"Taking drugs to make music to take drugs to"
was how Rugby's Spacemen 3 famously described their modus operandi. Indeed,
their music referenced all of the greatest psychedelic moments in rock
history, from narcotic blues through MC5-styled sonic attack and yet managed
to sound like no-one else before or since. The group was formed by Jason
Pierce, who went on to found Spiritualized, and Peter Kember, aka Sonic
Boom. Perfect Prescription was their second album and when it came out
on Glass in 1987 nobody really paid it any attention. Anyone who remembers
the UK music scene of the mid-1980s will recall what a resolutely un-rocking
time it was, and the very thought of gargantuan feedback laden riffs was
just too greasy for your average consumer. Yet, from this distance Perfect
Prescription sounds absolutely classic. Walkin' With Jesus is one of the
most ecstatic drug songs ever, with two chords beautifully sounding the
way to nirvana. It fades into Ode To Street Hassle, a lush string-driven
homage to Lou Reed before ascending into the heavenly orchestras of Transparent
Radiation. The second side is earthier, all detuned blues and alien riffs,
but every bit as psychoactively stimulating. They made another couple
of albums after this but the two collaborators were becoming increasingly
distant, at the end working separately on their songs like Lennon and
McCartney. They've both gone on to do great things but they've never yet
come close to replicating this kind of magic
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