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Jul 26, 2021 By Mark Redfern

Spiritualized (aka Jason Pierce and backing band) previously announced a vinyl reissue series and now they have announced a vinyl reissue of their all-time classic third album, 1997’s Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space. It will be out on September 10 via Fat Possum. The band have also shared an uncensored version of the album’s “Come Together” video, in which Pierce is executed. Watch it below, followed by the reissue’s cover art.

The reissue will feature reworked artwork by Mark Farrow. Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space was the last Spiritualized album to feature Kate Radley on keyboards and also featured Dr. John, The London Community Gospel Choir, and B.J Cole. A press release points out the album title was inspired by a passage in Joystein Gaarder’s novel Sophie’s World, where “a young girl attempts to define the meaning of life by traveling through time and space, meeting the world’s great philosophers.”

Pierce had this to say about the reissue in the press release: “We went out to America ahead of recording this record. John [Coxon] had joined on guitar and I’d recorded the title track and a number of other demos that ended up on the finished record. But we got to play ‘Cop Shoot Cop’ and ‘Electricity’ live and to work them out before we recorded them for the record and then John became integral to the band. He came from a world of Syl Johnson and Al Green, Teenie Hodges and Reggie Young; a different world within the guitar lines. And then there was Kate [Radley]’s hugely influential keyboard that was relentless and loud.

“I like Pure Phase the best of these four records, but people still say Ladies and Gentlemen is where everything kind of came together. I’m still astounded by both records, where they don’t let up. There’s no kind of curfew. Or no ‘you can’t stay on that section for that length of time.’ They sit on where they arrive and stay there, and I found that kind of amazing. The abstract parts were just as beautiful as these kind of pop/simplistic nursery rhyme ideas and they were no less important.

“I went all over the place to make it. I went to Memphis to see [country recording legend] Jim Dickinson for two weeks, I think. Parts of his recordings are in there but by the time I finished, I had all these different mixes. There was very little that was one single mix. There were some mixes from the old A&M studio on La Brea in Los Angeles. Part of the reason that I’ve never received any royalties from any of these records is that I was always thinking, ‘Well where should I go now?’ Suddenly, the move from Rugby to London was small-time compared with ‘well can I do this in L.A, can I do it in Memphis, can I do it again?’ And then ‘Can I fly out to New York and put Dr John on the record?’

“With Dr John, I just wrote a letter, sent the track and his response was immediate. He said ‘absolutely, absolutely, love it.’ It was where he wanted to be. I was completely in awe of him and his playing and everything he put to it. I could hardly speak, to be honest. Not that I needed to speak much. It didn’t add anything little or less to the proceedings. It was an amazing session, amazing to do.”

A reissue of the band’s debut album, 1992’s Lazer Guided Melodies, was announced back in February and released in April. A reissue of their second album, 1995’s Pure Phase, was announced in April and released in June. There will also be a reissue of 2001’s Let It Come Down.

Spiritualized’s last album, And Nothing Hurt, came out in 2018 via Fat Possum (and Bella Union in the U.K.). It was our Album of the Week. Read our review of And Nothing Hurt.

Read our 2008 interview with Jason Pierce.

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