🔷🎊𝐒𝐋𝐀𝐕𝐄 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐆𝐄 𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐧𝐬 𝟐𝟐 𝐓𝐎𝐃𝐀𝐘🎊🔷

The second single from Placebo’s third studio album 𝑩𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌 𝑴𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒕 𝑴𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒄, was released on September 25th, 2000 and reached no. 19 in the UK Singles Chart.

🔷𝐎𝐅𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐈𝐀𝐋 𝐕𝐈𝐃𝐄𝐎🔷
➡️ http://bit.ly/2VhCxjy

Photo credit: Screenshot from the official video, single cover / edit by Silke

🔷From the very beginning of Placebo’s career, Brian has always said that the initial purpose for him to start a band was his dream to never get a real job. 𝐒𝐋𝐀𝐕𝐄 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐆𝐄 is an exact illustration of ordinary, boring way of life which Brian was trying to avoid at any price.

📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: The song tells you to be an individual, believe in yourself and have the courage to chase your dreams. If you do, the rewards at the end are tenfold versus doing what your parents tell you to do. Get a good job, get married, have 2.4 children, 1.2 goldfish, 3.6 cars... To a lot of people, that's the epitome of personal success. Which is why so many people get through a mid-life crisis. People reach a point in their lives and go, "Is this it?"
(𝐴𝑙𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑃𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑠, 𝐴𝑢𝑔𝑢𝑠𝑡 2001)

🔷As 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐟𝐚𝐧 recalled in 𝑩𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌 𝑴𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒕 𝑴𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒄 𝑺𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒊𝒆𝒔 (𝑬𝒑𝒊𝒔𝒐𝒅𝒆 2), the working title for Slave to the Wage was 𝐃𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡 𝐕𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐲 𝟗𝟗.

🔷The line “𝑺𝒊𝒄𝒌 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒊𝒓𝒆𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝑴𝒂𝒈𝒈𝒊𝒆'𝒔 𝒇𝒂𝒓𝒎” is a reference to the Bob Dylan song Maggie's Farm.
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: "It's just a song about not working for The Man and chasing your dreams. It's about not working yourself into an early grave. It's our version of Bob Dylan's Maggie's Farm which finds it's way into the lyrics as well".
(𝑈𝑛𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤𝑛 𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑧𝑖𝑛𝑒, 2000)

Photo credit: Screenshot from the official video

𝐁𝐨𝐛 𝐃𝐲𝐥𝐚𝐧 - 𝐌𝐚𝐠𝐠𝐢𝐞'𝐬 𝐅𝐚𝐫𝐦

➡️ https://bit.ly/2mhKWT7

🔷The song was produced by Paul Corkett and Placebo and recorded at Olympic Studios and Townhouse Studios in London. Brian has some painful memories about recording of the track's vocals:
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: The day I recorded the vocals to that track was the day that I found out that Scott Piering, the legendary plugger and our friend, had died and I was thinking about him that morning. There was a cloud that was hanging over us that day. I strangely felt his presence.
(𝑀𝑒𝑙𝑜𝑑𝑦 𝑀𝑎𝑘𝑒𝑟, 𝑂𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑏𝑒𝑟 20𝑡ℎ, 2000)

🔷Slave to the Wage contains a sample from 𝐓𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐬 𝐍𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬 by the band 𝑷𝒂𝒗𝒆𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕 written by Stephen Malkmus and Scott Kannberg.

Photo credit: Screenshots from the official video  / edit by Silke

𝐏𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 - 𝐓𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐬 𝐍𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬

➡️ https://bit.ly/3PYg1ne

𝑾𝒉𝒂𝒕 𝒎𝒂𝒅𝒆 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒔𝒂𝒎𝒑𝒍𝒆 𝑷𝒂𝒗𝒆𝒎𝒆𝒏𝒕'𝒔 "𝑻𝒆𝒙𝒂𝒔 𝑵𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝑾𝒉𝒊𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔" 𝒐𝒏 "𝑺𝒍𝒂𝒗𝒆 𝑻𝒐 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑾𝒂𝒈𝒆"?
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: I was just a huge fan. It comes from the B-sides album, and I just really liked this abstract guitar that was going on. It's much slower in its original state. We just looped it and sped it up really fast, at least ten times faster than the original. Again, it was sampling, which was something we had never done before. At the time, it was a great motivator for us. We didn't want to do what we'd done on the last record.
(𝑉𝑖𝑐𝑒, 𝑂𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑏𝑒𝑟 13𝑡ℎ, 2016)

🔷The single CD was available in two different versions:
▪️𝐂𝐃𝟏
Slave to the Wage (Radio Edit)
Leni
Bubblegun

▪️𝐂𝐃𝟐
Slave to the Wage (Album Version)
Holocaust (Big Star cover)
Slave to the Wage (Les Rythmes Digitales Remix)

▪️𝟏𝟐” 𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐲𝐥 includes all the same songs except for the Slave to the Wage radio edit.


📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: "It's kind of an American Beauty thing. You can find yourself like the character Kevin Spacey plays, in a mid-life crisis and realising 20 years of his existence has been for nothing, for materialism and no soul. […] I think people are taught at an early age that individuality isn't necessarily a good thing and that they have to conform."
(𝑆𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑦 𝑀𝑎𝑖𝑙, 𝑂𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑏𝑒𝑟 2000)

Photo credit: Screenshot from the official video

📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: “It's a song about chasing your dreams. It's kinda like the Robert Frost poem, "The Road Not Taken. It's, basically saying, promoting individuality and saying that you don't have to follow society's rules in order to become a personal success. It often involves a bit of risk taking and courage. But we're certainly living proof of the fact that these decisions that we made when we were very young, we're living proof embodied that the road less traveled can be incredibly fruitful, if you stay true to yourself, if you have the desire to be an individual, if you have the desire and the courage to chase your dreams. If you want to work at a bank, and that gives you a hard-on, then go work for a bank. Or, if you want to be an artist and that gives you a hard-on, be an artist. Don't feel that you have to work at a bank. And if you're prepared to make sacrifices and take risks, if you're lucky, if your karma is good, then these things will pay off in the end. Which I think it's a positive message really.”
(𝑉𝑜𝑥 𝑂𝑛𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑒, 2001)

You can read the poem to look for connection yourself.

𝐑𝐨𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐭 𝐅𝐫𝐨𝐬𝐭 - 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐨𝐚𝐝 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐓𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐧

➡️ http://bit.ly/2FiZnQ5

The video is aesthetically inspired by the movie 𝐆𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐚𝐜𝐚. The story is based on the only ‘real’ job 𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧 ever had. “I spent a summer shredding documents once. It got so boring and mundane that I used to be late on purpose," he said to the 𝑆𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑦 𝑀𝑎𝑖𝑙 (2000).
The video was directed by 𝑯𝒐𝒘𝒂𝒓𝒅 𝑮𝒓𝒆𝒆𝒏𝒉𝒂𝒍𝒈𝒉, who’s worked with Placebo before (and would also work after).

🔷That’s what 𝑯𝒐𝒘𝒂𝒓𝒅 remembers of creating the video.
📢“Cold, beautifully stylish near future, not sci-fi. Is it sci-fi, is it whatever? Is it a love story? I told a lot about it. If it's not the case, let's build like 'Gattaca', people, they are almost automats in the office – machine or computers but there is one girl who suddenly decides… And ok, that creates a knock on catalyst effect. So it started to shred, everything shred, shred, shred… It was colourful, simple, and powerful. We don't say it was sexual kind of clothe coming off you love 'cause you never saw anything. And cool – you know, not sexy girl, interesting girl, it just seemed to work. So that's how 'Slave To The Wage' happened.”
(𝑃𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒𝑏𝑜 𝑆𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑦 𝑃𝑟𝑜𝑗𝑒𝑐𝑡, 2016)

Photo credit: Screenshot from the official video

🔷𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚 𝒃𝒆𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒅 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒗𝒊𝒅𝒆𝒐 𝒃𝒚 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒈𝒖𝒚𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒎𝒔𝒆𝒍𝒗𝒆𝒔…
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”This video was inspired by two things. The content was inspired by the only summer job I ever had, which was working in a bank, shredding documents. We used that as a metaphor for the drudgery of having a nine-to-five in the modern world. And the second, aesthetically it was by a film ‘Gattaca’ starring Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman. It was the film where they met and first fell in love.
Another video with Howard Greenhalgh, who did ‘Nancy Boy’ and ‘Bruise Pristine’.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐟𝐚𝐧: ”It’s filmed at the University of East London, on a sunny day.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞 𝐇𝐞𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐭: ”Kind of a weird building. Modernist architecture and stuff like that.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”I remember there was an airstrip at the halls of residence. Very weird. How do they expect the student to get any sleep whatsoever?”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞: ”There was quite a lot of extras on this one.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”There’s another Howard Greenhalgh gratuitous panty shot coming up, which managed to slip by censors. There seems to be a gratuitous panty shot in every video.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐟𝐚𝐧: ”A bit of postproduction on this one.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”It’s amazing car, it’s from an eastern bloc country, before the Wall came down. A Czechoslovakian or Bulgarian car which they used to drive the politicians around it.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞: ”There’s a cool shot where you have wings and you stand in front of the bus.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”Closest I’ll ever been to an angel.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐟𝐚𝐧: ”You grew those after ‘Pure morning’.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”And naturally the clothes have to come off.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞: ”It’s probably Howard’s most postproduction-heavy video so far, apart from ‘Nancy Boy’.”
📢𝐁𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐧: ”It’s a good time to mention that Howard used to be an Olympic gymnast.”
📢𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐟𝐚𝐧: ”That’s true.”
(𝑂𝑛𝑐𝑒 𝑀𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑊𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝐹𝑒𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐷𝑉𝐷, 2004)


🔷𝐋𝐈𝐕𝐄 𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘🔷
The song was played live since the first show of the 𝑩𝒍𝒂𝒄𝒌 𝑴𝒂𝒓𝒌𝒆𝒕 𝑴𝒖𝒔𝒊𝒄 𝒕𝒐𝒖𝒓 in Oxford, UK on July 20th, 2000, and then, was part of every tour except for 𝑴𝒆𝒅𝒔 and 𝑩𝒂𝒕𝒕𝒍𝒆 𝑭𝒐𝒓 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝑺𝒖𝒏 𝒕𝒐𝒖𝒓𝒔. A special acoustic rendition was done for 2015 𝑴𝑻𝑽 𝑼𝒏𝒑𝒍𝒖𝒈𝒈𝒆𝒅 show in London in 2015.

Now, during the 𝑵𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝑳𝒆𝒕 𝑴𝒆 𝑮𝒐 𝒕𝒐𝒖𝒓, it’s back on stage again.
So, let’s watch one of these newest performances tonight, particularly, the one from 𝐅𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐳𝐞 𝐑𝐨𝐜𝐤𝐬 festival on June 17th, 2022.

Post by Olga