Primal Scream

Glasgow to Creation

Primal Scream began in Glasgow as a project of two schoolfriends, singer Bobby Gillespie and guitarist Jim Beattie. They took the name from a line in the title track of the Fall's Live at the Witch Trials. Gillespie had been in a punk band called the Drains with Alan McGee and a fifteen-year-old Andrew Innes. He also drummed for the Jesus and Mary Chain in the mid-1980s, and the Reid brothers eventually told him to choose between the two bands. He stayed with Primal Scream.

Their first single, All Fall Down, led to a deal with McGee's Creation label. Velocity Girl, the B-side of Crystal Crescent, appeared on the C86 compilation, a scene the band disliked. They moved to Elevation, McGee's Warner Bros. subsidiary, and abandoned four weeks of sessions with Stephen Street before making Sonic Flower Groove (1987) with Mayo Thompson. It cost 100,000 pounds and reached number 62 in the UK. Beattie then left, Innes and the rhythm section of Henry Olsen and Toby Tomanov arrived, and the sound turned harder and more rock-oriented. The self-titled album followed in 1989, with Martin Duffy on keyboards. NME called it confused and lacking in cohesion.

Screamadelica

McGee had introduced Gillespie to acid house in 1988. In 1990 the club DJ Andrew Weatherall, given the 1989 album by a press officer, remixed one of its ballads, and the result, Loaded, reached number 16 in the UK. Come Together reached number 26 the same year.

Screamadelica arrived in September 1991 and reached number 8. It mixed Weatherall's dance productions with rock and gospel numbers such as Movin' On Up, mixed by Jimmy Miller, who had produced the Rolling Stones. In 1992 it won the first Mercury Music Prize. Gillespie later said he had expected an underground record.

Movin' On Up led the Dixie-Narco EP in January 1992, which reached number 11 in the UK. Its other tracks included Carry Me Home, a Dennis Wilson song recorded at Ardent Studios in Memphis in November 1991.

Memphis and the rock years

In 1993 the band went to Ardent Studios in Memphis to work with producer Tom Dowd and the Muscle Shoals rhythm section. McGee thought the sessions too flat and the tracks were reworked, and the result, Give Out But Don't Give Up (1994), reached number 2 in the UK. Its first single, Rocks, reached number 7, but NME called the band dance traitors and several critics found the album derivative, and its roots-rock style was compared to the Rolling Stones. Their manager, Alex Nightingale, said the American tour supporting Depeche Mode was the closest they had come to splitting up. In 2018 the original Memphis mixes, found by Innes in his basement, were released.

Mani joined on bass in 1996. Vanishing Point (1997), made with Brendan Lynch and Weatherall at the band's own rehearsal rooms, produced Kowalski, a number 8 single, and a title track used in the film Trainspotting. In 1998 Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine joined for the If They Move, Kill 'Em EP. XTRMNTR (2000) reached number 3, with guests including the Chemical Brothers, Bernard Sumner and Shields, and Swastika Eyes reached number 22. It was the last full album released on Creation. Evil Heat (2002) and Dirty Hits (2003) followed. In 2005 their Glastonbury set was cut off after it overran.

Later work

Riot City Blues (2006), produced by Youth, reached number 5, as did its single Country Girl. Beautiful Future came in 2008. In 2010 the band played Screamadelica in full at Olympia in London with a gospel choir and horns, and toured it in the UK in 2011. Mani left that year to rejoin the Stone Roses, and Simone Butler became the full-time bassist in 2012.

More Light (2013), released on the band's own First International label, was produced by David Holmes, and Chaosmosis appeared in March 2016. A singles collection, Maximum Rock'n'Roll, came out in 2019. In 2022 the band sold half of its back catalogue to BMG, and Come Ahead, which grew from rhythm tracks sent by Holmes, was released on 8 November 2024. Weatherall died in February 2020, Denise Johnson the same year, and Martin Duffy in December 2022. Screamadelica appeared on a Royal Mail Classic Album Cover stamp in January 2010 and was reissued for its thirtieth anniversary in 2021. In 2023 the band began touring as a twelve-piece with members of the House Gospel Choir. Mani died in November 2025, and Phil Mossman took over the bass for a full performance of XTRMNTR at the Roundhouse in London on 8 December.