TELL ME WHAT TO DO IF IT ALL FALLS THROUGH....

I began 1998 quite bored with my job, and determined to get out. Whilst i kept a look out for alternative employment, music - as always - provided an escape from the daily grind. The charts were slowly being dominated by pop fluff - boy bands, girl bands, crap dance remakes of 70's songs, dance music (not decent stuff, but the sort of shite aimed squarely at Saturday night townies and their "disco dollies"), bland soul artists, R'n'B, and boring MOR Radio 2 bands like The Corrs, Lighthouse Family, and Savage Garden. The execrable music of Steps and Robbie Williams were inexplicably huge, and alternative /indie music's influence on the mainstream was on the wane. Bands and music that would have spent weeks in the Top 40 just a year before would be out of the hit parade in a matter of just 3 or 4 weeks. There was one exception that year, though. Catatonia, an indie band who had only scraped the bottom reaches of the Top 40 previously, would turn out to be one of the biggest bands of the year. Armed with a new album chock full of great songs, 3 or 4 bona fide indie anthems among them, they became proper pop stars in the best sense of the word. Just a few weeks into the new year, their new single "Mulder And Scully" was all over radio and tv. There was huge anticipation that it was going to be a big hit, and i was lucky enough to see them live the week before the single entered at No. 3, at a small room in Rock City called The Rig. It was sold out, and they barely fit on the tiny stage, something that wouldn't happen again. I was very excited to think that they would finally get the success i thought they deserved, and i've still got the ticket stub now. I did my part, buying the single on cd and coloured 7", as i did with all their following singles. Watching one of my bands make it big really made me proud, and i'd been raving about them to everyone at work, and anyone else who would listen. 

I was at the time quite vocally passionate about music, loudly deriding anything i thought was crap, and feeling the need to defend the artists i loved. When Catatonia had yet another Top 5 hit a couple of months later with "Road Rage" (oh how i love those rolled "r"s) and their album, International Velvet, topped the album charts, i felt vindicated. They stood out in the increasingly homogenous music scene, especially with Cerys Matthews' smoky,  bruised yet angelic Welsh-accented singing, which was more powerful and full-throated now than on their debut album. I listened to them daily. I even sent off for two of their early indie releases on the Crai label, after they were advertised in the NME (along with a "nice one Cerys" message). Posters of them went up on my bedroom wall, the first time i had done that since i was about 13 or 14! I hadn't been this big a fan of a band since getting into Madness.

My passion for music was at one of its peaks throughout that year, and my wish to write about it, to air my opinions on it, was granted in the spring. I'd written to the the local paper, The Hucknall Dispatch, at the beginning of the year, asking if i could write a music review column, (free of charge, obviously) as i was considering taking a course in journalism. I'd been looking at those work from home courses that get advertised in the papers sometimes, and they cost a fortune, so i thought getting a bit of experience might be a good idea. They'd taken their time replying, but finally said yes. So i set about writing reviews of new releases, which initially came from whatever i bought for myself, but later included free promotional cds after i'd written to several indie labels: the early EP's by Badly Drawn Boy were amongst those that came through the letterbox, and to this day i could kick myself for not keeping them as they were worth a fair bit the last time i looked! All they requested in return was that i send in the reviews, which i never got around to doing, instead cutting them out and keeping them in a folder. Like a portfolio of sorts. A few of my work colleagues were sceptical and took the piss, not quite understanding that reviewing music requires more than writing "this is good" and "this is crap". I had a few words of encouragement from fellow music lovers, and that was enough really. I really did think it might be my ticket out of low paid menial work, and into a world i suspected was considerably more exciting than the one i inhabited. I was scanning the local papers for other jobs on a almost daily basis at the time,and when an advert asking if you were a music fan cropped up, i rang the number immediately. It was some sort of sales job, selling subscriptions to a music club (like Brittania Music Club), and they were looking for people who had a big interest in music to do that. I reasoned that it had to be better than warehouse work, and went for an interview. It was a sales job indeed: door to door sales. Whilst the thought of pounding the streets knocking on doors wasn't something that had ever crossed my mind, i was seduced by the promise of earning better money. Imagine how much music i could buy. It turned out not to be so rosy. Knocking on (sometimes quite hostile) peoples doors trying to flog them subscriptions for local restaurants, with no guaranteed pay (if you didn't make any sales, you didn't get paid), was not what i had signed up for. The only part of it i enjoyed was the "team building" meeting in a morning, and being able to bring some music in. There was a certain amount of camaraderie, but if you didn't have the gift of the gab - which i certainly didn't - then you were destined to get nowhere. The only things that lit up the three and a half rain-sodden street tramping months i spent as a door-to-door salesman were music, and going to see Super Furry Animals at Rock City. The 'furries had recently released the Ice Hockey Hair EP, and it had been their biggest hit yet, peaking at No. 12. The title track was a fuzz-guitar laden power ballad (according to the band|), but layered with keyboards and sound affects, and a surging chorus. It's still one of my favourite songs to this day. The other tracks were a chilled but funky "Smokin", extolling the pleasures of cannabis. They'd written it for a Channel 4 program on the Seven Deadly Sins, presented by Howard Marks (one of the bands' heroes). The other tracks on the EP were "Let's Quit Smokin", a remix of the aforementioned song, and an instrumental, "Mu-Tron".

Seeing the band live for the first time was thrilling. They played songs from the EP, and the first two songs, along with a few b-sides like "Guacamole", and the notorious expletive-packed single "The Man Don't Give A Fuck" from a couple of years before. The sound was amazing - i'm sure they had started using a quadrophonic sound system live by then - and the band were on top form.

My record purchases were limited by my dwindling funds, as the job was clearly not working out. But it didn't stop me buying them. SFA's support band were called Grandaddy, a lo-fi band from Modesto, California. They mixed cheap electronics and synths with grungy guitars, and always sounded slightly out of tune, but somehow this added to their ramshackle charm. The music press loved them, and their debut album, Under The Western Freeway, had good reviews. They weren't a band about storm the charts, not least because of their frontman Jason Lytles' reedy voice, described as Neil Young-esque (see also Wayne Coyne of The Flaming Lips, and Jonathon Donahue of Mercury Rev). But they were good live, so i bought their new single, "Summer Here Kids". A summer anthem for those who don't like the summer, it was written about Lytles' disappointing teenage experience at a summer camp. Minor chords, grungy guitars, a piano riff that sounded like a drunk trying to play the famous riff from "Dancing Queen", and a hysterically off-key moment in the second chorus, it somehow spoke to me, as i was having a crap summer myself.

I later bought their album, which was full of quirky, off-beat pop songs with lonely vocals and lo-fi instrumentation. Worth a listen.

For quite some time i'd had an affinity with the underdog - the less famous band, the song that wasn't a big hit - and bands who somehow managed to gain some success against the odds or despite being considered uncommercial always get some respect from me, even if i'm not particularly into their music. So when a rock band with definite prog leanings and not what you would call a conventional image managed to crack the Top 40, i was very pleased. The band were called Ultrasound, and they didn't do three minute pop songs. Their frontman was not exactly a pin-up, being a huge thirtysomething bloke with a dodgy bowl haircut. Andrew "Tiny" Wood had a huge voice though, akin to the mammoth bawl of Noddy Holder. Most of the band were not young by pop star standards. Their glam-meets-prog rock had captivated the music press and a cult following though, and in June their single "Stay Young" hit No. 30. A seven minute glam/prog/rock and roll call to arms and hymn to youth. I loved it. I still love this song, despite a lyric referencing a certain now-disgraced former glam rock icon, but the song was written long before those events came to light. Ultrasound split after another year or so, having taken too long to release their debut album, Everything Picture,  losing momentum and falling out as a band. They reformed in 2010, and have released two new albums since.

That summer, i decided to quit knocking on doors and took a job working the graveyard shift in a petrol station. This afforded me the opportunity to listen to my beloved music whilst working, which was a bonus, and once again a regular wage to indulge my interests.

1998/99 was a golden age for indie and alternative music, in that loads of unique bands kept popping up, and were championed by the music press, especially the Melody Maker. Most of these acts swiftly disappeared after a couple of singles, and most of them were hitless, but great nonetheless, which gave me plenty to review in my music column.