Pitch Shifter - The 1990 Demo

I probably didn't need to buy the demos of Pitch Shifter's debut album, but here we are. On one hand, the band meant a huge amount to me for a good and important period of time, and despite not being a fan of their earlier industrial stuff when I first heard it I've found I quite enjoy it now I'm older. On the other hand - and I say this as something of a compliment I guess - I'd honestly struggle to tell you whether I was listening to the demos or the album itself, and I already have that album on vinyl and on cd; this LP feels pretty redundant. I was vaguely aware of the band putting the record out via Kickstarter but I didn't go out of my way to buy it, only picking it up a while later when it found it's way into the Record Culture sale section (where I think there is still at least one copy). I can't turn down a good offer.

Of the eight songs on Industrial, six of them have demos here (Gravid Rage and New Flesh are missing), and we instead have Behemoth, an unreleased song from the era, originally called Mouthscape. Musically, the quality of the demos is on a par with the album itself. I wouldn't necessarily call either "good", in fact part of the charm of Industrial was the bleak, imposing wall of sound and lack of frills. Mark's barked vocals might be different, or they might be exactly the same - there are only a few moments when you can really tell what he's saying anyway. I'm sure someone somewhere would have noticed if they'd just pressed six of the exact same versions of these songs in a different order, but I can't help but wonder if this is just some elaborate prank - that maybe they did just put out the exact same mixes but call them demos (possibly even by accident). Or maybe I should listen to the actual album again to be more sure. The vocals on Landfill do sound different (a bit more echo, perhaps?) but I've not listened to the album in a while, so maybe I'm just mis-remembering. I still love the simplicity of those lyrics. Behemoth is the only thing that really sounds like a demo - it fits perfectly onto the album musically, although the vocals are much cleaner than anything else from the era. It's a nice addition, but not worth the entry cost on it's own.

Thinking about it, it's a rather major criticism of a record - the idea that it really doesn't need to exist because it sounds identical to one that I paid the grand sum of £2.85 for on eBay (including postage!). A bigger criticism is the artwork, which looks like someone bashed together in about 3 minutes in a Word doc. The font is definitely the first one they found in the dropdown menu. It bothers me that there's a white square before the word "Pitch" and one after, but not one after "Shifter" - it makes sense when the two words are written one above the other - as on the Industrial artwork, but makes no sense in one line. Mostly it's one of the least interesting looking record sleeves I own, but that aspect is just infuriating. The italic version of the font on the centre label is even more horrific. I'm no design snob, but it looks terrible.

Some nice things to say about it - it's a really heavy, thick vinyl (but why you'd want the demos (allegedly) to be pressed on nicer vinyl than the album itself I don't know), and it's on clear vinyl which is more interesting than just black vinyl. Etched into the run-out grooves are the coordinates of a location in Bristol, which I think is where they hid a "Pitch Shifter skull", although I remember a tweet that no one had discovered it for a good while; I don't have much time to spare, let alone in Bristol, so even if I had noticed these earlier, I doubt I'd have made the journey. It didn't come with a download code, but I'm pretty sure I could just shuffle around the tracks from Industrial in iTunes and have six-sevenths of the experience digitally. 

Format: 12", numbered (462/500)
Tracks: 7
Cost: £18 new
Bought: Record Culture
When: 26/01/21
Colour: Clear
Etching: Side A: "51°26'33'' N - 2°32'10'' W" Side B: "Seth-Wynn-Seth Forever"
mp3s: no 

Pitch Shifter - Submit

There was a while (a long time ago) when I thought I might try to get a complete collection of Pitch Shifter records, but I never really put that much effort in and the idea kinda fell away. Shortly after starting university, I found this 12" in a second hand record shop in Manchester for a bargain £4. I'd recently bought Desensitized on vinyl on eBay, so it was almost a sign to begin a collection (of course, their later albums never got pressed on vinyl, so it would have been annoyingly incomplete).

I'd not heard Submit before, but was familiar with their heavier earlier sound from Industrial. It wasn't the Pitch Shifter I'd become a fan of, but I enjoyed it for seeing their roots. Now I'm much older, Desensitized might actually be the sweet spot - I've come round to Industrial in recent years, but it's still hard work. Songs like Triad and Diable are the right mix of accessible and heavy. Interestingly, Deconstruction here feels like the missing step between those first two albums - the first hint of vocals that weren't strictly growled. It's nice to hear (versions of) Bastardiser and New Flesh P.S.I. from the Death Industrial 7" - back in the day I remember that 7" used to sell for a lot more than it seems to now.

The etching in the run-out groove tells the listener to "buy the cd for Silo", a hidden song that appears after Tendrill. 14 years after buying the 12", I haven't bought the cd so still haven't heard Silo. Maybe someday I'll spend a few £ and get a copy. It's not at the top of my priorities mind you.

Format: 12", picture sleeve
Tracks: 6
Cost: £4 second hand
Bought: Manchester
When: 15/11/03
Colour: Black
Etching: Side A: "A fat wallet production" Side B: "Buy the cd for 'Silo'"
mp3s: no

Pitch Shifter - Industrial

My introduction to Pitchshifter came in the form of Everything's Fucked from their 2000 album, Deviant; listening to Industrial you'd never know it was the same band.

It's now been 14 years since I first heard this album and, up until a few weeks ago, many years since I'd last listened to it. When I bought a copy on cd - the very same day that I bought Deviant - I had no idea what was going on. Whilst I'm not surprised that 16-year-old me didn't get it, I am surprised that 31-year-old has been enjoying it so much lately. With my hindsight-hat firmly on, I have a lot of respect for early 90's Pitch Shifter.

I can't quite seem to find the words for why I'm feeling that way about, but mostly I love how this album fully embraces bleak, angry, brutal industrial music in every way: the title - just one word that sums it all up - is brilliantly simple; the sleeve says in giant letters "VASECT SEETHE DESPISE"; the lyrics to the first song are just "Hate / I hate / You motherfucker / Drown / Bleed / I wish you would"; the black-and-white picture of the band hanging out by a freight train (of course). This record paints a pretty bleak image of the midlands in 1990. I think what it is is that there's no pretentiousness to be had anywhere. That's what I can see in this album now that I couldn't before.

This particular copy I found on eBay in 2004 for the bargain price of £2.85 (including shipping!). I never really intended to have a complete collection of Pitchshifter records but I thought it'd be a good one to buy. I'm glad I did pick it up back then. As I mentioned before, this record hasn't had a huge amount of play by me and spent many years quite unloved. I do love rediscovering albums though and I'm pleased that I'm finally able to get so much out of Industrial.

Format: 12", picture sleeve
Tracks: 8
Cost: £2.85 second-hand
Bought: eBay
When: 11/05/04
Colour: Black
Etching: Side A: "Deity embodiment" Side B: "With more clout"
mp3s: no

Pitch Shifter - The Remix War

I'm not sure whether this record counts as a mini-album, an EP or a 12" single. Seven songs puts it in the first group, but the fact that there are only four different songs makes it seem more like an EP, but then almost half the songs are remixes of Triad, so are we really just looking at a single? Luckily, none of this actually matters; I was just struggling for an opening paragraph.

I bought this on eBay at the end of my first year of university. I'd got into eBay in a big way over the year and half before that and it was proving useful in fleshing out my Pitchshifter collection (living in halls-of-residence and eBay went perfectly together, because there was always someone to receive your post). A great bargain, I got this 12" for £3 including postage. The bidding must have finished at £1, which makes me suspect I was the only one bidding on it. It's not in great condition but, of the albums they had out at the time, it was the only one I didn't have on at least one format and I wanted to hear it.

Four of the songs are remixed by Pitchshifter themselves (or Pitch Shifter, as they were known then) with Therapy?, Gunshot and Biohazard remixing one song each. All of the songs are from Desensitized and the two best songs, Triad and Diable make up most of the mixes here. To Die is Gain was a pretty decent song too and this mix is nice. The best songs here are the mixes by the other guys though - Therapy? make Diable sound like a Therapy? song and Biohazard almost seem to slow Triad down. However, the most interesting is Gunshot's 90's hip-hop take on Triad which works brilliantly. I could definitely go for more hip-hop remixes of early Pitch Shifter.


Format: 12", insert
Tracks: 7
Cost: £3 second hand
Bought: eBay
When: 08/06/04
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Pitch Shifter - Desensitized

Pitchshifter were a huge band for me and my friends for quite a number of years (something I've written about in much more detail here) but digging out their back-catalogue took quite some effort. We got into them when Deviant came out so it was quite easy to find that album and "dot com" in the shops. The first mini-album Industrial had been re-issued on cd and was fairly easy to come by too. Of course after hearing Deviant and "dot com" we were all quite knocked back by Industrial. I remember having read on the internet that Pitchshifter started as an industrial band (with a space in their name) and that the sampling and drum'n'bass came much later, however at 16 my knowledge of industrial music only really consisted of a couple of Nine Inch Nails albums so I was quite shocked by what met my ears. Still, I enjoyed it despite it almost being a different band to the one we had come to love.

Over the next few years I set about trying to find the other early Pitch Shifter albums, which was a task eBay helped considerably with. There were a few years when I spent hundreds on eBay, sending cheques to people across the country for records I'd won (these were the pre-PayPal days, and they were sloooow). During that time I picked up all the Pitch Shifter albums I was after either on cd or vinyl. I was lucky in finding this copy of Desensitized in reasonable condition for a mere £7, complete with insert.

Musically, Desensitized and Infotainment feeling like the jigsaw pieces that connect Industrial and "dot com"; the samples are there and they're starting to experiment but this album still fits perfectly on Earache Records - the guitars are cutting and vocals are still mean as shit. It's a pretty bleak album too, but that's one of the things I love about it. Diable and Triad are two of the best early Pitch Shifter songs for me (and I think the only two I ever saw them play live), but the whole album is enjoyable.


Format: 12", insert
Tracks: 12
Cost: £7 second hand
Bought: eBay
When: 18/06/03
Colour: Black
Etching: Side A:"Immitate your friends" (spelt with two m's) Side B: "Death to Pitch Shifter"
mp3s: no