I was looking for something in my files and I ran across a whole bunch of other stuff that I think would be interesting to share. I decided to create a new category for this material called, “Dude, I Forgot About That!”
I will admit right here that this category is only a thin veneer for something other people might call “nostalgia,” but this stuff is too cool and too recent (relatively speaking) to fall under the “n” word. Plus, let’s face it: I don’t want to admit to being that old.
Glenn Miller is “nostalgia.” The Primitives are “Dude, I Forgot About That!”
The Primitives were a band from Coventry, England, that flashed across college and alternative radio stations in the late 1980s with a brand of jangly guitar-based pop that sounded like a cross between Blondie, The Ramones, and The Buzzcocks, with a dose of Beatles thrown in. Their trademark was a lot of ear-splitting buzzing guitars, a lot of drum bangin’, and really cool chick vocals on top– all smashed into 3-minute-and-under mini masterpieces.
The band at its peak consisted of Paul Court (guitar), Steve Dullaghan (bass), Tig Williams (drums), and a bleached-blonde lead vocalist named Tracy Tracy.
They released a couple of singles and EPs on their own before being signed to RCA in 1987. The album Lovely came out in 1988, and their first major hit, which you couldn’t get away from between late 1988 and early 1989, was called “Crash.” (This is the cover from their Japanese 3″ CD single. Maybe 3″ CDs would be an interesting topic for another “Dude..” entry.)
Now here’s a cool thing about the Internet. Go to this site, choose “Interact” and then go to MP3. Many of the band’s songs are right there, full versions, free for downloading. My suggestions are “Crash” (the Lovely version), “Dreamwalk Baby,” and “Stop Killing Me,” a really cool breakup song that carries the distinction of proving to me that you can blow out a set of headphones. Really nice ones, too.
Two of my favorite tracks, “Spacehead” and “Through The Flowers” are missing from the site, but they do appear on this collection. A recommended buy.
There was a remixed version of “Crash” on the Dumb and Dumber soundtrack, but whoever did it managed to pull any soul out of it, giving it a bad mid-1990s feel. Avoid that one.
The Primitives toured the world through 1991, including a double-bill with The Sugarcubes that I missed here in Chicago in March of ’90. (A lady I worked with saw the show and gushed about it for months. She did bring me a cool Sugarcubes pin, though.) They released a couple more albums, but by the early 1990s they were pretty much done with their mission.
It was sort of neat to start the 1980s with The Pretenders and Blondie and end the decade with The Primitives.
p.s. The reason I wrote this in the first place was because I ran across a press release from the band’s fan club, “Spacehead,” from 1989. They had some cool T-shirts for sale, too.
Lyrics for a couple of the songs are on the next page.

CRASH
(Court, Dullaghan, Tracy)
(here) you go, way too fast
don