In 2008, Primal Scream promo’d their new album, Beautiful Future, with an Andrew Weatherall remix of the song, Uptown (1). Lyrically concerned with dead ends kids, whose only escape from 9 to 5 drudgery, is partying, pills, and powders, this was The Scream’s equivalent of Flowered Up’s Weekender. Though far more sympathetic toward its protagonist.

I’d been a Weatherall groupie during the early 1990s. However, by the end of the decade I’d deliberately distanced myself, since following the DJ around had played a significant part in my downfall, a near death experience (2), and an extended stay in hospital. Weatherall, of course, wasn’t to blame, but as I attempted to start again, I stopped going out, quit my job, quit my flat, quit my girl, and sold every record I’d bought between 1992 and `94 (3). I was still watching, and listening from afar, but I wasn’t gonna get involved. To be honest, his coked-up turn-of-the-millennium electro left me cold, and I couldn’t get with the vocals on Two Lone Swordsmen’s rockabilly referencing, Double Gone Chapel (4).

Weatherall’s Long After The Disco Is Over lick of Uptown wasn’t quite a return to the E’d up, crossfader crazy crusader of old, but it was eclectic, accessible, and practically pop compared to what he’d been up to in the previous years. With its roots in the post-punk funk that Weatherall had compiled on his Nuphonic Records collection, Nine O’Clock Drop, it boasted a whacking great dub, Jah Wobble-esque bass line, melodica, and flickering, fractured metallic guitar. There was a whistling synth riff, that seemed like a reprise of The Primal’s Don’t Fight It, Feel It, and the arrangement was a definite nod to the ecstatic stuff that he’d made with Hugo Nicolson, nearly two decades before. Re-tracing the tried and tested template of slowly building up, layer by layer, breaking down, and then coming back with a bang, and something extra. In this case, the something extra was epic orchestral strings.

This rework of Uptown was an unapologetic rush, and the first thing of Weatherall’s in a long, long while that made me want to run to the shops, immediately, and buy a copy (5). It had my interest completely re-piqued, and the floodgates to fanboy-dom were, once again, flung wide open (6).

The Weatherall remix of Primal Scream’s Uptown is arguably largest licensing coup on Colleen “Cosmo” Murphy’s latest Balearic Breakfast compilation, Volume 3, which I think is the best instalment so far. Uptown on vinyl might be the album’s biggest draw, but there’s plenty of other great stuff too. By no means is it the only classic included.

Jonathan Wilson’s Desert Raven is sprawling, psychedelic, soft rocking, cosmic Americana, that the DJHistory.com forum went absolutely nuts about when it was first released. I don’t remember who unearthed Quintus Project’s Night Flight, but I heard it on a Moonboots mix. I do remember hassling him for an ID. Folks were fighting over copies, until it was quickly reissued with an expertly executed Lexx edit. Moonboots also turned Shawn Lee’s San Diego into an anthem at he and Jason Boardman’s Aficionado dos. Phil Mison remixed it, for a 12 on their now sadly defunct label, and it’s Phil’s version that Colleen has gone for here.

Colleen has also collected a couple of her own “Cosmodelica” remixes – those of Jacob Gurevitsch and David Holmes (7) – and a Prins Thomas take on Heavenly Recordings label mates, Mildlife. Pigeon’s Infinity and Shunt Voltage’s Generator are both A Love From Outer Space-esque mid-tempo, druggy electronic chuggers. The former features a Middle Eastern melody, conjuring an air of seductive mystery, while the latter rattles, clanks, almost industrial, and squelches, sorta acidic. Zero 7’s On My Own sounds, to me, like the perfectly produced, disco-derived pop that David Mancuso might have played at his legendary Loft parties (8). Highly detailed and constantly evolving, its hooks pay homage to Chicago house and Marshall Jefferson. Whispering, “Move Your Body”, in yer ear.

Colleen “Cosmo” Murphy’s  Balearic Breakfast Volume 3 is out now, on Heavenly Recordings.

NOTES
(1) This promo was a magical bit of Machiavellian marketing, since you could only purchase  the Weatherall remix if you splashed out on the vinyl box set. The mix has remained unavailable digitally, although it has appeared on a couple of comps – namely Ministry Of Sound’s Masterpiece, and now Colleen’s new one. That said the band did try to compensate by selling a white label 12 to fans at gigs.
(2) I have had a few of these now.
(3) I must be on the mend, as I’ve recently started buying them back.
(4) It has to be said that Weatherall’s cover, as part of The Asphodells, of A.R. Kane’s A Love From Outer Space is now incredibly poignant.
(5) I, of course, ordered the box set, but an old mate from Streatham’s Inner Rhythm Records, Paul, who I think still trades under the name “Balearic Soul”, also bagged me a white label to DJ with.
(6) The Uptown remix was the highlight of Weatherall’s somewhat short-lived studio partnership with Steve Boardman. A creative collaboration that began in 2006, with The Bullet Catchers Apprentice and took in work with Siouxsie Sue, Fuck Buttons, Doves, and Battant, plus Weatherall’s A Pox On The Pioneers and Two Lone Swordsmen’s Wrong Meetings I & II. The pair also penned the song, I Laugh Myself To Sleep, which David Holmes recently covered.
(7) “Cosmodelica” is a reference to Colleen’s long running radio show of the same name, itself an homage to Primal Scream’s Screamadelica.
(8) Mancuso definitely played Weatherall’s remix of Uptown.