pygmalion

Slowdive departed from the shoegaze sound with the mesmerizing minimalistic murmurings of this shimmering sorrowful swansong.  Formed in Reading, England by childhood friends Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell, the group was signed to Creation Records and became associated with the shoegaze movement with their first two albums 'Just For A Day' and 'Souvlaki'.

Engineered and produced by Chris Hufford and Slowdive, 'Pygmalion' was recorded at Courtyard Studios in Sutton Courtenay, Oxfordshire and features Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell on vocals and guitar;  with Christian Savill on guitar;  Nick Chaplin on bass guitar;  and Adrian Sell and Ian McCutcheon on drums.  

Halstead recalls:  “Pygmalion was a pretty big shock for Creation. I can remember Alan saying to me while we were recording it, ‘It’s got to be a pop record’ and I was thinking, ‘We’ll see Alan’. But that’s the way they were heading. Alan had Oasis by then...Pygmalion always felt like the end of something. The band was disintegrating while we were recording it and I don’t think Nick and Christian were into that direction. Simon (Scott, drums) had already left the band because he was aware that live drums weren’t a big part of it.”




'Pygmalion' only charted at one hundred and eight on the UK album chart.  The band was dropped from Creation one week after the release of 'Pygmalion'.  Goswell and Halstead formed Mojave 3 with McCutcheon.  Goswell says:   "The press creates the hype. The press kills the hype. It was frustrating, but not the be all and end all, we were still having an amazing time stateside and in the rest of Europe, so the UK is really small fry...[We were] happy to leave. It was inevitable and we felt unsupported by Creation towards the end. The label itself was pretty disfunctional by that point...We were dumped by Creation and Neil & I decided to continue on our own. The interband relationships weren’t that great by that point anyway. Nick had already pretty much left the band and was married and settled. Both he and Christian showed little interest in the recording of Pygmalion, Simon had left during this time also, partly because he thought he was being replaced by a drum machine, and partly because he’d done a stupid thing at one of our last shows. Neil & I had stuck together throughout all the shit, and decided to continue without the others."  






http://www.slowdiveofficial.com/







"Rutti"




"Crazy For You"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nUv1hbaqh8






'Pygmalion'
full album:






All songs written and composed by Neil Halstead, except where noted. 


1. "Rutti"     10:06
2. "Crazy for You"     6:00
3. "Miranda"   Halstead, Rachel Goswell 4:49
4. "Trellisaze"     6:21
5. "Cello"     1:33
6. "J's Heaven"     6:45
7. "Visions of La"   Halstead, Goswell 1:46
8. "Blue Skied an' Clear"     6:54
9. "All of Us"     4:09