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Rollercoaster Tour: The Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Blur, and Dino Jr together in ‘92
08.14.2018
08:40 am
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Back before there was a festival for every city, a booking agent for every band, and a service charge for every ticket, live music was a little less… predictable. Remember the good old days?
 
We all know the monster that it became, but Perry Farrell’s Lollapalooza festival was at one point, pretty cool! So influential in fact, that it inspired an entire industry to effectively dismantle it. Or maybe we’re just getting old…
 
One thing is for certain, however, if the Lollapalooza tour had not begun in 1991, then there certainly would have been no Rollercoaster Tour. Spread across eleven dates throughout the United Kingdom in 1992, the tour was the product of a buzz surrounding the newfound Lolla. With FOUR rotating co-headliners playing full, 45-minute sets each night, the Rollercoaster Tour intended to “give the recession-bitten public value for money with four bands for the price of one.” And that’s exactly what they achieved by assembling some of the most celebrated alternative rock bands at the time (and of all time): the Jesus and Mary Chain, My Bloody Valentine, Dinosaur Jr, and Blur.
 

 
Similar to Farrell’s involvement with ‘Palooza, the Rollercoaster Tour was dreamt up by members of the Jesus and Mary Chain. The Scottish noise-pop group was supporting their record Honey’s Dead, but decided it would be better for the fan if they were to split the bill with three other like-minded bands. Dinosaur Jr, the only Americans on the lineup, had been around for a number of years by this point, their classic record Bug had been released in 1987. Shoegaze pioneers My Bloody Valentine were at their peak in 1992 - their seminal distortion record Loveless had come out just a year prior. Also, this would be the last time MBV would play the UK until their 2008 reunion tour. The greatest outlier of them all was the youngest and most energetic of the bunch, Blur. With just a debut record under their belt, the English band was just moments away from taking rest of the world by storm with the colossal explosion of [the dreaded] Britpop. Woo-hoo!
 

Ticket Stub from the Rollercoaster Tour, London
 
Jim Reid, singer of the Jesus and Mary Chain spoke about the Rollercoaster Tour in the April 2013 issue of ‘MOJO’:
 

That year, everyone was talking about [Perry Farrell’s touring alt-rock package fest] Lollapalooza, which to us was pretty crap. We did it, playing at 2pm after Pearl Jam, and it was fairly disastrous. So we thought, Why not do a good version of it? We were just trying to shake things up, to make it not like a bunch of boring blokes standing around with pints of beer. We were sick to death of plodding up and down the UK on our own, playing the same shitholes. The venues we playing on Rollercoaster, like Whitley Bay Ice Rink and Glasgow SECC, we could never have done on our own. Instead of a fucking cold Friday night in Nottingham Rock City, it felt a bit more like being a rock star - more a Bowie/Bolan thing. The idea was to have bands from different corners of the indie scene. It was pre-Britpop, so Blur were there to cover the Manchester/baggy thing, the grunge thing was covered by Dinosaur Jr., and then it was the Valentines doing freak-out noise, and we were doing something similar, but more poppy.

 
More after the jump…

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Posted by Bennett Kogon
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08.14.2018
08:40 am
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A brief history of 90s Britpop as told through the covers of ‘Select’ magazine

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Selective memory can be a marvellous thing. It ensures we are never wrong, always right and (best of all) that we have always had such impeccable taste in music.

In Britain there were a lot of drugs about in the nineties—a lot of bad drugs—which might explain why so many of us—who lived through that heady decade—only recall the really good stuff rather than all that crap we apparently really enjoyedMr Blobby? Babylon Zoo? Rednex? Will Smith?—well, somebody bought this shit, how else did it all get to #1?

Personally, I have no recollection (officer) as to how all these records charted, but I can certainly give you a brief illustrated history of what we were actually listening to and what we all supposedly liked.

Exhibit #1: Select magazine

Select was arguably the magazine of the 1990s—the one that best represented (or at least covered) what happened during that decade—well, if you lived in the UK that is. Select had attitude, swagger and wit and was very, very opinionated. It didn’t tug its forelock or swoon before too many stars—though it certainly had its favorites.

Select kicked off in July 1990 with his purple highness Prince on the cover. It was a statement of the kind of magazine they were going to be—cool, sophisticated, sexy, sharp. Prince was good—everybody loves Prince. It didn’t last long. Over the next few months, the magazine struggled to find a musical movement it could wholeheartedly endorse. In its search for the next big thing—even The Beatles (rather surprisingly) featured on its cover.

Select threw its weight behind such bands as Happy Mondays, Primal Scream, Blur and most significantly Suede—who never quite managed the level of success the magazine hoped for. Then Select did something remarkable—rather than follow the trend the magazine decided to shape it.

In April 1993, Select published an article by journalist Stuart Maconie entitled “Who Do You Think You Are Kidding Mr. Cobain?” In it Maconie made a very convincing case for abandoning the influence of American music (grunge) and taking up with the “crimplene, glamour, wit, and irony” of local British talent.

Maconie offered up a list of bands he thought would make it big—Suede, Saint Etienne, Denim, The Auteurs and Pulp—lumping them together under the title “Britpop.” Within a year—the idea of one journalist had become a movement of disparate bands, genres and styles—from Oasis to Blur, Elastica to Pulp, Sleeper to The Verve.

Maconie’s idea gave Select their drum—one they were going to bang until everyone was deaf or the thrill had gone.

Select lasted for just over a decade 1990-2001. Its final cover featured Coldplay—which might explain where Britpop had gone wrong. Some kind soul has scanned all of the back issues—inside and out—and a trawl through their covers tells the story of what was in, what was hip, and what was “going on.”

If you’ve a hankering for the past or just want to relive the heady days of the 1990s, then check here to read, view and enjoy the whole archive of Select magazine.
 
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Prince on the very first cover of ‘Select’ July 1990.
 
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Something old, something new… a taste of what’s to come…
 
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Something very old: The Beatles—but a hint of what this magazine hoped to find in the 1990s…Britpop. November 1990.
 
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You get the feeling this bloke’s gonna feature a lot in this magazine…Happy Mondays’ Shaun Ryder, January 1991.
 
More Select covers for selective memories, after the jump…

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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03.24.2016
01:01 pm
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Russell Brand’s revolutionary bubble burst by Blur’s ‘Parklife’
11.04.2014
04:45 pm
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It has taken just one word, one word to burst Russell Brand’s revolutionary bubble of being some kind of modern day “Che Guevara.”

One word, and all his pompous verbosity and over-weening self-aggrandizing vanity is turned to great comic effect.

The word is “Parklife” as in the in the 1994 hit song by Blur.

You may recall that tasty toe-tapper—the one where actor Phil Daniels spouts a lot of self important nonsense about nothing much in particular—the kind of drivel that could so easily have splurged out of Russell Brand‘s own mouth:

Confidence is a preference for the habitual voyeur of what is known as…

(There’s a game here—spotting which is Brand and which is Blur.)

It all began in response to a tweeted quote from Brand’s book Revolution about the “significance of consciousness.” Earthman Johann tweeted “Parklife” and suddenly Brand’s revolutionary zeal was undone. 
 

 
Mr. Earthman Johann tweets that “Buzzfeed and the Independent is all very well, but I’ll not rest until Slate have dashed off some hurried analysis of the Parklife meme.”

This was followed on November 2nd by another tweet form Dan Barker:
 

 
 
From such small beginnings a viral revolution was unleashed. Next up, was a Vine by Alan White that merged song and revolutionary in near perfect harmony.
 

 
From then on, nearly everything Brand tweeted was ridiculed by “#Parklife.”
 

 
And lo, of course, the inevitable YouTube videos.
 

 
Another video after the jump…

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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11.04.2014
04:45 pm
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‘Live Forever: The Rise and Fall of Britpop’ with Oasis, Blur and Pulp
04.02.2014
01:04 pm
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I have always thought Britpop was a bit like another famous British institution, the Carry On… movies. Both had likable and identifiable characters: Sid James, Kenneth Williams, Hattie Jacques, Joan Sims and Charles Hawtrey in the Carry Ons; and Damon, Jarvis, Noel and Liam in Britpop.

Both produced populist entertainment that was at once nostalgic and contemporary. The Carry Ons offered traditional music hall humor, poking fun at British institutions like the army, the National Health Service, education, unions and foreign holidays. While Britpop drew its influence from Sixties’ pop (Beatles, Rolling Stones, The Kinks), and mixed it up with a punk rock swagger.

The Carry Ons came out of drab, gray, post-war Britain, while Britpop was more of a media construction, a handy (or possibly lazy) way to categorize the very disparate talents (Oasis, Blur, Pulp, Powder, The Boo Radleys, Menswear, Elastica, etc) that appeared during the drab, dull years of Conservative political rule during the 1990s.

Britpop was pitched as a nineties reinvention of the “swinging Sixties,” with two bands—Oasis and Blur—dominating the pop charts (much like The Beatles and Rolling Stones once did). There was a much publicized “fight” for the number one spot in 1995. Blur won with the single “Country House,” Oasis came in second with “Roll With It”—they may have lost the battle but Oasis eventually won the war.

If you have ever wondered what all the fuss was about, or why those days back in the 1990s were an exciting time to be young, British and full of hope for a better future, then this documentary Live Forever: The Rise and Fall of Britpop will explain all. It’s a wonderfully made and very entertaining film that brings together Noel and Liam Gallagher, Damon Albarn, Jarvis Cocker, 3D (Massive Attack), Louise Wener (Sleeper) and artist Damien Hirst, amongst others, to discuss, pontificate and reflect on why Britpop was arguably the last great musical movement from the UK—which says much, as it is now twenty years ago. If you haven’t seen this documentary, it is certainly worth seeing, once. Enjoy.
 

Posted by Paul Gallagher
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04.02.2014
01:04 pm
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Woo-hoo!: A London Tube stop ticket barrier sings Blur’s ‘Song 2’
01.29.2014
01:05 pm
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This is so, so silly-stupid that I laughed my easily amused ass off. The longer it goes on, the funnier it gets.

I kinda hate myself for blogging this, but if you want minor chuckle, this will probably provide one. Don’t expect to learn anything, though…

Posted by Tara McGinley
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01.29.2014
01:05 pm
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Fun, Fun, Fun, On The Gramophone: Kraftwerk Release Limited Edition Box Set
04.24.2012
06:01 pm
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Ah, the joys of the box-set, the artfully designed collectible that allegedly adds value to your music collection. Of course, sometimes it’s a damn fine thing, especially when it includes lots of unreleased goodies. Or when the set is cheaper than buying the individual discs. Other times, it’s little more than a cunning scam to sell you something you already own.

Last year, Elvis Costello warned his fans off purchasing his box of delights, claiming he was “unable to recommend this lovely item to you, as the price appears to be either a misprint or a satire…” The price was $258.70 (£212.99) - ouch. Some bands are undeterred in extracting the cash - how many box sets have U2 released? (Too many?) While others see it as a way of celebrating their oeuvre - last week Blur announced the release of their mega box 21, out on July 31, this year. Yet, often the cost of these box-sets suggests they are really meant for the thirty-plus professional, who can afford to shell out the big bucks on such shiny trinkets.

Which brings me to Kraftwerk, who have announced the release of a limited edition black box set of their 2009 box-set The Catalogue. The main selling point here is it’s a “black box set” and it’s “a limited edition”, limited to “2000 individually numbered copies”. The box includes:

...all 8 remastered and repackaged albums in a 12"x12” box. To celebrate the 35th anniversary of their landmark electronic début, Autobahn, pioneers Kraftwerk re-release the digitally remastered of all of their albums. These include redesigned sleeves and all original titles restored. An absolute must for collectors and anyone with an interest in the electronic music culture. This edition also includes large format booklets and expanded artwork:

Autobahn (1974)
Radio-Activity (1975)
Trans-Europe Express (1977)
The Man Machine (1978)
Computer World (1981)
Techno Pop (1986)
The Mix (1991)
Tour de France (2003)

So, if you’re tempted, then follow the trail here to find out more. Or, maybe you can hang on until the 40th anniversary of Autobahn comes around?
 

 

Posted by Paul Gallagher
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04.24.2012
06:01 pm
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Sandals full of dogshit: Channel 4’s ‘The Word’ ft L7, Hole, Stereolab, Snoop vs Emu & more

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More Nineties nostalgia to round out the weekend. Growing up as a kid in that decade I was subjected to huge ignominies in the name of yoof TV. “Yoof TV” was the British expression for television programs made by people in their thirties and forties for people in their teens and early twenties, trying hard to represent the energy and anarchy that being young supposedly represented. YEAH!  Like down wiv ver kids anthat?! Yoof!! Energy!!! Rissspekt!!!! YOU KNOWORIMEAN?! It was baaad (meaning just bad). MTV built an entire channel around it, but the biggest, smelliest turd lurking at the bottom of the yoof barrel was undoubtedly The Word.

The Word was Channel 4’s first stab at a concept called “post-pub” television, and as the name would suggest it had a rowdy, boozy, “anything goes!” atmosphere, though I think the show’s primary audience were still too young to go to the pub. Launched in 1990, it was presented by the annoying Manc Terry Christian with a rotating cast of inept co-hosts, most famous of which was probably the ex-model/whatever Amanda De Cadanet. She lives in LA now, and you can have her. Fans of River Phoenix, watch this clip and prepare to have all your romantic illusions about the best and/or best looking actor of his generation (and his crappy band Aleka’s Attic) shattered.
 
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The show certainly was ground-breaking, paving the way for reality tv and the general circus-of-humiliation we now take for granted on the goggle box. One popular feature was called “The Hopefuls” where people would do anything (literally anything) to get on TV. Giving a homeless person a toe-job, drinking a pint of puke, licking an obese man’s bellybutton sweat, yeah these crazy yoofs will do ANYTHING man! Like putting on a pair of sandals filled with dog shit?! Yeah they’re so desperate it’s KERRAZY!

There were moments of genuine unscripted tension too. The best of the co-hosts, Mark Lamarr (currently a dj for BBC Radio 6) famously took issue with Shabba Ranks over his homophobia. Oliver Reed was secretly filmed getting drunk in the dressing room (a very classy move by the producers). The British riot grrrl group Huggy Bear and their fans were forcibly removed from the studio for protesting over a segment about a couple of porn star twins, and funniest of all was an altercation between Snoop Dogg (then just emerging with Doggy Style) and the British kids TV host Rod Hull’s puppet Emu, which had a reputation for violently attacking guests.
 

 
There’s a piece on the Guardian’s website by The Word’s creator Charlie Parsons called “How The Word changed televisiion for ever” that would be funny if it were not so depressingly true.

The show provided a glimpse of the future of television – some would argue a horrifying one. No longer could celebrities be treated with total reverence, as on The Des O’Connor Show or Wogan. Five-minute videotaped pieces tackled subjects that would these days be given whole series on ITV – dog plastic surgery, fat farms, child beauty pageants.

Yet, while Parsons only mentions it in passing at the start of the piece, 20 years later The Word does have one lasting positive legacy - the live music. Sure, they went for what was then currently popular, but this ensured a diverse range of bands and lead to the television debuts of both Nirvana and Oasis (Nirvana’s spot including the infamous moment when Kurt declared that Courntey Love was “the best fuck in the world”). The tone may have been jarring (see the fluffy bra podium dancers gyrating to Stereolab’s kraut-punk!) but the energy was real. This was one of the very few places on TV you could see bands whose shows you had only read about, and if you were lucky they gave good show too - like L7’s Donita Sparks dropping her pants. Charlie Parsons, speaking as someone who WAS a lonely teenager in a bedroom at the time, THIS is why we watched your towering pile of faeces of a show. Not for “The Hopefuls”, not for the interviews, the wackiness, the innuendo, the edginess, the supposed rule breaking, the sticking-it-to-the-man-down-wiv-yoof-culcha-yah - we watched your show for THIS: 

L7 - “Pretend We’re Dead” live on The Word
 

 
After the jump: Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, Hole, Stereolab, Blur, Daisy Chainsaw, Pop Will Eat Itself with Fun-Da-Mental & Huggy Bear

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Posted by Niall O'Conghaile
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03.20.2011
10:06 pm
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New Blur Documentary: No Distance Left To Run
11.30.2009
11:23 am
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From the band’s website:

A feature length documentary film telling the story of blur is due for cinema release on January 19th. “No Distance Left to Run” is directed by 32 (Dylan Southern & Will Lovelace) and is a Pulse Films Production.

Filmed throughout the band’s 2009 rehearsals and acclaimed summer tour, No Distance Left To Run finds all four members of blur together for the first time in nine years. With previously unseen archive material alongside new interviews and reportage, the film recounts the highs and lows of a very British band from the late 80’s return to their headline at Glastonbury and Hyde Park, The result is a musing on Englishness and identity and a portrait of friendship and resolution.

(via Nerdcore )

Posted by Tara McGinley
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11.30.2009
11:23 am
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