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The irresistible story of a one-man cultural phenomenon.
Minister for the Counterculture, Mancunian mainstay and alternative national treasure John Robb has lived a life in music. In this book he charts his adventures on the cultural frontline, chronicling the making of a DIY icon.
Robb’s quest began in his hometown of Blackpool – where punk was a battle against the odds – and went international when he toured the world with his band. The first person to interview Nirvana, he also discovered The Stone Roses for weekly newspaper Sounds and did early interviews with The Jesus and Mary Chain and The Manics, before moving on to legends such as Mark E. Smith, Nick Cave and Patti Smith. Along the way, he became an on-screen commentator and author of bestselling books.
Robb’s memoir tells of deep friendships with figures from Poly Styrene to Chris Packham. Packed with riotous stories, it provides an alternative account of British musical and cultural history and a triumphant blueprint for a punk rock life.
Preface: the universe explodes into a billion photons of pure white light
1 Life, death and the scary bits in between
2 Ghosts of ancient relatives on the high seas
3 Alien kid: my swinging sixties
4 Tower power! Blackpool by the sea
5 Spaceships! The moon landing
6 Wounded bull in Victorian England: school daze/cruel ways
7 Wigwam bam thank U glam (confessions of a teenage pop nerd)
8 Riot squad for Toxic City FC: tower power and nutters that come from the sea
9 Wake up! Wake up! You’re already dead: inky fingers and the music press
10 In 1977 we finally get to heaven
11 Fighting in the dancehalls: punk adventures in a seaside town
12 Revolting into style! Cut and paste culture
13 Songs of love and fury: the Membranes
14 Entertaining friends: our first gigs
15 Xerox machine: fanzines and a missive from couch potato command
16 Get a head: the Membranes get going
17 If you enter the arena, you've got to be prepared to deal with the lions
18 Hey! When the sun goes down! Manchester calling
19 Twenty-four-hour drinking at northern prices! Moving to the fort by the breast-shaped hill
20 Death to trad rock
21 The world acclaims… the eternal protein men! How to survive being a bunch of cults
22 Beyond God and Elvis: 1987 and searching for the new thing
23 Everyone’s going triple bad acid yeah! Nirvana, Dinosaur Jr. in my garden
24 The day my universe changed: there is acid in the house
25 When I get to heaven: adventures on the music frontline
26 Blind faith: blissing in action in the early nineties
27 Post detergent vacuum cleaner man: adventures into sound
28 Home turf: Goldblade bring the punk rock soul power
29 Goldblade drop the bomb
30 Do you believe in the power of rock’n’roll?
31 R U ready for the twenty-first century?
32 End of the century!
33 All we got are punk rock rebel songs: Goldblade bring the noise
34 Dream the vicious dream: oh what a tangled web we weave…
35 Borders blurred: the visa campaign
36 Justice!
37 All roads lead to the palace of wisdom
38 Fangs for the memory: the fall guy, or, how I was bitten by the elastic man
39 Dark Matter/Dark Energy: the Membranes take a trip into outer space
40 New blood for young skulls: a new generation is still louder than war!
41 Someone stole my brain: words are my weapons and music is the glue
42 Breath in/breathe out: enter the green dragons, green populism and the sixth great extinction
43 What nature gives… nature takes away, or, where do you go after you have been across the universe?
44 Feel my disease: the great plague
45 Fastest man alive: the roaring twenties
46 In the city of future ghosts
Index