The Primordial Undermind story begins in the fall of 1988, when Eric Arn parted company with Connecticut's legendary Crystalized Movements and moved to Pasadena, CA for grad school. Eric recorded some demos, and sent them to penpal Nick Saloman of the Bevis Frond. The subsequent favourable response and directive to "go forth and form a band" resulted in the recruitment of some fellow scientists to record 10 full-band demos. Saloman was to produce an LP for the nascent Undermind, but an inability to get more than one planet in place at a time resulted in Arn flying to London to do the recording with Saloman on bass, and Martin Crowley (Bevis Frond) on drums. Bits and pieces of these sessions appeared over time, such as the track "Swimming the Ultramoon" on the 1991 7" compilation "If I Could Hear You I Would Hit You" from the Baby Huey label.

In the spirit of open, but always focused, collective membership that would come to typify the band, the original rhythm section departed, as Nathan Wilson (bass), Brian Craft (guitar), and Skip Turner (drums) jumped in, bringing things up to 1992. The first fruit of this incarnation was the "Sferic Mandalas from the Ecclips'd Eye" single on Baby Huey in September 1992. These tracks display a lysergically melodic punk-rock edge, with fine twin guitar work. Another single, including the classically ornate psychedelia of "Aenesthetic Revelations" followed in April 1993. 1993 also saw release of a full-length cassette on the deep underground Shrimper label called "And All Tall Monsters Stand". Poster-boy Dave Stankoski came into the fold on bass, and Hollywood screenwriter/director David Atkins stepped up on drums, to form the lineup that recorded two superb albums: "Yet More Wonders of the Invisible World" for German "head" label September Gurls, and "You and Me and the Continuum" on Camera Obscura.

The former is heavily song-based, with concise and well-structured acid rock tracks occasionally giving full reign to superb guitar interplay and Eastern influences . Some tracks point the way to the freer and more extended feel of the "You and Me and the Continuum" album. Between the releases of these albums, Arn relocated to Boston, along with guitarist Craft, where they joined up with the former Estes Rockets rhythm section of Bill Huss and Jason Marcoux. This lineup performed extensively, including sets at the first three Deep Heaven festivals (which the band in large part initiated), and the Ptolemaic Terrascope's Terrastock festival in Providence, RI. By 1998 it was back again to the West Coast for the band, this time to the SF Bay area. A hybrid of the LA and Boston line-ups came together for Terrastock II in '98, prompting the formation of a working SF line-up. The tenacious Brian Craft remained, and a new rhythm section was recruited in the persons of Bret Holley and enigmatic skin-pounder Grawer as well as the addition of Doug Pearson on violin and electronics. KFJC radio overlord Steve Taiclet also joined the band for a crucial stint on guitar. This line-up recorded PU's third full-length "Universe I've Got" in 1999. The release of this disc prompted the band's first major tour, the Camera Obscura Rolling Psychedelic Circus. They were joined by Salamander of Minneapolis and Tokyo, Japan's Overhang Party for a manic jaunt from west to east coast and back. Late 1999 found Eric making yet another move, this time to steamy Austin, Texas.

Austin proved to be fertile ground for growth and change, with a rotating Undermind lineup at various times including Tom Carter, Dave Cameron, Courtney Cater, BC Smith, Otis Cleveland, Jared Barron, Johnny Mac, Matt Martinez, Travis Weller, Joe Volpi, Elizabeth Warren, and Vanessa Arn. A relatively spare quartet of these folks recorded the Undermind's all-instrumental expansive fourth album "Beings of Game P-U" for Camera Obscura in summer 2000. Various combos of the above players have appeared at the SXSW fest (five times), and completed a west coast tour with Seattle's Kinski in late 2001 and an east coast/midwest tour with Portland's Davis Redford Triad in spring 2002. A determined septet converged in mid 2002 to record the Undermind's fifth full-length outing "Thin Shells of Revolution", which was released on Austin's Emperor Jones label in late 2003, coinciding with an eastern US tour alongside Austin spacerockers ST37.

At the end of 2004 the Arns picked up stakes once again and sailed across the seas to settle in Vienna, Austria. A series of intensive recording sessions at Douglas Ferguson's Still Studio in Austin were conducted just before the move, providing abundant raw material that has been refined into the latest Primordial opus, 'Loss of Affect'. Stay tuned for release plans on that one. No one can say what will happen as the spirit of the Undermind mixes with the musical ghosts and healthy improv/avant-garde scene of Vienna, but it'll probably be weird...


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"Universe I've Got" in The Wire

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