THIS IS A JOURNEY INTO SOUND

The years 1994 -96 saw the nation in a celebratory mood: British music was back in the ascendant, our film industry was providing Hollywood with some serious competition, and there was a general sense of national pride in our sportsmen and women. "Cool Britannia", as the press dubbed it, saw a positive and hopeful mood that mirrored the swinging sixties. But not everyone went along, or fitted in with this mood. Certainly not Manic Street Preachers. They'd arrived in a whirlwind of eyeliner, leopard print, rage, and political sloganeering back at the beginning of the decade, declaring themselves to be celebrating the "culture of boredom, alienation, and despair", writing cut and paste lyrics attacking consumerism, capitalism, exploitation, as well as themes of the struggles of youth, despair, and other personal subjects. Their manifesto was to sell sixteen million copies of their self-proclaimed "best rock'n'roll album ever" Generation Terrori

As the calendar flipped over into 1999, the last year of the millennium (actually, 2000 was officially the last year, as a thousand years must pass, and there wasn't a year zero), and i was feeling pretty lonely in my bedsit, and really not enjoying night shifts on my own. The only thing that kept me going was music, and writing my Review section for the local newspaper, so they stopped printing it without any warning, it was a bit of a knock. So i plunged even deeper into my ever-growing record collection. The mainstream music scene had by now been almost swamped by identikit dance music, boy bands, stage school singers, and middle of the road crap. There was so much of it i found myself starting to like some of it - i had the two latest NOW albums - which was a disturbing development! I needed a jolt out of this, and it came in the form of a surprise No. 1 hit by U.S Punk band The Offspring. They had been one of the bands who were my introduction to Punk back in '94/95, but

As i've written elsewhere in this blog, although it was increasingly easy as i grew up to get hold of older music, finding out about the artists was difficult. In a time before i had access to the internet, information about music from previous eras was either gleaned from the pages of magazines like Record Collector, or through older friends and acquaintances. In the mid 90's a satellite station named UK GOLD started broadcasting complete episodes of Top Of The Pops from the early 80's, and i was immediately grabbed by the Synthpop and electronic music - Human League, Depeche Mode, OMD and the like - and over the following years i picked up a few greatest hits and best of's, some having been introduced to me by older workmates. I was vaguely aware that some of these bands had more of a story than just a collection of shiny pop hits, especially The Human League, whose "Being Boiled" stood out a mile from the rest of their Greatest Hits album, almost sounding l

As 1998 wore on and i changed jobs again, i decided i needed my own place. I was never going to afford a flat or house on my wages, so i found a bedsit near the centre of town. At £55 a week, it wasn't exactly a penthouse, and there was no central heating, but it suited me fine: one room, with a separate bathroom (there was a guy living upstairs), and a kitchen downstairs. Plenty of privacy, and no-one to complain about how loud my music was! And i needed the space to play more music, especially now i was receiving free cds through the post to review in my music column in the local paper. I'd been writing it for a few months now, and managed to persuade a few indie labels to send me some promotional stuff - Beggars Banquet, XL, Wall Of Sound, and a couple of others whose names escape me. It certainly helped as i now had less money to spend on music. Cds that came free with the many music magazines i read were a bonus too, and the sadly now defunct Melody Maker was one weekly