Happy, stoned and cool as f*ck

For a young, fanatical music nerd like myself, the late 80s and early 90s were wonderfully exciting years. For me in particular, going to college and finding out about whole genres of music I never even knew about – and loving them – was hugely inspiring. As has always been the case, the music press were just itching to latch onto the next big thing, the next fad, the next movement. The dozen-or-so years that spanned these two decades spawned a succession of such scenes. We were fed C86, rave, Riot Grrls and Britpop. All of these had an effect on me one way or another, but in amongst them all were Madchester and Grunge, the two that I particularly immersed myself in.

I’m not a big fan of labelling and categorising music as a rule. Much of the music I listen to tends not to fall neatly into any particular genre. In fact the best stuff defies the whole concept of ‘genre’. For instance, are the White Stripes blues, country, punk, garage, alternative rock, a fusion of all of them, or something else entirely? Lemmy famously refuses to label Motörhead as anything other than “rock and roll” . The other problem is that genres give us an immediate expectation of what something is rather than allow us to make up our own minds. So if something is described a being “jazz-influenced”, I’m likely to dismiss it out of hand as I really am not much of a jazz fan. I gradually came to realise the futility of assigning genres and pigeonholing artists throughout the 90s as the music press invented increasingly rubbish sub-genres of existing rubbish sub-genres. But back in the late 80s, I relied on names of genres as a way of helping me to find out about the sort of music I might like.

Madchester and grunge evolved on different sides of the Atlantic at the same time. Grunge was centred around Seattle, WA. while Madchester, as the name suggests, was rooted in the northern English city of Sheffield. Ha! Only kidding… The press began to realise the stirrings that were happening in Manchester among both the live music scene and the clubs. Indie bands like James, the Stone Roses and the Happy Mondays seemed to be blending more dance-based rhythms and sounds into their music. New Order were drawing more and more on the acid house phenomenon alongside the likes of A Guy Called Gerald who made what is widely believed to be the first UK acid house single (Voodoo Ray) in 1988.

Of course, once the press ‘discovered’ this was all going on (ie: once they found their way out of London onto the M6), it became a viable ‘scene’ and NME, Melody Maker, Sounds, the whole lot of them couldn’t wait to proclaim it the coolest new thing. Meanwhile, I was listening to the Wedding Present, R.E.M. and the Sugarcubes, trying to keep a distance from the hype. You see, I’ve always felt it’s rather uncool to try to be cool. If you jump into something just because someone tells you it’s the cool thing to do, you get found out pretty quickly. So as Madchester brewed away, I sat back cynically and observed from the sidelines.

I did, however, buy a couple of the records that emerged from the fledgling scene. Come Home by James, Find Out Why by the Inspiral Carpets and the record that was to give this scene its name Madchester (Rave On), a four-track EP by the Happy Mondays (actually, I was given a white label 12” promo of that by a local indie record shop. I still have it and am open to sensible bids…) But it was the Stone Roses who everyone seemed to be constantly banging on about and I remained rather cautious about them, refusing to be drawn into the hype machine. Then one day I heard their album and it all changed.

The Stone Roses’ eponymous debut album is often cited in such lists as ‘greatest debut albums of all time’, ‘records that changed the world’, ‘best ever records ever made ever!’, and in all honesty I can’t find myself disputing its eligibility. In spite of my guarded, cynical approach, that record blew me away, and it pretty much still blows me away to this day. While I maintain R.E.M.’s ‘Lifes Rich Pageant’[1] has the best opening sequence of songs on an album, without a doubt the best closing sequence occurs on ‘The Stone Roses’: Shoot You Down, This Is The One and I Am The Resurrection. Impossible to separate those tracks, in my opinion, they work as one.

The defining moment of the entire Madchester scene occurred in November 1989 when the Stone Roses and the Happy Mondays appeared on the same edition of Top of the Pops[2] (the latter ably assisted by the divine Kirsty MacColl). At that time, if just one indie band appeared on TotP, it was worth tuning in for; so two was an event. From that moment on, Madchester was mainstream. Predictably, its borders opened and Madchester became ‘baggy’. Now nationwide, ‘baggy’ described the clothes the scenesters wore rather then the geographical region the scene was centered.

  “Gotta be loose fit, has to be loose fit…
  Don’t need no skin tights in my wardrobe today
  Fold them all up and put them all away.” – ‘Loose Fit’ by Happy Mondays

The looser and baggier, the better. I myself bought a Joe Bloggs[3] hoodie and wore it with pride a few times before I realised how ridiculous I looked! And yes, I did have the must-have fashion item for Madchester groovers like myself – the obligatory Inspiral Carpets ‘Cool As Fuck’ t-shirt (which I never wore around my nan…). I bought everything the Mondays, the Roses and the Inspirals released, of course, along with the numerous offerings from James and the Charlatans, as well as many of the lesser-known northern bands of the time (Intastella, Top, Paris Angels, World of Twist) and their southern counterparts (Flowered Up, My Jealous God and some long-forgotten outfit called Blur…) I also remember an after-show event at Exeter University (I forget which gig it was) where I danced like an absolute maniac to baggy tune after baggy tune.

Madchester/baggy – whatever you want to call it – really captured my imagination and it was the first real scene/movement – whatever you want to call it – that I felt a part of. It was a very difficult time of my life, what with mum being ill and passing away, but Madchester offered me an escape and the chance to ‘belong’ to something. It was a ‘working class’ scene too. Today’s middle-class hipsters couldn’t be further removed from the likes of Shaun Ryder, Ian Brown et al and those of us in our ‘Cool As Fuck’ t-shirts. During the Thatcher era, we needed something to belong to because (much like in 2014) the working class were being beaten down, trampled on and generally made to feel completely worthless. The youth of that generation saw little future for themselves and a period of partying and hedonism not only emerged, but became the mainstream. It was a rebellion of sorts. We’re lacking such a scene in 2014 when we so badly need one. I mean, who the fuck are Mumford & Sons speaking to exactly?  The cast of Made in fucking Chelsea, that’s who! The hipster ‘scene’ is as rock ‘n’ roll as a Tory Party Conference!

Bizarrely, thanks to Madchester, two previously disparate groups – the indie kids and the ravers – came together as one. In 1992, I was in the crowd as Primal Scream headlined Glastonbury. Just two years before, I had bought Ivy Ivy Ivy, a hard rock single by the Scream. Now I was in a field as they played a set powered on electronic beats. The long hair and baggy hoodies of the indie kids and the white gloves and whistles of the ravers mingled as this one-time C86 jangly indie band summed up once and for all what the last three years had been all about.

Then, a couple of months later in a different field, I saw Nirvana...



Soundtrack:

• Hallelujah [club mix] – Happy Mondays (original version from ‘Madchester (Rave On)’ EP)
• Loose Fix - Happy Mondays (Paul Oakenfold remix of Loose Fit)[4]
• Shoot You Down / This Is The One / I Am The Resurrection – The Stone Roses (from ‘The Stone Roses’)

As a side note, here's a Happy Mondays-related piece of news some of you may have missed. Fracking hilarious!

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[1] As previously discussed here.
[2] Watch the Mondays with Kirsty here (she's probably the only one not completely off her tits...); and the Roses here.
[3] The baggies' label of choice
[4] Possibly my favourite remix of all time. The b-side, Oakenfold's remix of Bob's Yer Uncle is a very close second!