Handcream for a Generation

Cornershop released their third studio album When I Was Born for the 7th Time in September 1997.[1] Its lead single "Brimful of Asha" (1997) became a commercial success after it was remixed by Fatboy Slim, reaching number one in several territories. This led to a supporting slot for Oasis on their headlining tour of the United States.[2] In 1998, the band took a break from touring for the majority of the year; exceptions to this were appearances at various European festivals in July 1998.[3][4][5] They released two vinyl-only singles during 1998, remixes of "Good Shit" and "Candyman". Frontman Tjinder Singh and guitarist Ben Ayres acted as DJs for some venues and radio stations during this downtime.[3]

Singh and Ayres spent sometime working on their funk side project Clinton.[6] They started their own record label Meccio Records, where they released music by artists they liked.[7] Clinton released their debut studio album Disco and the Halfway to Discontent in January 2000.[6] Singh said he was suffering from fatigue and was dealing with personal issues. Around this time, Cornershop left their American label Luaka Bop, who had shifted distribution away from Warner Bros. Records to Virgin Records.[8] Singh said the label was going through a restructuring process, which he did not want to deal with.[9] In June 2000, Cornershop were rehearsing guitar-led material for the next album, having four songs finished by this point.[7][10]

Handcream for a Generation was recorded at West Orange Studios in Pretson and Eastcote Studios in Ladbroke Grove, between mid-2000 and June 2001, with Singh acting as producer.[11][12] They would spend a few days at one of these studios, then a few days at the other, and repeat this over a period of time. They would playback the songs while driving on the motorway, which in turn helped them come up with new ideas.[7] Rob Swift of the X-Ecutioners co-produced and mixed "Wogs Will Walk" and "Slip the Drummer One"; Singh said Swift was "very simplistic, no messing about, just getting to a groove".[11][13] Singh wanted songs that worked well in a live setting, which meant recording a bass guitar for the first time. Partway through the sessions, Singh's father had died and his wife later gave birth to his first child.[13] Alan Gregson and Philip Bagenal served as executive engineers; Mike Marsh then mastered the album at The Exchange.[11]

Handcream for a Generation retreads the Punjabi rock of When I Was Born for the 7th Time and the electro-funk of Clinton's sole album.[14] Singh said he came up with the album's title a couple of years prior and used it was a lyric in two of the songs.[12] Matt Cibula of PopMatters referred to it as a concept album "made to express Singh's disapproval of the way modern music is handled".[15] AllMusic reviewer Stephen Thomas Erlewine said Singh borrows the guitar sound of Oasis member Noel Gallagher "throughout the record; and winds up with a record that is hipper, looser, and funkier than [Oasis'] Be Here Now, but weirdly reminiscent of it all the same".[16] Los Angeles Times' Natalie Nichols noted that the band had "always fused disparate elements," this time expanding on the sound of their last album with "such Punjabi staples as sitar and tabla, along with squiggly electronica, vampy glam-rock, funk riffs, dub reggae, soul grooves and more".[17]

The soul-funk of "Heavy Soup" opens Handcream for a Generation with Otis Clay acting as the MC, backed by Memphis-styled horns.[14][18][19] Alongside this, Julian Argüelles played bass clarinet, Ian Hooper added keyboards and Mick Greenwood provided trumpet.[11] "Staging the Plaguing of the Raised Platform", which features a children's choir, strings and bass played by Alan Gregson, who owns West Orange Studios, comes across as a remake of "Brimful of Asha".[11][20][21] "Music Plus 1" apes the disco house sound of Daft Punk, in addition to blending dance beats, techno, electro-funk and jangly guitar work.[20][17] For "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III", Singh compared learning lessons from the movies of the same name to learning about the music industry. The lyrics include comments on the nu metal trend, and overall state of the music industry, which Singh said was "saddening to see what has happened to it - for it to be more manufactured, to see more managers running it, to see less artistry".[12] The song features Paul McGuigan of Oasis on bass, while its rhythm was reminiscent of "Rocks" (1994) by Primal Scream.[11][22]

Noel Gallagher (left) and Sheema Mukherjee (right) played guitar and sitar, respectively, on the 14-minute long track "Spectral Mornings".

"Wogs Will Walk" evokes Cornershop's early songs, namely the material on their early EPs, with its garage-soul organ and electronic sounds, as well as chanted vocals that are fed through a boombox; it draws an overall comparison to There's a Riot Goin' On (1971) by Sly Stone.[23] A repeating two-note organ pattern is heard throughout, interrupted by scratching from Swift.[24] "Motion the 11" is a roots reggae song with elements of Punjabi music, accompanied by flugelhorn from Greenwood, bass by Gregson and vocals from Doreen Edwards.[11][20][19] It opens with Rastafarin chanting from London-based reggae toasters Jack Wilson and Kojak of the Nazralites.[11][25] "People Power" shares the same set of lyrics as the first track on Disco and the Halfway to Discontent, set to Orange Juice-esque music.[22][15] "Sounds Super Recordings" is a faux radio advertisement with tabla and breakbeats, detailing the death of an Indian musician.[14][23][25]

"The London Radar" is an audio collage of clipping vocals that recites aeroplane protocols, which also recalls Daft Punk's sound, as well as the work of the Chemical Brothers.[18][15][25][26] "Spectral Mornings" is an 14-minute long psychedelic song that channels the 1960s work of the Grateful Dead.[16][20][19] The song, which attempts to recall "7:20am Jullandar Shere" from the band's second studio album Woman's Gotta Have It (1995), features sitar performed by Sheema Mukherjee, and guitar by Gallagher.[11][21] When touring with Oasis, Gallagher would performed with Cornershop and wanted to collaborate with them. A failed attempt occurred when Clinton was working on their debut, while Gallagher was working on an Oasis album.[12] The first demo of "Spectral Mornings" ran for 40 minutes, to which Singh said it "would have been longer, but the tape ran out".[13] "Slip the Drummer One" includes scratching sounds from Swift; a reprise of "Heavy Soup" concludes the album.[11][15]

In August 2001, Cornershop released "Motion the 11" on a promotional seven-inch vinyl record after a DJ set in London.[27] On 8 January 2002, Handcream for a Generation was announced for released three months' time; alongside this, its track listing was posted online.[28] "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" was made available for streaming through Dotmusic's website on 1 February 2002.[29] Later that month, the band previewed songs from the forthcoming album at a one-off performance at the Scala Theatre in London.[30] The day prior to the show, a continuously changing remix of "Spectral Mornings" was posted on their website.[31] Following this, they performed a one-off show in Germany.[32] "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" was released as the album's lead single at 4 March 2002.[33] Two versions were released on CD: the first with "Returning from the Wreckage" and a remix of "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" by Osymyso, while the second included remixes of "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" by Midfield General and Detroit Grand Pubahs.[34][35] All of the remixes were released on 12-inch vinyl records, two for the UK and one in the US.[36][37][38]

Handcream for a Generation was released on 1 April 2002 through Wiiija, which was promoted with a UK tour that same month and a US tour that lasted until the end of May 2002.[30][39][40] The US edition, released on 23 April 2002, was done through BMG and distributed by V2 Records.[8][41] Coinciding with this, "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" was released to Modern rock radio stations in the US in May 2002.[9] Before returning to the UK, they performed at the Fleadh Nua festival in Ireland.[42] The band supported Oasis for a one-off show in London in July 2002, and co-headlined the Summer Sundae festival.[43][44] "Staging the Plaguing of the Raised Platform" was released as single on 19 August 2002 under the shortened title "Staging".[43][45] Two versions were released on CD: the first with "Green P's" and the music video for "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III", while the second featured "Straight Aces" and remixes of "Staging" and "Motion the 11".[46][47] Around this, the band performed at the Reading and Leeds Festivals.[48] In October 2002, it was announced that the band were dropped by Wiiija because of poor album sales, and later denied rumours that they had broken-up.[49][50]

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	78/100[51]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[16]
Entertainment Weekly	B[52]
The Guardian	[20]
Los Angeles Times	[17]
NME	8/10[18]
Pitchfork	7.6/10[19]
Q	[53]
Rolling Stone	[23]
Spin	6/10[14]
The Village Voice	A[54]

Handcream for a Generation was met with generally favourable from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 78, based on 23 reviews.[51]

In a review for The Guardian, journalist Alexis Petridis complimented the variety of music styles, writing that "[w]hat should be an incoherent jumble is held together by sheer exuberance". Though, akin to Sandinista! (1980) by the Clash, the album's "ambitions are occasionally overreaching", singling out "Spectral Mornings" as "pushing it a bit" and "Slip the Drummer One" "meanders about in a directionless, potheaded haze".[20] Nichols said that while "these lush tracks may at any instant recall Booker T., the Velvet Underground, XTC, T. Rex or countless other acts, they’re indisputably Cornershop".[17] Tim Kessler of NME said it "lifts the soul with a joyful infusion of psychedelic thinking and brilliant rhythmic cross-genre filching".[18] Pitchfork contributor Rob Mitchum said that with the album's "effortless genre-hopping and EPCOT cultural sampling, [it] is the most globalist musical statement" since the music video for "Black or White" (1991) by Michael Jackson.[19]

David Fricke of Rolling Stone opined that the album "is a festive crash of cultures, a Babel of loops and ethnic body language. Dixie R&B, Bollywood kitsch, Crooklyn hip-hop, Eurotrash electronics -- [...] Singh shakes 'em up like rats in a box".[23] Robert Christgau in The Village Voice praised Singh as someone who "comes to the idea of world music naturally" and described the album's mood as "[h]ow to be conscious and happy at the same time".[54] Erlewine said that while the album "all flows well", there was "no hiding that for all their political stances and past reputation, Cornershop doesn't really have all that much to say this time around".[16] In a review for Spin, journalist Josh Kun said it "often feels mapless" compared to the subdued nature of their last album.[14] Ian McCaleb and Brad Reno of Trouser Press thought it was a "very bad" sequel to Clinton's debut, as it "focuses almost entirely on energetic grooves, proving that all the momentum in the world is worthless if it’s not headed in a specific direction".[21] Chart Attack writer Elizabeth Chorney-Booth criticized the band for leaving "us waiting for nearly five years for something this mediocre" that had "too much filler".[55]

Handcream for a Generation peaked at number 30 on the UK Albums Chart. "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" and "Staging the Plaguing of the Raised Platform" peaked at 37 and 80 on the UK Singles Chart, respectively.[56]

All songs written by Tjinder Singh.[11]

1. "Heavy Soup" – 3:21
2. "Staging the Plaguing of the Raised Platform" – 4:35
3. "Music Plus 1" – 4:46
4. "Lessons Learned from Rocky I to Rocky III" – 4:24
5. "Wogs Will Walk" – 4:54
6. "Motion the 11" – 5:46
7. "People Power" – 3:54
8. "Sounds Super Recordings" – 1:30
9. "The London Radar" – 4:07
10. "Spectral Mornings" – 14:24
11. "Slip the Drummer One" – 3:42
12. "Heavy Soup (Outro)" – 2:13
13. "Straight Aces" (bonus track) – 3:16

Personnel per booklet.[11]

Citations

Sources

• Handcream for a Generation at YouTube (streamed copy where licensed)
• Handcream for a Generation at Discogs (list of releases)