Pygmalion (album)

A departure from Slowdive's previous two studio albums Just for a Day (1991) and Souvlaki (1993), Pygmalion features a more experimental sound tilted towards ambient electronic music,[1] with sparse, atmospheric arrangements. Pitchfork's Nitsuh Abebe described the album's songs as "ambient pop dreams" that are stylistically closer to post-rock than the band's trademark shoegaze style.[2] BBC Music writer Wyndham Wallace viewed Pygmalion as a shoegaze album, albeit not in the traditional sense, noting that at points the record forgoes percussion "entirely".[1]

With the exception of the lyrics for the songs "Miranda" and "Visions of LA", which were written by Rachel Goswell, Pygmalion was composed by Neil Halstead.[3] The music on the album reflected Halstead's experimentation with digital technology and techniques such as looping, which was born out of his increased fascination with dance music.[4]

Pygmalion was released on 6 February 1995 by Creation Records.[5] The cover illustration for the album, designed by Steven Woodhouse,[3] features imagery from Rainer Wehinger's graphic notation for György Ligeti's 1958 work Artikulation.[6] Though Slowdive had begun preparing for an expected tour of the United Kingdom in support of Pygmalion,[4] a week after the album's release Creation dropped Slowdive from its roster, and by the end of the year the band had split.[7][8]

The Sanctuary Records subsidiary label Castle Music issued a remastered edition of Pygmalion in 2005.[2][9] Cherry Red Records issued another remastered edition of the album on 16 August 2010, with a bonus disc consisting of demo versions of Pygmalion-era tracks.[10]

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[11]
The Guardian	[12]
NME	5/10[13]
Pitchfork	8.7/10[2]
Q	[14]
Record Collector	[15]

Pygmalion was largely overlooked by contemporary music critics.[8] With the Britpop genre at the height of its popularity, Slowdive were seen as "past-their-sell-by-date shoegazers" by a music press who were more interested in covering the Britpop scene, according to journalist Kieron Tyler.[8] NME critic John Harris wrote that Pygmalion represented a seeming act of "career suicide" by the band, for whom he composed a mock epitaph: "Slowdive... They could have had the world, but they decided to go all skeletal and wibbly and make sneakingly fascinating records that will sell absolutely fart all."[13] More enthusiastic was Q's Andrew Collins, who said that "Pygmalion basks splendidly in its own sod-you resonant shapelessness."[14] Caroline Sullivan of The Guardian was intrigued by the album's sound and quipped that it "should spark many a philosophy debate—after all, if music is this minimal, can it be said to exist at all?"[12]

In a retrospective review for Pitchfork, Nitsuh Abebe called Pygmalion "a detour of the best sort",[2] while in a separate appraisal for AllMusic, Abebe said that "for anyone who appreciates the indirect and intangible, it's a stylistic masterpiece."[11] In his review for BBC Music, Wyndham Wallace wrote that Pygmalion "remains Halstead and Goswell's masterpiece",[1] while Head Heritage writer Rust Phimister said that with the album, "Slowdive distilled the expansive aural atmospheres of Souvlaki to perfection."[16] Trouser Press, however, found that Pygmalion "completely lacks all the tension, songwriting, sounds and power of the band's work, leaving only the spatial dimensions", deeming it "essentially a solo ambient recording" by Halstead "that should have been released under his own name".[17]

The Pygmalion song "Blue Skied an' Clear" was featured in the 1995 film The Doom Generation; Gregg Araki, the film's director, is an avowed fan of Slowdive.[8]

In 1999, critic Ned Raggett ranked Pygmalion at number 122 on his list of the best albums of the 1990s for Freaky Trigger.[18] In 2016, Pitchfork listed it as the 12th best shoegaze album of all time.[19] Pitchfork described Pygmalion as a "post-rock masterpiece" in a 2018 article that included quotes from several musicians professing appreciation for the record, including members of Low, The Twilight Sad, Deafheaven, Múm, A Place to Bury Strangers, Survive, and Girlpool.[20]

All tracks are written by Neil Halstead, except where noted.

Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.[3]

Slowdive

• Rachel Goswell – vocals, guitar
• Neil Halstead – vocals, guitar
• Christian Savill – guitar
• Nick Chaplin – bass guitar
• Ian McCutcheon – drums

Production

• Chris Hufford – production, engineering
• Slowdive – production, engineering

Design

• Steven Woodhouse – cover illustration

• Pygmalion at Discogs (list of releases)
• Pygmalion at MusicBrainz (list of releases)