The Charlatans
The Charlatans could very well be the most underappreciated band to come out of England in the last two decades. Not only were they among the standard-bearers of the Manchester musical revolution at the beginning of the 90s, they've continued to crank out spectacular albums to this day -- their sound seeming to morph into unpredictable territory with each new release. Pick up 2001's Wonderland -- an album which, for me personally, provided an ironically upbeat and groove-laden soundtrack to the chaos and heartache of life in New York City following 9/11 -- then compare it to the late-night chill of 1994's Up to Our Hips, or their most recent release, Simpatico.
Or this -- the song that put the Charlatans on the map: Weirdo.
The Stone Roses
Make no mistake -- I Wanna Be Adored, released in 1989, is one of the best, most enduring songs of the last quarter-century. It's quietly snotty, the perfect precursor to the all-out "Fuck You" bombast of Oasis's breakout hit Supersonic, which would take over the airwaves just a few years later. Ian Brown continues to make excellent music even now -- his solo stuff is fantastic, particularly his work with UNKLE -- but the Roses, who managed to create such an indelible mark on the musical landscape with only two albums, were pure fucking brilliance.
From their second and final album, 1994's Second Coming, here's Love Spreads.
Black Grape
If you haven't seen Michael Winterbottom's vibrant and hysterical film about the birth of the Manchester scene 24 Hour Party People, drop what you're doing immediately, get yourself the DVD and a few hits of ecstasy and enjoy; the experience will tell you everything you need to know about Shaun Ryder. In the late 80s and early 90s, the Happy Mondays were UK rave culture. Ryder and the Mondays all but annihilated themselves and their career at one point by reducing their collective brain to an amorphous blob of Jello. Astonishingly though, they somehow managed to crawl out of their K-hole and continue to make music. The Mondays are back together these days, but for whatever reason, it was always Ryder's short-lived side-project Black Grape -- who released only two records before splitting up -- that really did it for me.
This song is one of my favorites ever. It features a brilliant re-cut of the infamous Ron & Nancy Reagan primetime "Just Say No to Drugs" address from the mid-80s. The words have been rearranged to make the Reagans' message pro-drug-use. (Incidentally, there's a video version of the re-cut speech floating around out there somewhere that's definitely worth getting your hands on if you can. For those who live in L.A., I know it can be found at Rocket Video on La Brea. Everyone else, you're on your own.)
This is Get Higher.
Lush
Call them Dream-pop, Shoegaze, whatever you'd like -- Lush made gorgeous music. Like their contemporaries My Bloody Valentine and the Cocteau Twins, Lush was all swirling guitars and delicate, ethereal vocals. Maybe the most persuasive thing that I can say about them is this: Back in the early 90s, one of my best friends was a long-haired guy who listened to pretty much nothing but Death Metal; the moment he heard Lush for the first time though, he fell completely under their spell and started replacing his ubiquitous black Cannibal Corpse and Napalm Death t-shirts with Lush-wear. This was, needless to say, funny as hell to watch. But such was the hypnotic power of Lush.
This is Superblast.
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