THE idea to get back together was sparked by the death of their original bass player.
“We lost Stevie D,” says The Primitives’ singer Tracy Tracy.
“We met up at his funeral and got talking about doing something as a tribute to Steve. It snowballed from there really.”
Their first reunion gig was at the end of last year at an exhibition showcasing Coventry bands.
“We really enjoyed it and it seemed better than the first time round.”
How?
“We’re a lot wiser, we can pick what we want to do and everything’s sounding fresher.”
She laughs: “Hopefully I’m a better singer.”
The Primitives became indie darlings with the release of their debut album Lovely, which featured the Top 20 hit Crash.
Even Morrissey gave them his blessing and could often be seen wearing a Primitives’ Stop Killing Me T-shirt.
The bleached blonde Tracy, like Wendy James from rival band Transvision Vamp, became an indie pin-up.
She’s still a looker, judging from the new band photo.
“There’s no airbrushing involved but it’s all lighting and make-up,” she laughs.
In 1992, after two more albums, Pure and Galore, and extensive tours of Europe and the US, The Primitives called it a day.
She has worked on various music projects since.
“I’ve always flitted in and out of music, nothing with any great success but I’ve always loved music. I think once you’ve been in a band you can’t stop.”
Crash was given a new lease of life when a revamped version featured in the Jim Carrey film Dumb And Dumber.
“I think we had better songs than Crash. We weren’t all about Crash but that one hit the limelight. It was actually Through The Flowers that got us our first radio play and our first TV appearance.”
In fact, it wasn’t Crash but Really Stupid that Mojo magazine named as one of the top 40 UK indie singles of all time two years ago.
“That was pretty amazing. It was like ‘we weren’t really that bad then’,” she laughs.
Aside from the tour there is talk of a covers album. They’ve already recorded versions of Suzi Jane Hokom's Need All The Help I Can Get and Toni Basil's Breakaway.
“It’s not written in stone but because it’s sounding nice and fresh it’s like well, why not? We’re just going to go in to the studio and see what it sounds like. We haven’t even got to the stage of talking about record labels.”
Despite various internet biographies of The Primitives saying Tracy is Australian, she, like the rest of the band, is from Coventry.
“I lived in Australia for five years with my parents. Even at the exhibition about Coventry bands there was a card saying ‘Australian-born Tracy Tracy’ so I had to tell them ‘no, I’m not’”.
These days she’s living in Spain.
“It was a case of getting the CDs back from my parents,” she says of the preparation for the tour.
“But once we got in to rehearsals it all came together.”
Gig
Who The Primitives, Lucky Soul
Where: The Bodega Social Club, Pelham Street
When: Monday, 8pm
Tickets, £10, 0871 310 0000
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