1995: End of year Britpop disco

Back in September, when we were all throwing open our curtains wide eyed, in full expectation of the promised Indian summer, it struck me that a full fifteen years had passed since I passed over the Severn bridge and across the border. Fifteen years since starting university: stick thin, lank of hair; Lennon-like (so I hoped) in my NHS specs; registering, on the emotional Geiger counter, that odd state somewhere between excitement and terror.

Whatever else might or might not have happened during those surreal first months living away from home – I remember a snowball fight, someone puking in a bin, a preposterously large Christmas dinner and a couple of lectures – what is undoubtedly true is that we had some damn good music. On Wednesdays and weekends, we lived for the indie clubs and student union discos. In my first year alone, Oasis, Blur, Pulp, Black Grape, The Boo Radleys and Cast played the university or Cardiff International Arena. Stereophonics and Catatonia (then just beginning their journeys) were relegated to playing for £1 on a Friday night. A gang of northerners seemed to haunt our living room every night from midnight to 4am, playing the whole of (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? so repeatedly that it became part and parcel of my dreams.

The end of Britpop coincided with the emergence of a phenomenon that continues to this day: ultra short-term nostalgia. On this view, we sneered at Britpop. It was, we were told almost as soon as we’d stopped hearing Parklife on the radio, shallow hyperbole, written by people with more chutzpah than talent, aimed at mockneys and would-be hard partyers who had all the attitude without the coke. As with any musical phenomenon, there was some truth in this. One need only mention Menswear and Northern Uproar to illustrate the perennial rule that if something good comes along, an awful lot of crap arrives in its wake.

But these were glorious times too. Britpop marked the last time, to date, that British guitar music made a genuine impact on the country’s charts, culture and even politics. You could even argue that it was the last time really good music of any sort really dominated the airwaves. Listen to Radio 1 now and it’s a mishmash of styles and sub-genres; and not a good mish-mash, but a pot pourri of largely substandard vocoding and grinding. In other words, it’s what Radio 1 has been like for much of its existence. But for three years, roughly, from 1994 to 1997, there was at least a sense that this was it: classic tunes were making a return, and we were right there, just for that brief moment, right in the centre of it.

Too many great British songs were released in 1995 for me to list them all. So instead, allow me to take you on a journey through the year, with one song a month, to allow a brief, nostalgic dipping in. As a flavour of those who haven’t made my list, I left out Elastica’s Waking Up, Paul Weller’s The Changingman, The Charlatans’ Just When You’re Thinkin’ Things Over, Ash’s Girl From Mars, and all sorts of tracks from the Boos and Cast. Well, there’s always the 1996 list; watch this space next December...

January
New Generation by Suede



Suede’s second album, Dog Man Star, may not have had the classic pop appeal of their debut, but this one is a right belter to start off our imaginary disco. It’s got horns, multi-tracked guitars, a massive chorus, lyrics that recall David Bowie’s “Heroes”, and a title that makes us feel we’re all part of it. Nice work.

February
Slight Return by The Bluetones



No-one our age could possibly fail to recognise its opening notes; and even better, it’s one of those songs with just the right amount of time to get on the dancefloor before the chorus kicks in. Something about the Bluetones perfectly encapsulates Britpop: it might be the jangly guitars, or perhaps the vocals that tread the line between swagger and vulnerability. Either way, this song couldn’t come from any other country, or any other decade.

March
Ten Storey Love Song by The Stone Roses



OK, so the Roses aren’t officially Britpop – they predate it, and they were pretty much dead in the water by the time Christmas ’95 came around. But we were still sixth formers when they came out with this superb number, which sounds more like their earlier classics than anything else on Second Coming. Much like New Generation, it’s about the soaring ambition of love, but cleverly, the theme is combined with a rhythm that’s laid-back, almost dream-like.

April
Some Might Say by Oasis



You can’t do a Britpop piece without Oasis, and this is the one that had us whacking up the volume and opening all the windows at school. The first taster of the Morning Glory album, it has the usual guitar swagger from Noel Gallagher and meaningless lyrics from Liam, but neatly avoids their occasional pitfalls of over-zealous self-regard and over-extended choruses. A massive song, so much better than Roll With It, with which they later battled Blur.

May
Common People by Pulp



If civilisation ends, and the internet goes down, and in the mad scrabble to salvage some small vestiges of culture, we only have time to save one Britpop song, this will surely be the one. Perfect in every way, it manages to say something serious about the times as well as providing the ultimate 90s dancefloor filler. What’s great about the lyrics is that, regardless of how common you happen to be, you can still sing along with the common people, without fear of castigation.

June
Reverend Black Grape by Black Grape



Somehow, Shaun Ryder managed not to die while heading up Happy Mondays. What’s more, he came back with Black Grape, arguably a better band with – for just a short period – more in the musical tank. Love the groove, love the harmonica, love the combination of proper rapper and Shaun’s unique just-off-shouting vocals. Proof, too, that Britpop wasn’t just about guitars.

July
Alright by Supergrass

One of the ultimate summer tunes, this could just as easily have been a Small Faces or Kinks track, and the video (which annoyingly can’t be embedded) is similarly timeless. Simple, short and sweet, they played it pretty much everywhere, every week, and rarely was it unwelcome.

August
Neil Jung by Teenage Fanclub



Both the song title and the band name may be silly, but Teenage Fanclub delivered some of the all-time great vocal harmonies. This, to be fair, wasn’t heard that much in the clubs around our way, but it still sounds just as fresh now.

September
History by The Verve

Richard Ashcroft has always thought a great deal of himself, sometimes with justification. This, and the later The Drugs Don’t Work, are beautiful illustrations of the slower, melancholic side of Britpop – string-laden, dewy-eyed and using Ashcroft’s northern vowels to their full effect. This is what you’d stick on when you returned from the club with your mates, empty handed, and wanted to feel like your inability to pull was part of something grander and more meaningful.

October
King of the Kerb by Echobelly

Back to classic Britpop, and another song that could only have been made there, then. With great fuzzy guitar, mid-tempo four-four beat, and a proper sing-along chorus, this is the kind of song that probably doesn’t mean much to anyone, but evokes a nostalgic sigh nonetheless.

November
The Universal by Blur

Fifteen years on and British Gas are still using it for their adverts – that’s the price of coming up with some really catchy strings. But divorce it from its later commercial use (if you can), and this is a truly marvellous, life-affirming song, despite its apparent cynical intent. “When the days seem to fall through you, well just let them go” seems to sum up those heady days of young adulthood: you’ve gone through the trauma of adolescence, you won’t have to worry about any of the really big stuff for another couple of years, so just live. And “The future’s been sold” seems to sum up how utilities companies procure their gas supplies. Ah well.

December
Disco 2000 by Pulp



Yes, I know it’s another one of theirs, but I couldn’t let the year – and this post – end without this extra slice of classic bitter-sweet Pulp. At this stage, remember, we were still half a decade away. Meeting up in the year 2000 – when we would be out of uni and possibly, bloody hell, actually working – seemed insanely unlikely. Which, I suppose is, the point of the song.


Merry Christmas, one and all.