808 State and NME

(From the NME's WWW site, issue No.1, June 1996)

808 STATE feature MANIC STREET PREACHERS singer JAMES DEAN BRADFIELD on a track on their new album - their first new material in four years. The innovative Manchester dance meisters will celebrate their return with a free gig at the 30,000-capacity Castlefield Arena in their home town on June 21. The album, 'Don Solaris', and the first single from it, 'Bond', are said to have a deep drum'n'bass and moody techno flavour which modernises 808 State's sound.

Bradfield performs on a track entitled 'Lopez' while other guest artists include Louise Rhodes from Lamb, sometime Tricky chanteuse Ragga, Doughty of US band Soul Coughing and Manchester's MC Tunes. Although it is the band's first new album since 1992's 'Gorgeous', a spokeswoman said the trio - Graham Massey, Darren Partington and Andrew Barker (Martin Price left to work on other projects) - had been busy touring, writing, recording and remixing a variety of artists including REM, Bomb The Bass, Soundgarden, David Bowie, Bjrk, Quincy Jones, The Shamen, Primal Scream and Future Sound Of London. Massey helped write and produce Bjrk's 'Post' LP while Partington and Barker have been busy with DJ stints around the country.

Massey told NME: "We had fallen into the trap of getting caught up with the whole dance music thing, you know, what's the latest thing? But we just decided to be ourselves in the end and I think it's paid off." He was confident his band could catch up with cutting-edge contemporaries such as Orbital, Underworld and Leftfield, whose path to fame and fortune was paved by 808 State's early success.

Massey said: "The trouble with being pioneering is that you boot open the door and other people come through. But the scene's a lot more open-minded these days than when we first tried to get this stuff through. From our point of view, we've always been up there. Hopefully, this new album will prove it - that's the main reason we did it." He added that the band were playing a couple of secret warm-up gigs for Castlefield Arena and would follow the event with more live dates around Europe this summer, including a Beetle Bash in Warwick on June 22.

"It seems a long time since we did this sort of thing, but it's a good feeling to be back," said Massey. The track listing for 'Don Solaris' is: 'Bond' (featuring Doughty), 'Bird', 'Azure' (featuring Louise Rhodes), 'Don Solaris', 'Joyrider', 'Lopez' (featuring James Dean Bradfield), 'Balboa', 'Kouhoutek', 'Mooz' (featuring Ragga), 'Jerusahat' and 'Banacheq'. 808 State's gig at Castlefield Arena kicks-off at 6pm and features a host of guest DJs and will be broadcast live by Manchester's Kiss 102FM.

COMPULSION have recruited 808 STATE's Graham Massey, along with fellow innovators HOWIE B, SCANNER and STATIC to remix their new single 'Juvenile Scene Detective', out on June 24. The single, which comes from the band's album 'The Future Is Medium' (out now on One Little Indian), will be available in two CD formats as well as vinyl seven-inch. the band will also play T In The Park on July 13 and Phoenix Festival on July 21.

Updated on: 16 August 1996