Primal Scream - Screamadelica [180g, Gatefold] (2LP) Vinyl

Screamadelica is the third studio album by the Scottish band Primal Scream, first released on 23 September 1991 by Creation Records. It followed Sonic Flower Groove (1987) and Primal Scream (1989), and marked a decisive break from the group's early indie rock sound towards the house and acid house music then emerging in British clubs.

The Album

Much of the record was produced by the acid house DJ Andrew Weatherall with engineer Hugo Nicolson, who remixed and rearranged the band's original recordings into dance tracks; further production came from The Orb, Hypnotone and Jimmy Miller. The band was Bobby Gillespie on lead vocals, Andrew Innes and Robert Young on guitars, Martin Duffy on keyboards, Henry Olsen on bass and Phillip "Toby" Tomanov on drums, with Denise Johnson singing lead on "Don't Fight It, Feel It" and Jah Wobble playing bass on the dub version of "Higher Than The Sun". Weatherall's first contribution to the band was "Loaded", a reworking of the earlier Primal Scream song "I'm Losing More Than I'll Ever Have" that added a drum loop taken from an Italian bootleg mix of Edie Brickell's "What I Am", together with a spoken sample from the Peter Fonda film The Wild Angels. "Slip Inside This House" is a cover of the 13th Floor Elevators song written by Roky Erickson and Tommy Hall.

Artwork

The sun face on the sleeve was painted by Creation Records' in-house artist Paul Cannell, who took his inspiration from a damp water spot on the ceiling of the Creation offices. In January 2010 the Royal Mail chose the cover as one of ten designs for its Classic Album Covers set of postage stamps.

Reception

Screamadelica reached number 8 on the UK Albums Chart and was the band's first commercial success, later certified Platinum by the British Phonographic Industry. It won the first Mercury Music Prize in 1992 and was named album of the year for 1991 by both Melody Maker and Select, with NME placing it third in its own list for that year. Select went on to name it the number one album of the 1990s, Q ranked it 18th in its 100 Greatest British Albums, and Rolling Stone placed it at number 437 in the 2020 revision of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. The album has sold over three million copies worldwide.

This Pressing

This is the 2015 Sony Music reissue, catalogue number 88875138721, on two 180 gram black vinyl LPs cut at 33 1/3 rpm in stereo and made in the EU. The pressing was sourced from the stampers of the original 1991 edition. It is issued in a gatefold sleeve, the inner spread carrying a live photograph of the band, with the rear sleeve printed in red and blue to match Paul Cannell's cover. This is the standard black vinyl edition; it is not the 20th anniversary collector's edition, the picture disc, or any of the coloured vinyl variants.

Tracklist

Side A

1. Movin' On Up
2. Slip Inside This House
3. Don't Fight It, Feel It

Side B

1. Higher Than The Sun
2. Inner Flight
3. Come Together

Side C

1. Loaded
2. Damaged
3. I'm Comin' Down

Side D

1. Higher Than The Sun (A Dub Symphony In Two Parts)
2. Shine Like Stars