Today
we celebrate the ANNIVERSARY of Placebo's first big worldwide hit
single “Pure morning”. It was released 22 years ago today on
August 3rd
1998. The song reached no 19 un the US Billboard Chart, no. 4 in the
UK Singles Chart, no. 21 in New Zealand and no. 8 in Iceland to name
but a few rankings.
It's hard to believe but “Pure morning” wasn't even meant to become a single in the first place. The band recorded it as b-side song after the album “Without you I'm nothing” was already finished. But they immediately knew it was too good to use it as b-side and so it was added to the album in last minute and became the lead single of it. This explains why it is the only song on “Without you I'm nothing” that was produced by Phil Vinall (who had worked with Placebo on their single “Nancy Boy” before) while all other tracks were produced by Steve Osborne.
“Pure morning” is not a typical Placebo song and the band's managerin Alex Weston made clear that it was not indicative of the band's new direction or something. “It just stood right out. It needs a couple of listens, but then it's pretty hard to get out of your head. It's a risk, but one worth taking," she stated (dotmusic.com, July 1998).
The official music clip of “Pure morning” was directed by Nick Gordon and shot in slow-motion at the junction of Savoy Street and Savoy Hill in London. Brian once said that „Fourteen hours“, a film with Grace Kelly, was an inspiration for the video.
In
the clip he embodies a suicidal man, and police and authorities try
to stop him when it seems he wants to jump down from the building.
Shots of the rest of the band consist of them being arrested for
unseen crimes.
News
crews report on the scene and a single police officer runs through
the building to attempt to safe the young man from jumping. Brian
eventually leans forward but instead of falling down all the way he
starts to walk vertically down on the side of the building.
BRIAN ON “PURE MORNING”
"Well,
'Pure morning'... we kind of feel it was a little bit of a gift
really. We'd finished our album and we'd given it to the record
company and the pressure was off. We were just relaxing and doing a
B-side session, and we were working in a way that we hadn't worked
before. We went into the studio with just a guitar loop in the
morning and built a track on top of that as the day went on, so you
don't really know where you're going and it's a more spontaneous
thing. By the end of the day we had "Pure morning," and
once we took a step back, it became painstakingly obvious that it was
far too good for a B-side and ended up being the first single off the
album. It's different, it's a new departure for us and it's probably
quite indicative for where we're going in the future."
”Going on Top of the Pops and saying 'A friend with weed is better' is a laugh. You know that's quite a coup being able to subvert that set-up in that way you know. It means that we're never going to compromise ourselves lyrically you know in order to have a hit, we don't need to. ”(In conversation with Sally Stratton, August 1998)"It was completely spontaneous, it was a gift from the God of Music, who descended from the skies and said 'Here boys, you've been working really hard, have a hit.'"
(Juice Magazine, August 1999)
"There's been so many mornings when I've walked out of a dingy, after-hours drinking club in Soho, and gone, 'Oh, shit! The sun's up.' And you know for a fact that you're not going to be able to go to sleep for many hours, and that you're going to tear the wallpaper off... with your fingernails. And it's kind of about that feeling, about feeling the rest of the world is getting up and getting ready to go to work, and you're still coming down."
(Access Magazine, February 1999)
BRIAN ON THE VIDEO CLIP
(Brian, S. 1999)
Photo credits: Screenshots from the video
Post by Silke
