P.M. Dawn - s/d

http://i.thisislondon.co.uk/i/pix/2007/07/35a_19_seal_243x254.jpg

"How you gonna do it if you really won't take a chance?"

wielding a bass scythe

He's so fresh. Exciting.

Weird article. I must live in a different world, but it would never begin to occur to me to be embarrased about liking this band...

Though I do prefer "Jesus Wept" and "Dearest Christian When The Pawn Hits..."

it would never begin to occur to me to be embarrased about liking this band...

abs.

Paul Shirley, having confessed his love for P. M. Dawn yesterday, now inadvertantly confesses he is a horrible person. (The two events are not related...I think.)

Yikes: "As of January 2015, Doc. G actively tours and releases music, and is the only active member of P.M. Dawn. Prince Be has had three strokes and a double-leg amputation."

oh damn. :(

I thought the revive was gonna be on account of this quip:

Mike Joseph ‏@jhericurlchron 4h4 hours ago

Thought this morning: considering what modern-day hip-hop sounds like; KRS won the battle, but Prince Be won the war.

that is a lovely quip

but omg that is awful

Yeah jfc

Tragically, it has been confirmed via Facebook and elsewhere: Prince Be passed today.

http://www.people.com/article/attrell-cordes-pm-dawn-death

Oh god

I was playing The Bliss Album...? several weeks ago, written about as part of my canon. His talent for a while was boundless

RIP

Once put "Reality Used to Be a Friend of Mine" #1 on a decade-end '90s list.

I just had an outsider's view of it, but they especially seemed to be welcome relief from the Disposable Heroes of Hiprosy and 3rd Bass and other people who were on a HUAC-like mission at the time to rid hip-hop of pretenders.

always thought Prince was a fan, cuz 'Space' from Come sounds like a homage to the first album IMHO. rip.

Awww, RIP. There was a good year or so at the beginning of high school where P.M. Dawn and Prince were the only music I regularly listened to.

I have and like the first three albums, and The Bliss Album in particular is classic. A fully formed aesthetic wedded to a wide musical imagination. And I've always liked his vocals -- out-of-breath, off the cuff, a little bit of a smartass underneath the pillowy love talk.

tbh, I only ever heard the first two albums, and it's probably been 20 years at least since that happened. So listening to them tonight it's almost like getting blown away for the first time.

And a favorite bit of minutiae.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nia4R-m9X-k

And I've always liked his vocals -- out-of-breath, off the cuff, a little bit of a smartass underneath the pillowy love talk.

excellent

i liked that he had a bit of a lisp

he sounded like an awkward teenage poet but it was so charming & guileless. i hadn't heard "I'd Die Without You" in a while, listening to it felt like stumbling on an old love letter, it got to me more than i expected

Couple of intriging bits from early 90s Melody Maker interviews I just dug up.

https://twitter.com/NedRaggett/status/744015000914649088

https://twitter.com/NedRaggett/status/744015358609154048

Questlove:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BGx14Q7Qa5p/

VegG otm

the bliss album is the album i treasure the most from the time that i discovered it. sad to hear of prince be's death.

relief from the Disposable Heroes of Hiprosy (...) who were on a HUAC-like mission at the time to rid hip-hop of pretenders.

this seems an offtm description of a group that onstage - when not playing acoustic shows as AIDS benefits - had both an angle grinder and a jazz dude playing three strings of bass and four strings of guitar at once, and that covered the Dead Kennedys twice

Fair point. Maybe they were pompous in a more general sense--not a fan.

I was relistening to PM Dawn last night (the album to his son is kind of heartbreaking at the moment). One nice little touch that I hadn't noticed before (which gets into the smartass aspect, which I like btw) is in that Talking Heads cover where he fairly ostentatiously (the rest of the song is sung with the queen's English) sings, "You may aks yourself" each time (clearly he could have sung "ask" if he'd wanted to).

Still think the opening of Jesus Wept (Intro/Downtown Venus) is one of the strongest starts to a record I know, and have never gotten why it didn't hit bigger.

An act could be, to quote clem's good phrase, on a "HUAC-like mission at the time to rid hip-hop of pretenders" and still play AIDS benefits with jazz dudes.

Yeah no one thought Disposable Heroes of Hiprosy were real hip hop, certainly not hip hop fans. 3rd Bass was on Def Jam and was Rush management, completely different crowds.

it's a saturday in june, i hope everyone's listening to PM Dawn today

An act could be, to quote clem's good phrase, on a "HUAC-like mission at the time to rid hip-hop of pretenders" and still play AIDS benefits with jazz dudes.

I was noting more that they didn't use an angle grinder spraying sparks onto the crowd as percussion at acoustic shows - Hunter was 1/4 of the live band regardless. Either way, I don't recall any manner in which they were espousing the eradication of hip-hop less authentic than themselves.

one day as a teenager in high school, a HS admin approached me and asked if I wanted to be on tv. I said sure, not knowing what to expect. Turns out our school was sending a bunch of kids to be part of the audience for a local talk show for teens that I had never heard of. I don't remember much about the show really, except at the very end they brought out a very special musical guest. It was PM Dawn performing "Set Adrift..." This was shortly before their first album was released, so I had no idea who they were. My general reaction could be summed up as "what tha hell?!?" A few weeks later, they were stars.

RIP

I think sic's probably right--skimming around a Google search, P.M. Dawn and DHoH seem to turn up in tandem rather than opposition, as two of the bands then trying to broaden hip-hop. I liked and sometimes loved P.M. Dawn, couldn't stand the little bit I'd heard from DHoH. I did find this 1993 interview with Michael Franti:

"One of the things I've been excited about is that when I go around the world, I see different people and different cultures who are rapping. It's not like a Vanilla Ice thing where they're just trying to adopt Black rap techniques, and trying to appropriate that style."

Is that a good example? No--most everyone ridiculed Vanilla Ice at the time except for Chuck Eddy and Mrs. Vanilla Ice. (And the 10 zillion people who bought "Ice Ice Baby." And sometimes me.) I would be interested to know what Franti thought about P.M. Dawn in 1993. If there's an interview out there that says he's a big fan and loves what they're doing, I'd be surprised.

Anyway, don't ask me why I'm resurrecting something we used to argue about 25 years ago. It matters less than less than zero.

No "real" rap fans gave a shit about DHOH

Kind of wondering about their post "Christian" releases. I didn't realize how much of their output was out of print and not on streaming (both Spotify and Tidal, so this isn't a dig at anyone). Also curious about b-sides or non-album tracks, as they seemed like the sort of band that might have stashed interesting stuff.

Their most famous song was "Television (drug of the nation)"

They were previously The Beatnigs, and *Their* most famous song was ...

Xpost

It had never occurred to me before that PM Dawn debuted (album) in the same year that Nirvana released Nevermind. Kind of kindred spirits in some ways.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gj7fiMVTbZw

good non-album track, made a lot of sense of the band at the time

There's a whole variety of other/alternate tracks out there -- at least a CDs worth, with tracks like "May You Always Drink Bizarre" and whichever one it is that had a (great) Lynyrd Skynyrd sample use, but I keep forgetting the title -- not to mention a one (maybe two) disc project as such around 2000 called Fucked Music that was put out online for the most part. I suspect there's a lot of things that just never surfaced.

I'd completely forgotten about this one, which I went to some trouble to get ahold of before youtube. Maybe a little close to Downtown Venus to be a b-side, but on its own it's really nice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aikxDCm2G9E

Couple of nice short tributes:

https://twitter.com/garyjkemp/status/744059884698742784

https://twitter.com/boygeorge/status/744199426621640705

Plus this really enjoyable Anil Dash overview:

https://medium.com/@anildash/set-adrift-beneath-the-surface-of-p-m-dawn-f1e17520eba4

that Anil Dash piece has crashed one browser once, and another one five times. Anyone want to copy the text here?

bliss album is fucking stellar. revival necessary.

I mean:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aznqNWBn5c

help me, joni. i think i'm fallin

He sampled her on "Ways of the Wind", too!

it really does defy logic:

-boy george feature
-beatles cover
-clunky dis track

-and it still manages to smash.

and once again: xpost to "everybody digs joni"

He sampled her on "Ways of the Wind", too!

― Halfway there but for you, Thursday, September 8, 2022 10:47 AM

sade sample on another track, as well. just brilliantly good taste all around.

4th album : dreadful album title.

https://www.discogs.com/master/121081-PM-Dawn-Dearest-Christian-Im-So-Very-Sorry-For-Bringing-You-Here-Love-Dad

however, samples t.rex, so no complaints from me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piKFUi1xKdA

rest of the album is a lot more mellow of course.

i do love the bliss album. a bit better than the first

Same.

it really does defy logic:

-boy george feature
-beatles cover
-clunky dis track

-and it still manages to smash.

and once again: xpost to "everybody digs joni"

― ミ💙🅟 🅛 🅤 🅡 🅜 🅑💙彡 (Austin), Thursday, September 8, 2022 10:48 AM

a year later and this is still hella true.