Primitive Ignorant is back, and Symren Gharial details the new album, ‘Life Or Death’ below via Something In Construction.
The second Primitive Ignorant EP of 2021 following November’s debut album, Sikh Punk. Things are moving. Fast. It’s vital to move forward, when life seems simultaneously accelerated and mired in a freakish stasis.
There is an elemental small hours discord to these smoky beats and paranoid rumbles that electrifies when the dawn light breaks through.
Lead track High Rise Vampires sounds like NIN tackling a Bond Theme, Death Threats backs into the weirder ends of hip hop and Crystal World conjures forth a mutant Grace Slick in its gloriously baffled swagger.
No, more than ever, there’s a need to break free of all this, step into the light; reinvent and emerge, powerful and clear-headed, to continue the adventure.
“Life has never felt more precarious or precious than over the last two years. Mental health in Britain is spiralling and drug related deaths are soaring. Becoming a father for the first time compelled me to distil my experiences into a cinematic journey from death to life; opening with a memory of when I was brought back to life after an overdose, and ending with a celebration of sounds my beautiful baby daughter Amaya made both before and after she was born.” – Sym.
HIGH RISE VAMPIRES: It felt important to write an intimate song about my experiences confronting addiction. Disturbing reflections on twice being transported back from the dead surfaced with the arrival of my first child and the unrelenting power in gratitude for another chance in the world and the gift of a new life. A celebration of climbing out of the dark, emphatically insisting that it’s possible for everyone.
DEATH THREATS: My response to the anonymous death threats I received for the imagery used in the artwork for the first album. It feels scary and strange to feel threatened. It feels isolating. Stranger yet to feel it from strangers, who feed on outrage to fuel anger. This is a howl into the maelstrom created by the moral
bankruptcy of 21st century day politics and how social media churns social responsibility, collective offence and wild opinions into aggression.
LAST IN THE RIOT (SORDID SOUNDSYSTEM REBIRTH): The lead track from the last EP reshaped by the reclusive Scottish producer, now hiding in the Hollywood Hills, into an epic journey from the dancefloor’s dark corners into the light.
CRYSTAL WORLD: A title lifted from a Ballard novel. A contradictory reflection of missed opportunities and a life of loneliness in the face of death, whilst peacocking a supreme contentment for not conforming. As a human being you can change no matter what and, in my case, much of what I considered rebellion was really self-harm.
The last EP featured a collab with a ten year old kid and this one ends with a contribution from Sym’s unborn daughter. Powerful magic and new horizons.
AMAYA: I recorded my daughter’s heartbeat in the womb just before she came into the world and used it as the beat to the track. The whole track is built on noises made by her. It feels like a real miracle to have brought new life into the world after so nearly not making it myself and it’s extremely moving for me to have made a song with my daughter even before she had arrived into this world.
