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Just wanted to hear what you all think. For me Phanerothyme has been *THE* MP album the last fifteen+ years. The one I always come back to, and never get tired of. (For the record: in my digital player I have deleted California, cause it just shouldn’t have been on the album imo!)
Don’t know why because I probably appreciate AADAP more, and TU. But, it’s got some special magic to it, an easiness, the songwriting is on point, it’s really well crafted, and feels less contrived than previous and later efforts (which I all love needless to say). My theory is that Bent had a lot of songs that didn’t quite fit LTEC, because that album was such a “thing”. So Phanerothyme has a more open vibe. And Snahs three efforts are great. And we have the captain: Painting the Night Unreal. And Gebs best song: When You’re Dead.
One of my favorite activities when I need some peace of mind is to drive, or walk, in the Norwegian countryside in the dusk, and just look at all the houses, the trees and everything. Rain or sun. And my goto soundtrack to this activity is always Phanerothyme. Simply magical.
Would love to hear if anyone feels the same or have other (a bit unexpected) albums that just pop out.
the album I got into the band, received a copy as a present on my 18th birtday…
but why shouldn’t california be on the album?
I agree, but for me it’s the whole LTEC/Phanerothyme/IALC trilogy.
After those albums I kinda lost interest, although I still consider myself a fan (since 1993!).This is a very interesting topic, as I kind of lost interest during those years. Live gigs continued being really good, but the albums received few spins from my side. Barracuda and Fishtank have had way more spins being from that era. And when Litte Lucid came out, it felt like they finally were back. But there it is, we emphasis and embrace different things.
To me, “Phanerothyme” is better than its two “companions”. While “LTEC” has a really good first half, side 2 is quite weak. On “IALC” I only find “Neverland”, “This otherness” and “Custer’s last stand” top quality.
“Phanerothyme” is way more even plus contains two of my all time favorite Mp tracks: “For free” and “Painting the night unreal”.
In 2019 I asked Bent if he had a least favorite Mp album, and he immediately replied that “LTEC”, “Phanerothyme” and “IALC” shouldn’t have been three whole albums – especially the two latter he wasn’t too fond of, if memory serves me right – and Snah quickly agreed.
This reminds me: for a while I’ve been thinking about starting an Underrated/Overrated topic. Maybe it’s time?
Love Cult has “The Mirror and the Lie”, which alone makes it great. The bass riff (or is it guitar?) in the calm middle part is a forerunner to an obviously derived tune on “Gullible’s travails”. For me no weak track on the album – well, yes, “Serpentine” probably ;-)
And LTEC Side 2? “Whip That Ghost”, “Stained Glass”, even “30/30” – great tracks!
Therefore for me there are three best of three between 2000 and 2002 – or out of four, if you count “Barracuda” in, which isn’t bad itself.
Phanerothyme got me into MP so it’ll always have a special place in my heart, and its certainly up there among my favourite albums.
I feel the LP version of Phanerothym flows slightly better, however (where The Slow Phase Out and Go To California switch places).
Wow, I’m surprised about Bent so offhandedly discarding that trilogy!? Tho he’s always said P is a good album to wash the dishes to, so maybe he has some grievances. For me it’s of course really great, and a bit unexpected, as I usually like the heavier and more proggy side of MP – esp when combined w some great tunes, which there are loads off.
I remember the excitement of LTEC as I was big psychonaut in the 90s, so I was both curious and a bit afraid of what (and why!) they were going “pop” (as they said back then). When the album came out I was a bit underwhelmed. Then Phanorethyme remedied everything. Remember Bent said around the release that it was a “pocket-symphony”, which is a good take imo. Sort of small in scale and topics, no typical MP grandiosity, but the melodies are just flowing, mesmerizing. So, I def get more kicks out of a lot of the other records, or sections of other records, but this one I can always just play on repeat, when doing dishes or driving, and it’s just wonderful.
My California issue is totally due to an unhealthy appetite for the Doors in my teens, which has later led to an almost allergic reactions to that specific band, so when MP sampled the organ build up of Light My Fire I though it was highly unnecessary!
My favourite MP period is “Trust us/RW1”. In the year between these two albums I grew from a casual fan into a full-on psychonaut, traveling to an out-of-town show (at Beatpol Dresden) for the very first time in spring 1999, shortly after the release of RW1.
Today, 29 years after I had first discovered MP, I rarely listen to their studio albums, maybe 3-4 times a year plus new stuff upon release. When I do play an album from the back catalogue I always choose
“LTEC” followed by “Phanerothyme”. Which is weird because at the time the pop period seemed like a deviation from the heavy rock path, a commercial detour. Maybe that is more true for the latter than for the former, because the class of LTEC became apparent very soon after its release.I am not sure why I prefer to listen to these albums, maybe I have grown older and mellower or maybe, I like to think, they are indeed timeless works of high quality, maybe more timeless than, let’s say, AADAP. These albums still sound fresh every time, they are even growing on me 25 years after their release.
For this reason I am with you in considering them among the best works in the band’s legacy.
Great to read your stories! I discovered MP right after LTEC, so Phanerothyme was the first album I bought upon release. I still remember how I discovered it in the shelf on the day it came out.
Usually, an album grows on you, but in this case I also grew into the album. I really loved it right from the start, but I was also a bit pissed that I showed up too late for the AADAP/TU-party. Anyway, for a 17 year old it was a rather mature album, but because of that it didn’t wear off. The album’s qualities grew bigger and it is also my go-to album to this day.
Certainly also because it’s firmly tied to a great time in my life. The songs radiate a specific lightness and a bright optimistic look into the future of that time. The musical complexity of the later era often pushed that natural lightness aside.It’s a really good record, not only a collection of pretty songs but also a really solid album in the way it flows together near perfectly (the exception being Go to California, which is a fun song in itself but to me feels a bit “off” in the context of the album, it doesn’t seem to share the same mood). It’s by far my favorite of the pop trilogy, and the only one I’ll listen to gladly without skips. Actually, if I were to compile a “best of” from LTCE and Love Cult, Phanerothyme would still be better. Those other two records have their moments (The Other Fool, Stained Glass, Serpentine) but they also have pretty significant lows.
I’d love to hear more from Phanerothyme live. I’ll never dislike Go to California but it’s sad that in 14 concerts that’s the only song from the record that I got to hear, and I’m still bummed that I missed For Free this year.I am re-posting this because after I tried to edit it, it disappeared from the forum. Apologies for the duplication.
Prior to the recent tour a client/colleague asked me who I was going to see and why three times? She’s a late-50s Japanese American based in New York City, from a highly respected and well-placed family, and an expert in her chosen field of the history of Baroque and Renaissance art (very high-brow). We’ve never met in person but we’ve been working together for over ten years. I told her it was Motorpsycho and explained the repeat concerts in terms of the Grateful Dead, who I expected she might have heard of. Ha! It turns out she had been a little bit of a Deadhead in her college days, so understood exactly, and even described in her own words pretty much perfectly what I had tried to relay.
She then asked me to recommend something by them. So I suggested Phanerothyme. I just couldn’t imagine her freaking out to Timothy’s Monster, or Trust Us, or HMF, or DDU, for example, but Phanerothyme – great grooves, accessible songs, some recognisable musical references (East Coast US psych / Doors / Mamas and Papas …). She listened once and immediately bought it and stuck it on her happy, walking playlist! This was not the result I expected – I was dead happy :D
Phano was one of the two albums recommended to me by a friend when I first crossed the MP threshold. The other was Behind The Sun.
So I come at this as someone who didn’t hear Phano until 2017 – and with no prior experience of the band. I immediately loved it. And I still do. It’s my favourite of the three (LTEC, Phano, IALC), all of which I really like. I’m not so enamoured of Barracuda, but Fishtank is among my favourites – I remember the first time I heard it (possibly the third or fourth MP album I listened to) and being utterly blown away by Tristano – but that’s another story.
Phano continues to be one of my go-to albums, especially if I want a bit of a happy pick-me-up. And I just can’t get away from associating Go To California with sunny weather, so the album comes out a lot more in the summer months. From the quiet, gentle intoxication of her bedroom eyes, followed by the kinetic blast of For Free (especially the “Completely out of control …” part), all the way through to Geb’s whimsical vision of death (quite possibly one of my funeral choices), it’s a superb album that makes the heavy light and the dark bright. LOVE IT!
Awesome topic. I have always loved this album. Every song is amazing in my opinion.
I have very fond memories of the 2001 Tivoli Utrecht gig where they played six songs from Phanerothyme, including When yr Dead. Beautifull.
I guess it’s time for a critical re-evaluation, because this is the album which I really felt represented a drop in quality. It’s not that it’s bad as such, it just felt like it was a bit contrived and not as naturally flowing as the previous Motorpsycho albums.
In fairness, the change really came with LTEC, but at the time that album came out I was such a huge fan that I swallowed it whole upon release. After a while it began to sink in that there were some clunkers (Never Let You Out the biggest offender), but there are also some really nice songs (My Best Friend, Stained Glass, The Other Fool, Upstairs-Downstairs). By the time Phanerothyme was released, I was as much of a fan, but another album where it felt like they were trying too hard to do something different to their 90s stuff turned me off. The majority of the album feels bland to me and that’s the way I remember it. In that way it marked a turning point for me, and I actually felt IALC was more inspired and closer to the “true” Motorpsycho even if that is a rather flawed album.
I’ll try to revisit it with an open mind, but it has always resided near the bottom of the pile for me. But one thing I’ve learned with Motorpsycho is that one man’s shit is another man’s gold…
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