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''This Is A Fix'' is the second album by Wales-based band
The Automatic
The Automatic (also known as The Automatic Automatic in the U.S.) was a Welsh rock band. The band's last-known lineup was composed of Robin Hawkins on vocals, bass and synthesisers, James Frost on guitar, synthesisers, backing vocals and occas ...
. It was released on 25 August 2008. The band worked with producer Don Gilmore in Los Angeles, but were disappointed with these sessions, and instead worked with
Butch Walker
Bradley Glenn "Butch" Walker (born November 14, 1969) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and record producer. He was the lead guitarist for the glam metal band SouthGang from the late 1980s to early 1990s as well as the lead vocalist ...
at Sage and Sound Recording in Los Angeles then back in
Cardiff
Cardiff (; cy, Caerdydd ) is the capital and largest city of Wales. It forms a principal area, officially known as the City and County of Cardiff ( cy, Dinas a Sir Caerdydd, links=no), and the city is the eleventh-largest in the United Kingd ...
with Richard Jackson and
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
with
Stephen Harris.
The Automatic began work in 2006 on the follow-up to previous album ''
Not Accepted Anywhere
''Not Accepted Anywhere'' is the debut album from Welsh rock band The Automatic, originally released on 19 June 2006. Working with producers Stephen Harris, Richard Jackson and Ian Broudie on different tracks at a variety of studios around the ...
'', however after the departure of
Alex Pennie
Alexander Gregor Pennie (born 14 December 1985) was previously in Welsh band The Automatic from the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales, where he provided backing vocals as well as playing synthesizers and keyboards for the act. Pennie left The Au ...
and addition of
Paul Mullen, the completed recordings of such songs as "Steve McQueen" and "Revolution" - which featured Pennie providing synths and vocals - were shelved and later re-recorded with Mullen. Writing took place sporadically - with songs originating from both before and after Mullen's joining.
The album spawned only one single "
Steve McQueen", however "Magazines" and "Secret Police" were originally planned for release as singles. ''This Is A Fix'' leaked onto the internet a month before release, it was also hindered by online distribution issues - which saw both the single "Steve McQueen" and album get released late across sites such as
iTunes and
7digital
7digital Group Plc is a British publicly listed company that offers access to music, tracking and reporting for clients. London-based, 7digital provides end-to-end music services for the fitness, social media, DSPs, and gaming industries with b ...
.
Recording and production
Aborted 2006 Sessions
In late 2006 the band - consisting of Rob, Pennie, Frost and Iwan were reported to be preparing new material for their upcoming
NME
''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...
Indie Rock tour.
In late December 2006 it was revealed that the band had been in the studio, and had recorded two new untitled songs which were intended for release after the NME tour as a single. This single, whilst fully recorded and ready to go, was for unknown reasons never released, however the songs featured were revealed to be "Steve McQueen" and "Revolution".
Demoing & Aborted sessions with Don Gilmore
After touring extensively for the album ''Not Accepted Anywhere'' the band returned to the studio, and as of September 2007 had around 10 tracks in various stages of development. Keyboard and vocalist Alex Pennie then left the band in September 2007, with the band going on to report they would be heading to the US to work on their second album. A month after the departure of Alex Pennie in October 2007, former
yourcodenameis:milo frontman
Paul Mullen was revealed to be joining the band as a second guitarist, vocalist and synthesizer player.
Having already written new material throughout the year such as "Steve McQueen", "Revolution", "Accessories" and "Hard Rock" the band continued writing and demoing material in Cardiff with producer Richard Jackson. Upon the first day of Paul Mullen practicing with the band in their Cardiff studio the band wrote "Paul Harris", later appearing on the album as "This Ship".
[ , 5 August 2009] On 4 November 2007 guitarist James Frost posted onto
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
a studio video of the band recording, previewing such songs as "Magazines" and "In This World" in the demoing stage.
In January the band began recording in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
with Don Gilmore, working on some 17 different tracks, with Frost posting two further video updates onto YouTube of recording in LA, previewing new songs "Seven Eight", "Make The Mistakes", "Sleepwalking" amongst other tracks. Five weeks into recording, with the album close to completion, the band decided they were unhappy with the progression of the sessions, and ultimately stopped working with Gilmore.
Sessions with Butch Walker and Richard Jackson
After spending five of the allocated 8 weeks in Los Angeles with Gilmore, the band only had 3 weeks left, so it was decided that they would complete as much as possible with producer
Butch Walker
Bradley Glenn "Butch" Walker (born November 14, 1969) is an American singer-songwriter, musician, and record producer. He was the lead guitarist for the glam metal band SouthGang from the late 1980s to early 1990s as well as the lead vocalist ...
in LA, and then return to Cardiff and complete the album with producer Richard Jackson. With Walker the band recorded "Steve McQueen", "Magazines", "In The Mountains", "Bad Guy" and "Secret Police", in these sessions the band tried different techniques to how they had previously recorded, with Iwan recording cymbals separately to the rest of the kit.
Walker, along with
Chris T-T
Chris T-T (born Christopher Thorpe-Tracey, 16 September 1974) is a retired English singer-songwriter based in Brighton. In a 20-year career he released 10 studio albums, two live collections and a number of collaborations. He is also a speaker, ...
and
Frank Turner
Francis Edward Turner (born 28 December 1981), is an English punk and folk singer-songwriter from Meonstoke, Hampshire. He began his career as the vocalist of post-hardcore band Million Dead, then embarked upon a primarily acoustic-based sol ...
recorded with the band on "Steve McQueen", providing gang vocals and extra percussion.
The band returned to Cardiff, recording "Responsible Citizen", "Accessories", "This Is A Fix", "Sleepwalking", "Make The Mistakes" and "Light Entertainment" with Richard Jackson at Warwick Halls of Sound in Cardiff, as well as recording "This Ship" at the
Olympic Studios in London with producer
Stephen Harris.
Composition
It was revealed early on that the second album would be darker and heavier than the previous album, whilst still having a catchy pop element to it. With the first album the band had tried to stick to writing big chorus singles - which they felt had come out sounding quite similar, however with ''This Is A Fix'' the band let the tracks evolve without worrying about writing singles. This ultimately led to the band having far more potential singles than with ''Not Accepted Anywhere''.
Lyrics and themes
''This Is A Fix'' lyrically sticks to no particular sound or topic, the title itself is even left open to interpretation; "It could mean, a drugs fix, it could mean a solution to something, or a fix as in a set-up" Hawkins told the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
in July 2008. There are however some recurring themes - although they were not intentional; espionage and being lied and manipulated to by the media and government appear frequently
Tracks which deal with deceptions, and specially target certain bodies include "Responsible Citizen" which addresses the government's policies on drinking, "Magazines" is written about the band's experiences with the press and how the media can manipulate its audience. "Accessories" similarly deals with the media - specifically the record industry. Title track "This Is A Fix" is loosely based around government
war
War is an intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or paramilitary groups such as mercenaries, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violence, destruction, and mortality, using regular o ...
and the lies surrounding war, whilst "Secret Police" also talks of government lies and espionage. "In The Mountains" focuses on drug use and those who don't consider the consequences.
"Steve McQueen" wraps up themes from the first album - with the band's experience of growing up and returning to their home but no longer feeling a part of it. "Sleepwalking" is specifically about
Jan Grzebski - a Polish man who awoke from his
coma after 19 years in 2007 and the change that occurred while he was unconscious. Written after a party in
Beverly Hills
Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California. A notable and historic suburb of Greater Los Angeles, it is in a wealthy area immediately southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. ...
the band attended, they were asked by
Barbara Broccoli
Barbara Dana Broccoli (born June 18, 1960) is an American film and stage producer, best known internationally for her work on the ''James Bond'' film series. With her half-brother Michael G. Wilson, Broccoli controls the ''James Bond'' film fr ...
- the daughter of
Albert R. Broccoli
Albert Romolo Broccoli ( ; April 5, 1909 – June 27, 1996), nicknamed "Cubby", was an American film producer who made more than 40 motion pictures throughout his career. Most of the films were made in the United Kingdom and often filmed at Pi ...
, to come up with a
James Bond
The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...
theme tune
Theme music is a musical composition that is often written specifically for radio programming, television shows, video games, or films and is usually played during the title sequence, opening credits, closing credits, and in some instances at som ...
. The song was written to oppose the convention of being about the films hero - 007, and instead concentrates on the ''bad guys'' - because the band felt they were more interesting than the ''good guy''. In interview Frost also has noted they never intended to use the chorus because they though they were stupid, however eventually got used to them and forgot.
[2008 This Is A Fix London press session, streamed by ]Last.fm
Last.fm is a music website founded in the United Kingdom in 2002. Using a music recommender system called "Audioscrobbler", Last.fm builds a detailed profile of each user's musical taste by recording details of the tracks the user listens to, e ...
via Polydor
Polydor Records Ltd. is a German-British record label that operates as part of Universal Music Group. It has a close relationship with Universal's Interscope Geffen A&M Records label, which distributes Polydor's releases in the United States ...
Records
Many of the album's tracks changed titles throughout development - often when naming songs the band use wherever they are at the time, previous examples included "Raoul" - after the sandwich shop they visited whilst working on ''Not Accepted Anywhere'' and "High Tide on Caroline Street" - after the road in Cardiff. "Responsible Citizen" was originally titled "Hard Rock" after the
Hard Rock Cafe
Hard Rock Cafe, Inc. is a British-based multinational chain of theme restaurants, memorabilia shops, casinos and museums founded in 1971 by Isaac Tigrett and Peter Morton in London. In 1979, the cafe began covering its walls with rock and r ...
, "Arjans" was a sandwich shop in Cardiff and was the working title for "In The Mountains", "
Millennium Stadium" was the working title for "Sleepwalking" - this was because the band felt the song had a stadium rock feel to it. "Light Entertainment" was initially titled "Seven Eight" because of its
time signature
The time signature (also known as meter signature, metre signature, or measure signature) is a notational convention used in Western musical notation to specify how many beats (pulses) are contained in each measure (bar), and which note va ...
, "This Ship" was known as "Paul Harris" - the man responsible for signing the band to Polydor/B-Unique. "Secret Police" when performed in 2007 and during recording was titled "Revolution" - a reference to the lyrics.
Music and style
With the departure of
Alex Pennie
Alexander Gregor Pennie (born 14 December 1985) was previously in Welsh band The Automatic from the Vale of Glamorgan, South Wales, where he provided backing vocals as well as playing synthesizers and keyboards for the act. Pennie left The Au ...
, who provided synthesizers and high pitched vocals on the band's debut, and the addition of
Paul Mullen it was insisted by the band that Mullen would not be continuing what Pennie did on the first record. Instead Mullen would be providing additional guitar, along with vocals that would not be imitating Alex Pennie's vocal style.
Mullen's addition lead to their being no set frontman, with Hawkins, Frost and Mullen splitting vocals as well as synthesizer parts.
On ''This Is A Fix'', similarly to their debut, the band use a variety of synthesizers and keyboards -
Roland Juno and
Alesis Andromeda
The Alesis Andromeda A6 ''(A6 is an acronym: A - A, 6 - SIX, and their consonance corresponds to "ASICs" which is an abbreviation for "Application Specific integrated Circuits")'' is a 16-voice, 16-channel multitimbral analog synthesizer by Alesi ...
's were used purely in the studio, whilst the James Frost operated
Alesis Micron
The Alesis Ion is an analog modeling synthesizer. It was presented to the public on the Summer NAMM of 2002. Unlike the Alesis Andromeda, Alesis's analog synthesizer, its sounds are synthesized using DSP chips to mimic the sound of analog audio ...
and Paul Mullen operated
MicroKORG appear both live and on studio recordings.
The way the drums were recorded was influenced by a technique used by
Dave Grohl, where the cymbals are recorded separately to the rest of the kit. "Make The Mistakes" takes influence from a recording style of
Kings of Leon
Kings of Leon is an American rock band formed in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1999. The band is composed of brothers Caleb, Nathan and Jared Followill, and their cousin Matthew Followill.
The band's early music was a blend of Southern rock and ga ...
, using echoing guitar effects. "Light Entertainment" uses a 7:8
time-signature.
Artwork
The album's artwork, by design studio
Kiosk, was revealed on 3 July 2008. According to Yorkshire newspaper The Star, the artwork was based around a double decker
bus
A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...
in a
Meadowhall Centre
Meadowhall is an indoor shopping centre in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. It lies north-east of Sheffield city centre, and from Rotherham town centre. It is the largest shopping centre in Yorkshire, and currently the eleventh-largest i ...
car park, however the final artwork does not show this. Kiosk's creative director, David Bailey, points out that a double decker bus was only used for one of the images in the CD booklet. He goes on to describe the final artwork as '...a mixture of sci-fi sub/urban Britain and the presence of absence'. On the artwork for both the album itself and single "Steve McQueen" parts of the photographs have been deliberately obscured by black shapes. This stemmed from the idea of making people think about whether it is something that has been deliberately removed, or whether it's covering something up, tying in with the album's themes of media manipulation.
Release
In various interviews in 2006 and 2007 the band stated they would be releasing a brand new, previously unheard single in early 2007 - after the re-release of "Raoul" that the band's record label had insisted on.
This was to be a studio recording of "Steve McQueen", which would have possibly been accompanied by "Revolution" - both of which were recorded around Christmas 2006 with former band member Alex Pennie - before his departure in 2007.
This single was never released, for unknown reasons.
The re-recording of "Steve McQueen", with Paul Mullen replacing Pennie, premiered on
Zane Lowe
Alexander Zane Reid Lowe (born 7 August 1973) is a New Zealand radio DJ, live DJ, record producer, and television presenter.
After an early career in music creation, production and DJing, he moved to the UK in 1997. He came to prominence thro ...
's
Radio 1 show on 7 July 2008, with the music video being released the day after. A clip of the track was also added to the band's
MySpace. On 30 July 2008, title track "This Is A Fix" was released for free download via the band's website.
The album itself was originally intended for release in June 2008, however the band's label decided to move the release back to 25 August with the album being released the week after the
Reading and Leeds Festival
The Reading and Leeds Festivals are a pair of annual music festivals that take place in Reading and Leeds in England. The events take place simultaneously on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the August bank holiday weekend. The Reading Fes ...
.
Single "Steve McQueen" was released the week before the album, on 18 August 2008.
Album distribution issues
The album leaked onto the internet around a month prior to its official release. The 18 August 2008 release date of single "Steve McQueen" was affected when record labels B-Unique/Polydor failed to properly distribute the single, resulting in many online stores such as
7digital
7digital Group Plc is a British publicly listed company that offers access to music, tracking and reporting for clients. London-based, 7digital provides end-to-end music services for the fitness, social media, DSPs, and gaming industries with b ...
and
iTunes not supplying the single. The issue was resolved by Wednesday of the same week. Similarly a week later with the album's release, online retailers and physical retailers were not stocking the record until Thursday of that week due to distribution mistakes made by the band's labels.
The poor distribution of ''This Is A Fix'' was among the reasons that the band choose to withdraw from their 5-album deal with B-Unique and Polydor.
"Magazines" had been just announced as the second single from ''This Is A Fix'' when the band split from their labels, the single's release was ultimately dropped completely, although promo CD's of the track went out to the press.
Promotion
The band's first promotional run for the album came in March 2008, with a 21 date tour around the United Kingdom, playing at the country's smaller venues, taking
Viva Machine
Viva Machine were a Welsh rock band, formed in 2003. Initially known as Ipsofacto, they adopted the name Viva Machine in 2006. In 2008 they added a second guitarist and synth player Justin Hendy. The band announced an indefinite hiatus in Septem ...
along for all of the dates, and
Canterbury
Canterbury (, ) is a cathedral city and UNESCO World Heritage Site, situated in the heart of the City of Canterbury local government district of Kent, England. It lies on the River Stour.
The Archbishop of Canterbury is the primate of ...
for half of the tour. On the tour they played around 12 songs, both new and old. Notably "Light Entertainment" was the set opener on all 21 dates, with "Steve McQueen", "Secret Police", "Magazines", "This Is A Fix" and "This Ship" also played at almost all dates, the remainder of tracks from the album were usually played at different venues, so the set list would slightly change at almost all dates.
The band were offered a televised slot at
T4 On The Beach
T4 on the Beach was an annual British one-day music event which was held on the beach at Weston-super-Mare and televised on Channel 4. The event began in 2003 as Pop Beach in Great Yarmouth, changing to the current title and venue in 2005. The d ...
2008 after
Cage the Elephant
Cage the Elephant is an American rock band formed in 2006 in Bowling Green, Kentucky. They moved to England, U.K. and settled in London in 2008, shortly before their self-titled first album was released. The band currently consists of Matt S ...
were forced to pulled out due to illness. The Automatic had to cancel a date at
Midsomer Norton in order to soundcheck for the T4 event, which was given priority as it was televised.
The band performed at both
Glastonbury Festival and
Reading and Leeds Festivals
The Reading and Leeds Festivals are a pair of annual music festivals that take place in Reading and Leeds in England. The events take place simultaneously on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the August bank holiday weekend. The Reading Fe ...
. Their Glastonbury set was filmed but never televised, and despite performing on the main stage at Reading and Leeds, they were not filmed. At Glastonbury
NME
''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...
,
XFM and
The Telegraph
''The Telegraph'', ''Daily Telegraph'', ''Sunday Telegraph'' and other variant names are popular names for newspapers. Newspapers with these titles include:
Australia
* ''The Telegraph'' (Adelaide), a newspaper in Adelaide, South Australia, publ ...
all ran short videos, in the form of interviews and acoustic performances of "Steve McQueen". The band ran a ''radio tour'' of the United Kingdom promoting the new album, going to
Xfm Scotland, Edinburgh,
Alan Robson
Alan Robson (born 1 October 1955) is an English radio presenter, and host of the North East radio talk show, ''Alan Robson's Night Owls''.
Radio
Robson started his career with Metro Radio in Gateshead, presenting his first show on 12 Novemb ...
,
Clyde 1
Clyde 1 is an Independent Local Radio station based in Glasgow, Scotland, owned and operated by Bauer as part of the Hits Radio network. It broadcasts to Glasgow and West Central Scotland.
As of September 2022, the station has a weekly audi ...
,
1548 Forth 2,
Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to:
*Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England
*Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England
*Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...
's
Magic 1152
Greatest Hits Radio North East is a local radio station serving North East England, as part of Bauer’s Greatest Hits Radio network.
History
Great North Radio (also known as G.N.R) was formed in March 1989 using the AM frequencies of Me ...
,
100-102 Century Radio,
96.2 The Revolution,
Xfm Manchester,
106.3 Bridge FM,
96.4 The Wave,
102.1 Bay Radio
Easy Radio is an Independent Local Radio station that broadcasts to Swansea, Neath Port Talbot and East Carmarthenshire. It is owned and operated by Nation Broadcasting and broadcasts on 102.1 FM and DAB from studios near the St Hilary transmi ...
(formally Swansea Bay Radio),
107.8 Radio Hampshire amongst others. In August 2008
Rock Sound
''Rock Sound'' is a British magazine that covers rock music. The magazine aims at being more " underground" and less commercial, while also giving coverage to better-known acts. It generally focuses on pop punk, post-hardcore, metalcore, punk, ...
magazine ran an interview with the band in talking about the upcoming release, and what to expect,
Kerrang!
''Kerrang!'' is a British weekly magazine devoted to rock, punk and heavy metal music, currently published by Wasted Talent (the same company that owns electronic music publication ''Mixmag''). It was first published on 6 June 1981 as a one- ...
magazine also included two articles on the band and the new album. In late 2008 with the album released, the band toured across the UK again twice, the first in September/October and the other in November. These tours were run with ULive, meaning that each gig would take place at a university in the UK.
Webisode series
Throughout the buildup and release of ''This Is A Fix'', guitarist
James Frost
James Martin Frost (born 22 August 1986) is the guitarist, keyboardist and backing vocalist of Welsh band The Automatic, and guitarist and backing vocalist for Cardiff-based band Effort. As well as his musical duties for The Automatic, Frost ha ...
and touring photographer / technician Peter Hill recorded and released short webisodes following the Automatic's studio and touring antics. The first set of videos followed The Automatic in the studio - four webisodes were made, two in Cardiff and two in Los Angeles recording with Don Gilmore. The second set titled This Is A Fix webisodes covered the band's 2008 UK club tour promoting ''This Is A Fix'', recording "Steve McQueen" with Frank Turner, Butch Walker and Chris T-T and recording an advertisement for
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...
.
[FUTURE RELEASE: The Automatic](_blank)
accessmylibrary.com, CMP Information Ltd, Publication: Music Week, 28 June 2008 The series led up to the album release and was ended with a 15-minute video feature digitally available with
This Is A Fix, which like the webisodes followed the band prior to the album release.
Critical response
The record received a very mixed reaction from critics garnering a score of 47/100 at aggregator website
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created by Jason Dietz, Marc ...
. Despite getting such varied reviews, the three main rock music publications in the UK, Kerrang, Rock Sound and NME, all praised the record. Al Fox of the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
praised the album, saying "The album is absolutely dripping with new ideas: the band's willingness to try them for size and to drop anything that doesn't immediately seem to be working means that only the cream of a very good crop of songs has made it onto the disc".