too easy to forgive them. Despite being the title song, it's certainly not the hit of the EP, and I can visualize this song triggering a beer/bathroom break at their live shows. Like side A, side B ends with a cover, "Breakaway," originally by Toni Basil (yes she recorded more than 1 song), and like most of the Primitives best songs, it's a throwback to the sassy side of the '60s girl group sound.
Knowing the currently popular music trends I'm having a tough time believing that The Primitives will gain new audiences, despite them sounding (and remarkably looking) just as fresh as they did 25 years ago. I hate to see them making the rounds as a "retro" touring act but unfortunately that's what they will most likely have to keep doing in order to build momentum again. I wouldn't miss the show, however, if it ever comes close.
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Cold Cave's embarrassing attempt at crossover success opens with "The Great Pan Is Dead," a dull, emotionally overwrought synth-rocker slathered in Wes Eisold's affected, fake British accent (he's from Boston) that sounds like a nu-goth approximation of the Killers. Cold Cave may be aiming to win over the synth-pop revival crowd, but the Killers are more popular than Cold Cave (and headlining sold-out arenas) for one simple reason—they write better tunes.
I wouldn't bother to complain about Cherish the Light Years, Cold Cave's second album, if I had not expected more from the band. I fell in love two years ago with Cremations, a collection of abrasive, lo-fi noise-pop sketches, demos and live tracks that was given wide release on Hospital Recordings (run by Prurient's Dominick Fernow, who also plays in Cold Cave). Cremations remains their most rewarding work—they signed to Matador soon after the initial release of Love Comes Close, their first full-length, which cranked down the volume and shone light on their '80s new wave influences. It was a risky move, but Cold Cave smartly balanced the noise and pop halves of their sound, and Love Comes Close was on target more often than it missed.
To be clear, I have no issue with a band recognizing its popular appeal and tailoring its material to commercial audiences. In fact, it can be a smart move for a band making appealing music to focus on its pop smarts and expand its fan base; it's been done well by too many synth-pop bands to count over the past 30 years. The trouble is that to succeed, a band needs to have great songs, not just reference sounds that are currently in vogue (or "influences," as bands typically call them).
On Cherish the Light Years, Cold Cave's Xerox machine is in good working order. They lean heavily on New Order and Depeche Mode blueprints, shitting out synth presets and clunky melodies at every turn, but their songs are nowhere close to as smart or creative. These songs are faceless, lacking a sense of personality, and hardly original; they would sound at home if played by any '80s revivalist act on the indie circuit. Granted, the album is essentially focus-grouped to reach fans of such music—its best song, "Confetti," is the aural equivalent of the band crossing its fingers for a FADER Magazine cover story—but will alienate fans of Cold Cave's previous work as a result.
As icing on the cake, the mastering job on Cherish the Light Years is beyond horrific—all traces of sonic detail squashed together in the mix, equalized and compressed to infinity; everything pushed completely into the red for maximum impact at radio. Cold Cave's album is as much a victim of the last decade's loudness war as, say, Britney Spears' latest will be (the difference being that Britney will actually get radio play, so has a better excuse for botched mastering). All said, Cherish the Light Years reminds me how disappointing it can be hearing a once capable band make a bid for crossover stardom without writing a proper batch of songs first.
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