Live Review: Portugal. The Man 'Purple Yellow Red Blue' (Muneshine Remix)

Literally in the space of a second MUNESHINE’s PORTUGAL. THE MAN remix strikes a dreamy and nostalgic chord— namely, the opening guitar riff from SPANDAU BALLET’s 1980’s classic, ‘True’. 

It’s a cheesy and brilliant sample: cheesy because the original, like countless other pop gems of the 80’s, has become synonymous with cheap mix-tapes and love-song dedications; brilliant because cheese is brilliant. Anyone who says they don’t melt like mozza over these kind of sultry samples is probably lying.

More than that, though, it does something distinctly transformative to PORTUGAL’s original track. ‘Purple Yellow Red & Blue’ was, in the first instance, a darker, almost cultish piece of psych-rock. It trunles along on the back of a barking drumbeat and culminating in a lyrical bridge that repeats “I just wanna be evil”.

This remix has no such aspirations. On the contrary, the SPANDAU sample, punctuated by MUNESHINE’s retro analog drum loops, creates a lush and angelic backdrop that marries seamlessly with PORTUGAL’s stoner-dream vocals. MUNESHINE lets in the sunlight, not by merely cracking a window but by punching a great, synth-shaped hole through the drywall.

The finished product is a light and breezy track that could easily be mistaken for FOSTER THE PEOPLE or one of those shining pop moments from early MGMT. Indeed, even the lyrics here echo something of that ‘live fast die young’ mentality from ‘Time to Pretend’: “

All I wanna do is live in ecstasy… I wanna be a movie star or on TV, cause workin’ just don’t work for me” sitting neatly alongside lines like “Let’s make some music, make some money, find some models for wives.” It’s a charming and frivolous attitude, and one very much at home in a remix like this: as colourful in sound as it is in name.

Words by Gavin Butler

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SEE ALSO:

INTERVIEW: PORTUGAL. THE MAN

PORTUGAL. THE MAN ‘PURPLE YELLOW RED & BLUE’ (OFFICIAL VIDEO)

PORTUGAL. THE MAN ‘EVIL FRIENDS’ (JAKE ONE REMIX FT. DANNY BROWN)