Definitely? Maybe…
Definitely? Maybe…
There are always landmark moments of Rock music - events and music that changes the mood, the clothing, in fact the very culture and comes to define the time completely.
The Beatles did it in the 1960’s. To have longer than your collar was enough to bring back calls for National Service to return, yet youth culture causes seismic changes, and soon the world itself was filled with first moptops in round collared suits, then Kaftans with national health specs as the ultimate fashion accessory, and then hair so long you could not see where you were walking half of the time, even though the world was full of peace and love!
The Rolling Stones and all of the British Invasion bands also played an unmeasurable part in proceedings, a counterculture that the post war baby boomers embraced, and the establishment hated - no wonder the teenagers welcomed it with open arms.
The 70’s gave us Bowie and Glam, followed by the earthquake of Punk Rock - New Rose by the Damned followed by Anarchy in the UK by the Pistols upset a new generation of Mums, Dads and high-ranking government officials, and the tremors are still being felt today. As the eighties dawned, Weller wrote songs that spoke about how the generation felt about unemployment and their future, post punk became the phrase and Manchester, driven by Tony Wilson and Factory records became the centre of the musical universe through the sounds of Joy Division, New Order, The Smiths, Happy Mondays and Stone Roses, all of which I was there for in body and soul, if not always in mind, but the 90’s started and it went all a bit, well, awry for me and quite a few others
The Hacienda Club gave us the cult of the DJ and dance music, but a glow stick and a bottle of water bouncing round a club in a hoodie certainly wasn’t for me. Charlatans offered hope along with the Inspirals, but it seemed that the world was waiting for something else, a band that people could hang their hats on and truly identify with, and it came, not from nowhere, but from the district of Burnage and a council terrace house.
Oasis dressed like most of the lads on the terraces at football on a Saturday afternoon. They wore the same trainers, same jeans, polo shirts and tops, had the same haircuts and drank the same beers. They were, to all intents and purposes, us, and that struck a lingering chord. This wasn’t the swinging 60’s, it was the start of Cool Britannia - a phrase I hated but one that would come to define the times. Working class lads that changed things, and their debut album, Definitely Maybe was a clarion call of working-class sensibilities with an attitude dragged from the attitude of the Pistols and the song writing savvy of the Beatles, unashamedly taking direction from both.
Definitely Maybe and its successor, What’s The Story? (Morning Glory) are game changers and barometers of their time, and it’s hard to comprehend that this year marks the former’s 30th anniversary. Yes, there was the battle with Blur, a band that I also came to love, but the real change began here. If there was ever an opening track for a record that sets the band’s manifesto in under 4 minutes better that Rock n Roll Star then I still need to hear it, and the terrace anthem of Cigarettes and Alcohol, a song hewn from the very soul of Maine Road, still packs its punch alongside the poetic beauty of Live Forever or smooth grind of Columbia. It’s not just a great album, it’s a stone classic that all of those years on has lost none of its power and attitude.
We are delighted to feature first pressing copies of both these aural statements in our March sale, rare beasts anyway as the black plastic is now back in fashion after being elbowed out of the way by the CD generation but made even more desirable by the fact that they are both signed in black pen by the Gallagher brothers, original drummer Andy McCarrol, bassist Paul “Guigsy” McGuigan and Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs- Oasis in their first incarnation.
Coming with an estimate of between £600-800 apiece, and with great provenance to boot, it’s a great opportunity to own a piece of musical history that helped shape and style an era to cherish and, if you have a bloody good turntable deck, very enjoyable if you are a brave soul!
