Primal Scream

Primal Scream’s sixth studio album is an angry, cathartic piece of work. Early reports about Exterminator hinted that they were attempting to return to the sounds of Screamadelica, the album that garnered them immense praise, and saw them team up with the likes of Andrew Weatherall and the Orb. The “dance” presence is definitely here, with mixing handled in part by David Holmes, the Automator, the Chemical Brothers, and Screamadelica engineer Hugo Nicholson. Sonically speaking, however, this album bears almost no resemblance to it, with the exception of “Keep Your Dreams”. No, this is a dirty, aggressive audio assault, bringing distortion, noise, and crunchy beats in line with frustrated, bitter lyrics about the degradation of the world we live in. Gone are the happy-go-lucky days of 1987’s Sonic Flower Groove or the liquor-fuelled rock’n’roll of 1994’sGive Out But Don’t Give Up. Unfortunately, the album as a whole comes across as messy. There are some interesting moments — the raw acid energy of “Kill All Hippies,” the driving rock of “Shoot Speed Kill Light,” or the throbbing “Swastika Eyes,” which makes an unnecessary double appearance. What could have been a great album only works when accompanied by a foul mood.