Primal Scream
Traffic Festival @ Venaria Reale (TO) 10.07.2009

The message of Traffic, in the words of Mixo, the master of ceremony of the 3-day free festival in Turin, was "transformation", starting from the change of location from Parco della Pellerina to Venaria Reale in the immediate vicinity of the Juvarrian Royal Palace.

Transformation does not always rhyme with evolution.

That was the case with Primal Scream, but perhaps it would be more correct and appropriate to say Bobbie Gillespie.

The image on the festival website was promising because it reminded me of certain photographs of Einsturzende Neubaten: sharp, lived-in faces, pockmarked skin, with shirts unbuttoned and 70s-style open collars. However, it didn't take long to understand that we were witnessing the classic good rock "of trade" and that there would be little, too little, space for the electronics of XTRMNTR, their true masterpiece (except for Accelerator and Svastika Eyes).

I expected "contamination", that musical melting pot that made them icons of 90s Britpop, also thanks to their union with the Stone Roses, which gave them a much more rhythmic approach with the inclusion of their bassist, allowing them to venture into the funk of George Clinton in Funky Jam. However, all this is just a memory. The reason is simple, the machine is there, but the voice is missing, Denise's soulful backing vocals, the brass and Hammond inserts. Thus, the rock becomes excessively guitar-centric, which works well for "Jailbird" but not for "Rocks", which does transform into a banal little song. The same goes for "Movin on up". There's no groove, the gospel arrangements are missing.

Gillespie then looks like a terribly aged Dolce and Gabbana mannequin in cigarette pants and a vaguely mod look that's completely out of time. Throughout the concert, he's monotonous, immobile, with effeminate gestures that also rob the rhythm of its beauty and convincing nature. Simply a graceless singer without any stage charisma that does more harm to his own music than he might think.

The feeling is that they left something at home, I believe the pleasure of creating a great dance floor, and in this case, for poor Bobbie, the saying doesn't apply: "It is not the age mate, it's the mileage."