Pure Grain were the band Fred formed after the family cat split up.
Fred told thefamilycat.com:
"since the split i started a new band - pure grain . we recorded an lp nobody loses all the time last year - yet to get it released but still hopeful of someone being excited enough to put it out. we have our own label called supple pipe. released the here come the millionaires single on it in 1996 (or was it 97?).
the band is really just me and chris clark, though we work with people like audrey riley, tim bradshaw, gareth batson when we need musicians. we are recording a second lp right at the moment. we have a web-site at www.puregrain.co.uk (now defunct) - not much gon on there at the moment though!"
Pure Grain are songwriters Paul Frederick and Christopher Clark who want to change the world with their aching ballads and skewed country soul pop. Backed by friends and cohorts Gareth and John, Chris and Paul's romantic sounds will reach a larger audience with the forthcoming release of their debut album 'Nobody Loses All The Time' The perfect soundtrack to the summer
In this website you will find news about the band, mp3's, lyrics, and everything you need to know about Pure Grain
Nobody Loses All The Time
These were songs slated for inclusion on the album
Your Name 0'50
Curse Of The Supermen 0'42
Spiders and Sharks 0'44
Cowards Moon 0'42
Another Mile 0'49
Rarities and stuff like that should appear here in the very near future
There's also an american band of the same name, who formed in 2002.
Discography
They had the track 'Sweetest Song' on this Fierce Panda compilation "Cry Me A Liver"
Unbelievable Truth / Forget About Me
Theaudience / Mr Doasyouwouldbedoneby
Velocette / Bitterscene
Peachfuzz / Girl In The Grass
Pure Grain / Sweetest Song
The Clientele / We Could Walk Together
Here Come The Millionaires
Sp3001
Supple Pipe, 1999
1.(Here Come) The Millionaires
2.Why Didn't I Think Of This Before
3.Only Love Is Spoken Here
4.Ringing Bell
This was the one single I got hold of, "Here Come The Millionaires"
Where The Wild Nings Are
Image Required
Fierce Panda
EMBRACE / All You Good Good People
TOASTER / Huggy
GOD'S BOYFRIEND / I Don't Wash
MAGICDRIVE / Had To Be You
CHEST / Aniseed
ULTRASOUND / Same Band
KIDNAPPER / Is This A Girl?
LO-FIDELITY ALLSTARS / Diamonds Are Forever
REGULAR FRIES / Dust It Don't Bust It
CAMPAG VELOCET / Drencrom (Velocet Synthemesc)
TINY TOO / My Planet Tim
THE INTERPRETERS / Shout
LIBIDO / In My Shadow
UNBELIEVABLE / Forget About Me
PURE GRAIN / Sweetest Song
VELOCETTE / Bitterscene
IDLEWILD / Chandelier
THE HIGH FIDELITY / Sick Of It All
SPRAYDOG / Sweet Thing SPY '51 / Slow
Pure Grain were songwriters Paul Frederick and Christopher Clark who "want to change the world with their aching ballads and skewed country soul pop. Backed by friends and cohorts Gareth and John, Chris and Paul's romantic sounds will reach a larger audience with the forthcoming release of their debut album 'Nobody Loses All The Time'. The perfect soundtrack to the summer"
Interview with Fred and Chris at the time of the move to Jack Adaptor
here is the unedited interview with Burkhard from Intro Magazine in Germany
c = Christopher Cordoba
P = Paul Frederick
B = Burkhard
B - You have known each other for more than 8 years. When did you decide to let go of the past (esp.: Pure Grain) and start anew with Jack Adaptor ?
C- Well, Pure Grain was essentially a functioning 4 piece democratic band...
P - And we decided not to be democratic anymore.
C- and within that new structure came some freedom and from that evolved a new sound that didn't sound like Pure Grain. It felt alien to call ourselves that anymore.
P - Because we recorded a lot of material then, because we had the musical freedom to do what we liked without having to work with specific musicians and their particular hang-ups or constraints or enthusiasms, it took us a while to discover that it was a different project. We just didn't suddenly say, “This is Jack Adaptor!” After a long period we realised that we did something much stronger than PG.
C- Totally different.
P- Also, because we worked together for a long time a new name somehow...
C- It's a more playful name, that's the thing. Pure Grain was quite serious and the music was quite earnest. We did a lot of acoustic gigs as PG and that was quite meaningful and I think we just wanted to be a bit more adventurous and the name is a bit more fun. Because we did so much music, we could afford to be more
P- The name allowed us to be...or to pretend to ourselves, that we were just starting... and it gave the whole thing a bit of an impetus when we started to play it to others and said it was Jack Adaptor. Plenty of people would have preconceived notions about what we did before and we thought if we had a new name at least that would open a few doors
C- Paul said “call the band “Jack Adaptor”” and I liked it. My job is to pick up on anything ridiculous he says.
B - Why does Christopher R. Clark use his real name when he acts as producer, but uses the pseudonym Christopher Cordoba when he is a musician ?
C- Cordoba does the work, Clark decides if it's any good.
B - There are many electronic elements in your work. Have you grown tired of traditional Indie-Rock ?
C- I never liked traditional indie rock.
P - We never into it that much to get tired of it.
C- There were more keyboards laying around the studio at that time! And I got fed up with playing the acoustic guitar. That's about it really. People do pick up on the electronic elements, but I don't think there is anymore than on any other band's records.
P -That's right. We used them as a springboard for a lot of ideas for the first time.
C- There was no plan, was there? We didn't suddenly wake up and say,
P- “We are gonna make an electronic album.”
C- No
P - No I don't think so.
C- It's not like suddenly we heard a Kraftwerk album and thought that's who I want to be. There's a body of work that seemed to fit that sound and you could probably play those songs on other instruments and it would be just as good, just as impactful, but that was where we were at the time. If you haven't got a band and your session drummer can't come down for the session and you want to work on a track, you work on the track with a drum machine.
P - Sometimes Mat the engineer would do some things and he was more keyboard orientated.
C- Those keyboard sounds are supposed to be really clinical, but I find them really human. They are big, brown, dense sounds. They're fat - and that's like comfort food. You can switch on something and not have any particular skill, but if it's in the right moment in the track, it can actually add something without having a lot of effort involved really. So it's a question of trying stuff, really.
P- I think so, too.
C- And the freedom of it was not knowing anything about it and trying it out. Sometimes you can have too much knowledge as a guitar player and that destroys creativity. Maybe not having any knowledge about playing keyboards really helped.
P- Being an able enough musician to put what you heard in your head and what was coming through your hands, to make it sound as if you really knew what you were doing. It was done quickly and skillfully.
C- Well, if it wasn't done quickly, it wasn't going to happen!
P- True
C- Again, we are talking stylistically, which is important, but not the most important element; the content is the most important thing, but this time we wrapped it up in a way we never have before and that's the only way I can look at it.
B - If yes, is that one reason why you ended "The Family Cat"? Especially given the success you had in Britain at least ?
P- The Family Cat ended itself because half the band left and the record company wanted us to carry on doing the old songs and the bass player and I didn't want to do that. We wanted to do something new. But we were under a lot of pressure to not change.
C- What you wanted to do with John was different from the FC.
P- Yes. Had the FC been musically satisfying and fun, we'd have carried on doing it. But we had already had it in mind to do something completely different.
C- I have to say that that “swamped-in” guitar sound never really suited your voice.
P - What we lacked in talent, we made up for in volume.
C- You've got a great voice and it never really came through.
P - Yeah. So John and I wanted to do music that was more song-based.
C- Exactly.
P - And you were able to help us do that.
B - People tend to compare you to Phoenix, Beck or Steely Dan. Do you see yourself similarities or would you say that your musical starting point is more original ?
C- Why pin it down to those three bands? That's just the tip of the iceberg, though I do like all of those you mention. If you mean the “cut & paste” of Beck, infusing roots and electronic music, the more you look back on it, the more influential it seems. He's got to be credited as being quite influential. But you don't sit down and say you are going to model yourself on one thing. You take a whole lot of different things and put it into the melting pot. They are all there, but those three aren't the overriding influences. They've had no more impact than reading a Raymond Carver book or going to see a great movie or listening to some great Jerry Goldsmith or Bernard Herrman. I wouldn't say they are the starting point. The starting point is actually picking up the guitar when you are twelve and not knowing what to do with it....
We used to play that one song Curse of the Supermen and people used to come up to us and say that it sounds like Steely Dan. At that time I hadn't heard Steely Dan before.
P- Maybe when you heard Steely Dan, you thought oh my god, this is so interesting.
C- Yeah, but not initially.
P - Right, like when you played Rufus Wainwright's first album to me loads of times and I didn't get it. But when I got it, I wanted to discover where the music came from.
B - What do you think of the road that is being followed by labels as DFA or bands like The Rapture or LCD Soundsystem in New York, i.e. mixing elements from Punk and No Wave with hard electronic beats? Any similarities you see to your own work ?
C- Stylistically, I don't see much worth in any of that, really. It's all right, it's good pop music, but if you are talking about it being innovative - it's all been done before.
P- How much music have Radio 4 heard?
C- They've got one album and it's by Gang Of Four. They are reinventing something that's already been done. The whole point about Gang of Four is that it was a reaction...trying to invent something new that hadn't been done before. I think the combination of punk/funk is a combination of two things that shouldn't fit together and that's why people experimented with it. I don't see a need to go back there really.
P - I think I probably agree. As far as our work is concerned, there's no similarity whatsoever.
B - When one looks at your "debut" album's layout, its very pure. One gets the feeling of encountering a Newcomer-act. Your great musical variety and the elaborate musicality however lead to a complete different direction. So is the underground-style layout used on purpose ?
C- It seems we went through a process and it seemed like the best one. I am not really thinking about it much I guess. We like to fuck with people's minds.
P - The sleeve is the sleeve.
C- We are pretty much as underground as it gets, so why shouldn't the design reflect that?
P - You can't read too much into the imagery on the sleeve. It's nice that it is a music box, but it's not really relevant.
C- If you think the music is sophisticated, that's good. You see that in it. However, never judge a book by its cover. The pieces don't always have to fit. You don't want to see a cover and know what a band is going to sound like. Who wants that?
P - We could have done a cover like a grindcore album cover with people being eaten on it.
C- It's good that you were surprised by it.
P- Hopefully, the sleeve is enticing enough for people in the shop to want to look at it, to see what it is, and then be pleasantly surprised or excited by what they find inside.
C- Or horrified.
B - Paul, according to your homepage you regard yourself as a pessimistic optimist. Given the up and downs of a musician's life, do you think this is the only bearable way of looking at things ?
C- This is for you.
P - It's probably the only way...
C- Just say yes, just say yes!
P - Yeah.
C- That's all you need to say.
Okay that's all, thank you very much.
cheers, Burkhard