Spacemen 3 - Spacemen Are Go! (CD)

All Music Guide

Also released as Live in Europe 1989 with two extra songs, Spacemen Are Go was released in large part as a response to Performance, which at least some members of the group felt was a sub-par effort. Collected from various German shows in that year, the album covers the last era of the band as a live act, not to mention the rarest of all the lineups: a four-piece with bassist Will Carruthers and drummer Jon Mattock, who would eventually become founding members of Spiritualized with Pierce. Though fidelity varies a bit throughout, the remastering job, partially overseen by Sonic, presents good results, not to mention a number of cuts performed by the band only on rare occasions. Only three Playing With Fire cuts regularly appeared in the live set, but two of the less performed songs take a bow here, a stripped down, striking take on "I Believe It" and a gentle ramble through "Lord Can You Hear Me?" As for the classics -- or at least what many later would recognize as such -- some appear in notably different versions from the studio takes. "Walkin' With Jesus" has a quick, happy feel to it, for all that Pierce changes a line to go "cause I can't stand this life/without sweet heroin." Other songs, notably the twin rampages of "Revolution" and a 16-minute take on "Suicide," completely let fly with all the psychosis the studio versions had and then some. In keeping with the band's acknowledged reverence and inspiration from the past, a variety of covers appear, with a short version of the 13th Floor Elevators' "Rollercoaster" kicking things off for the album as a whole. There's also the "Bo Diddley Jam," not so much a cover as an enthusiastic rip through that legend's style, laced with appropriately heavy vibes.

- Ned Raggett, All Music Guide