Album review: Primal Scream’s Chaosmosis sees the band in transformation again

Chaosmosis alternates between tracks that hark back to the band's older sound and songs with a fresher sound.

Primal Scream's Chaosmosis. Courtesy Mick Hutson

Chaosmosis

Primal Scream

(First International)

Three stars

Chaosmosis is a two-paced affair, its tracks alternating between those seemingly written to burnish Primal Scream's impressive legacy and those that hint at a fresher, newer sound.

If Trippin' On Your Love, the album's opener, is a largely unsatisfactory retread of the band's sound from two decades ago, things take a turn for the better with (Feeling Like A Demon) Again, co-written with Peter, Bjorn and John's Björn Yttling. His influence delivers an infectious, bleep-ridden indie synth sound.

100% or Nothing is filler material, but Where the Light Gets In, which features Sky Ferreira, is an altogether more punchy affair. Ferreira is the perfect vocal foil for Primal's frontman Bobby Gillespie, and together the pair craft a moment of delightful, radio-friendly pop.

But it’s hard to escape the feeling that the album truly delivers on its portmanteau title.

If Gillespie intended it as a literary reference to a book by Felix Guattari, the deceased French philosopher, it also neatly describes this work, too: there is fabulous chaos here – but mostly there is a band in transformation again.