Graham Reid | | <1 min read
Happy Mondays: Stayin' Alive
One of the funniest and best gigs I ever saw was Black Grape in New York where a barely vertical Shaun Ryder read lyric from massive cue cards on stage, rapper Kermit bewildered everyone with his inaudible but energetic rhymes and there was a table on the balcony reserved for Blur who weren't even in the city at the time.
It was utter madness and the American record company people I was with just didn't get it at all.
Of course they hadn't seen where this one had come from, not knowing Ryder's previous band Happy Mondays and the whole baggy-meets-house (and a massive amount of drugs).
I do wonder if a new generation would get Happy Mondays today. Their free flowing, guitar-driven tripping out dance music would seem to have a place but . . .
Anyway for all and sundry here are 17 collected Happy Mondays tracks -- which seems to be a tour tie-in judging by a comment in the cover -- including a couple of remixes and the 12" version of the Bee Gees Stayin' Alive.
It's a lot of HM (sounds a bit compressed and thin in the bottom) and prompts the question, whatever happened to E as the drug of choice?
The Riverboat Captain - Aug 20, 2012
Last time I saw the Mondays it was at Coachella 2007.. Shaun had moved upmarket and was reading the lyrics from a monitor screen and an NME journalist took the Bez dancing role. It was even then a great party. They were introduced by a wreck of an old guy supporting himself with a stick, who I didn't recognise.. it was only later I realised it was dear old Tony Wilson who would only live a few months more, alas.
SaveAnt - Aug 22, 2012
I saw Black Grape in London in 1996 and it was a mad gig too. Johnny Marr played guitar on a couple of tracks, Michael Hutchence?! came on to sing on a few songs and Shaun was totally gone...
SaveThe Mondays are a great band though, the original lineup has reformed and have been touring, Shaun's clean again and going by the reports I've read they are sounding good!
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