kevin shields – Plain Or Pan

My Bloody Valentine are back on a brief tour and the reviews have been a wee bit mixed. Some people claim they can’t hear the vocals. Some people say the show they’ve attended is the best thing ever. Some people say the noisy bit in ‘You Made Me Realise’ isn’t noisy enough. Some people say the shows are too loud. Too loud! It’s My Bloody Valentine not James Blunt. Jeez. Lets hope they get some sort of new material together soon. It’s been too long. Anyway, until then…

In anticipation of their Barrowlands shows this Wednesday and Thursday I thought I’d post these obscurities and curios. First up, My Bloody Valentine do their version of Louis Armstrong’s ‘We Have All The Time In The World’. This is taken from a 1993 Island Records charity CD called ‘Peace Together’ which set out to get young people from both sides of the religious divide in Northern Ireland working together. There’s a fair amount of Irish artists on there (U2, Fatima Mansions, Therapy?, Sinead O’Connor etc etc, you know the rest) but the My Bloody Valentine track is easily the best thing on it. Hear for yourself.

In 1998, Kevin Shields produced a one-off, released-for-a-day-then-deleted Primal Scream single. ‘If They Move Kill ‘Em’ was taken from the ‘Vanishing Point’ album, but Shields buckled and bent and twisted and distorted it inside out. It sounds backwards in places, it sounds under water in other places, it sounds other-wordly in the rest of the places. It sounds as good as the cover (below) looks. It. Is. Fantastic. Even better, there are two mixes! The My Bloody Valentine Arkestra mix and the 12″ Disco MIx (my favourite – it has a bit in it that sounds an awful lot like Jimi Hendrix‘s ‘Crosstown Traffic’). The ep also featured 2 mixes of Primal Scream covering the Jesus & Mary Chain‘s ‘Darklands‘. What the hell – here’s Darklands and here’s Badlands. Happy listening.

‘If They Move Kill ‘Em’ sleeve

*Bonus Track. Andrew Weatherall‘s seminal, yes, seminal remix of MBV‘s ‘Soon‘. It’s My Bloody Valentine, but you can dance to it! It’s a belter! If you’re reading Mr Shields, many of us would like a new album or single or chord or anything.