You’ll have to forgive me on this one. I know I’ve been prone to hyperbole in the past, and sometimes it’s unjustified. However, with something as cathartic and raw as music, it’s a natural response.
It’s very easy to get all wrapped up in the feelings of “what might be?” with the announcement of a new album from your favourite band, or the prospect of a tour, or the latent, post-foetal glow of “the best gig ever.”
Like I say, it is not giddy, it is what it is.
2011 has, again, been ‘The Year of the Reformation’, with indie demi-gods The Strokes and Britpop mastodon’s Pulp leading the way.
That was until around 4pm today, for 18/10/2011 will go down as a day in British music history as the day The Stone Roses finally decided to build bridges, and announce a new album and two comeback shows at Manchester’s Heaton Park. Both of which will be a prefix to a planned world tour.
Now I’m sure the pessimists and those who steer clear of ‘Madchester’ and all it’s nostalgia will together, groan collectively at the sight and sound of Manchester’s ‘Old Guard’ rearing their demonic, cocaine battered heads, but you know what? Fuck ‘em.
I have my doubts, yes. Brown’s always been questionable live, Mani could barely stand up during Primal Scream’s set at Glasto he was that battered and I’m not looking forward to the painful six minute instrumental ‘Foz’. In fact, I hope they swerve a fair bit of ‘Second Coming’, although I’d imagine that album’s prominence in the pending set-list was probably a clause in John Squire’s contract.
Seriously though, despite the negative tones of the above paragraph, does it all really matter? It’s ‘The Roses’. They, along with others, gave voice to a disgruntled Manchester, down trodden by the political and economical holocaust that beset the country under Thatcher’s rule.
Brown, Squire, Mani and Reni had people dancing in an environment when only bleakness seemed to prevail. Their timing, given the current mood and state of the country, is apt and probably no coincidence.
There’s nothing wrong with harking back to a time and scene that’s happened over 20 years ago, nothing wrong with it at all. Like they say, you can’t know where you’re going until you know where you’ve been. Chances are some pen pushers are going to claim this is a setback for all the creativity and excitement that has burst out of England recently. For me though, The Roses pushed British music forward about 30 years anyway, so when you add it up, we’re still a decade ahead of the curve. So fret not.
I don’t care if they were before my time, or even that I will never truly experience the mood and variables that helped the band become who they were. That’s irrelevant. I have my own connection with the band, my own memories of how I felt when they came on in a club. My own imitation of Ian Brown’s swagger whenever ‘I Wanna Be Adored’ played in 42nd Street, when I was an 18 year old little muppet acting hard because of vodka and red bull.
It’s our turn now and whether non-conformists like it or not, these gigs are going to happen. Well, providing Brown and Squire can stay mates for eight months.
So, to the naysayers I say this, go and trawl Youtube looking for piss poor vocal performances by Brown. Laugh at Squire’s egotism on ‘Second Coming’, or Mani’s white outfit at Benicassim 2011. Ask “who is John Reni anyway?”
And whilst you’re all sat in your room, I’m going to go down to Heaton Park with 75,000 other folk, sing every song at the top of my voice and have the time of my life.
That is if I manage to get a ticket.
