Britpop re-assesed?

just revisiting Urusei Yatsura and had forgotten quite how much they were ripping off sonic youth and pavement. almost at teenage fan club-big star levels

absolutely, that was their whole thing. can't remember another group who did that successfully, apart from blur for a bit maybe

as with the fannies/big star, pavement/the fall and gene/the smiths, if you liked them then the similarities seemed insignificant. i still get pachinko and kubrick in town in my head from time to time.

This here stuff was my jam back in the day. I barely had 10p to rub together let alone spend on quirky-looking CD singles so I must have absorbed half of these via mixtape, or retrospectively once Napster etc came out and I wanted to spend a weekend downloading a Velocette b-side.

xp. i am a huge fannies fan and never minded the indebtedness to big star (I heard teenage fanclub years before big star so it was a bit of a surprise when I first heard the latter)

So, that Quietus review I did of Super Sonics inadvertantly led to another piece of mine for them, and frankly I was thrilled to be able to do this -- a full feature interview Johnny, Chris and Matt from Menswear

https://thequietus.com/articles/29097-menswear-nuisance-review-anniversary

Heh, I always figured the Wire influence was secondhand and the concept of Daydreamer was "let's write an Elastica song".

Curious track listing.

There's definitely a good compilation in stuff from the time that wasn't Brit Pop - Seefeel, Bark Psychosis, Butterfly Child, Insides, Spoonfed Hybrid, Disco Inferno ... and I'd have included Pram.

Perhaps my timing is wonky, though.

idly wondering if this is the only substantial* genre** where the only things of interest to be said about it are extra-musical - the sociopolitical context, the business model etc

* not the best word but reaching for "as opposed to micro-genres"
** another wriggly and not-quite-right word but hey

I really enjoyed Marcello Carlin’s then play long entries on the Britpop years but tgf I kind of like this music. Feel like there’s a lot to say about the great escape but I don’t particularly like that album.

I love The Great Escape and MC was fantastic on it.

I tried writing about it - informally but lengthily - before. On the Blur forum. And scared everyone away.

I want to add that the brain worm I posted tonight isn't really predicated on liking or not liking (some of) the music - I don't really but people do and that's fine

But something I'm not quite articulating to myself even about the metaness of the genre, assuming nostalgia and small c conservatism can be meta

Brit, such an ugly word and world

I wonder if someone who's not British might have something fresh to say about the music? Here in Canada it was received without a lot of the contextual trappings, but probably didn't seem as "exotic" as it might have to the rare American who was tuned in past a handful of Oasis hits.

From my 10-12 year old vantage point it was completely invisible in the US at the time apart from Oasis. Blur seemed genuinely very strange to me until “Song 2” came about.

Sometimes I check out also-fans/stragglers like Baby Bird and I’m like “wow this is extremely British”

also-rans

There was actually a small Britpop scene in Toronto, a handful of bands that were inspired both by the contemporary UK acts and the veteran bands that they emulated. A local group named Admiral got notable press here but only seem to have released a couple of EPs in 1996 and 1997.

I heard (the London!) Suede and early Blur far more often on my college radio station than 1995-1996 Blur-Suede-Oasis.

Toronto still seemed to be living in the Britpop era when I lived there in the 2000s. TBF it was the more the Blur/Suede/Pulp/Mod end of things rather than Oasis. I remember hearing a CBC documentary about Britpop where they mentioned how Chris from Menswe@r would corner every customer ever at the Good Mixer and tell them about his "new band Menswear" and I was like, yep, that happened to me too (although I only popped in because it was next to Mega City)

It's quite funny and all

https://neilk.substack.com/p/on-oasis-the-gallaghers-d4abcb889d59?fbclid=IwAR1rZKrpZpBWLLTRRzeJ9u5U6qifVFU94D1qM3sH5PLZXG8JxJtL3ZMYq-Q

As much as I hate lads rock the counter argument would be: did Britpop stop anything from happening? Trip-hop, dance music, etc. All charted. The music weeklies were dying too and they didn't dominate the coverage.

very little if anything to disagree with there, but also I was driving the other day and Rock & Roll Star came on the radio and I found myself enjoying it a great deal.

Saw one of their videos sitting in a cafe a couple of weeks ago and it was fine. I wouldn't buy it. Think I'm more inclined to think in a "right, this ok thing came out of this abhorrent culture, what next?" than aping bog standard middle-class outrage at it.

it is high time for a re-assesment of the Britpop movement

Posted 10th May 2001.

A few months before that fateful day that two planes etc.