Two days before Independence Day here in America, some proper fireworks are set to go off across the Atlantic, as July 2 marks the current release date for Utopian Ashes, a new collaborative record from Primal Scream legend Bobby Gillespie and Savages’ Jehnny Beth. Today (May 6) the pair have lit the fuse on our excitement and intrigue by sharing a riveting new track called “Chase It Down.”
Brimming with rock and roll excess and natural cool we’d expect from these two, “Chase It Down” sounds like the kind of track you’d purchase as CD1 and CD2 import singles at your local Tower Records circa ’98. Beyond sounding pretty fucking fab, the track is said to introduce the album’s ongoing storyline of a “withering marriage,” with Gillespie and Beth acting out as a couple with different perspectives on the relationship; the LP goes on to explore themes of loss, miscommunication, and emotional inarticulacy.
First Gillespie was movin’ on up — now it sounds like he’s movin’ on out!
“In the same way you create characters for a novel, we’ve created characters here,” says Beth. “But you put yourself in it, because you’re trying to understand the human situation. The singing has to be authentic. That’s all that matters.”
Adds Gillespie: “When you write a song you marry the personal with the fictional and make art. I was thinking about two people living alone, together but apart, existing and suffering in a psychic malaise, who plough on because of responsibilities and commitments. It’s about the impermanence of everything — an existential fact that everyone has to face at some point in their lives.”
Between this and the Nine Inch Nails and Health collaboration, it’s been one hell of a day for inspired musical unions. Fire up “Chase It Down” below, and pre-order the duo’s upcoming LP via Third Man Records.
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