spacemen 3 | bands i wish i'd seen live pt 1

when you're living in a fairly small city like bath, the kind of place that very few bands bother to visit, you get used to missing out on seeing good bands. especially if you're too lazy to get the train to bristol. so in my teenage years i spent a lot of time looking longingly at the gigs section of nme or melody maker (and frequently both), full in the knowledge that i didn't have a hope in hell of going to any of them. hence the title of a new series, possibly of just one entry, but who knows.

it was quite obvious to us from spacemen 3's records that their live "show" would be legendary. to be honest we didn't know that much about the band, except their names were sonic boom (best cheekbones in the biz), j. spaceman and the bassman, but that didn't stop us from discussing them in thrilled tones. everything about them suggested to impressionable, closeted teenagers this trippy, dangerous rock n roll mystique involving lots of acid, dry ice, sunglasses and sitting down to play because your legs feel a bit wobbly after all that pot. we were bored and wanted to be headfucked by noise and strobe lights. instead we had to get up early for chapel and double maths.

i have subsequently seen both sonic boom and spiritualized (many times now, and hopefully i'll be seeing them here in atlanta in a few weeks), and both were great, but still. maybe on the reunion tour eh?

here's a few earlier faves:

::: spacemen 3 - losing touch with my mind (from sound of confusion, 1986)
::: spacemen 3 - little doll (from sound of confusion, 1986)
::: spacemen 3 - revolution (from playing with fire, 1989)
::: spacemen 3 - suicide [live] (from playing with fire, 1989)
::: spacemen 3 - repeater (how does it feel?) [live] (from playing with fire, 1989)

plus here's a great interview with sonic and spaceman (well, mostly sonic - ironic that jason later complained that he never got a word in edge-wise):



and finally, as an added extra, here's one of my favourite sonic boom songs:

::: sonic boom - angel (from spectrum, 1990)

and if you look hard enough you can find basically all of spacemen 3's output for download... (hint: start here)

taking drugs to make music to take drugs to.