95 / 96 – BritPop and Lime Green Summers

As we draw a close to 2015, and approach 2016, it’s dawned on me that it’s been 20 years since one of the favourite periods of my youth.

I say youth, but does 20 years old count as a youthful age!?

Both 1995 and 1996 bring back many memories for me – thankfully most of them good! I remember feeling in just a bit more of a bouncy good mood and seemingly much more confident in myself for some reason, having been quite the shy lad for far too many years. I think that maybe the glandular fever, anaemia and fatigue I’d had flirtations with over the few years previous had finally been left in the past, and I never really felt I had anywhere near enough the fun in my late teens as I ought to have had.

I can’t even specifically put my finger on why these years have lingered longer in the annals than others. There were no life changing events, but the time just had a buzz for me that for whatever reason I’ve not been able to easily forget.

So what was it about ’95 and ‘96?

Maybe it was the music?

In the first half of the nineties, I found that there wasn’t a particular collective of music that I could (or wanted) to fall into. There were, of course, many fantastic songs during this period though – indeed one of my favourite ever songs came out in 1994 (Baby I Love Your Way – Big Mountain), but largely the charts felt just much of a muchness. And then out of the shadows of the rumblings of the Indie scene, came its commercial cousin: BritPop

 

It had taken me a while to get into any kind of alternative genres, as perhaps my tastes were limited? But once I’d listened to Blur’s ‘Parklife’ and Oasis’ ‘Definitely Maybe’ albums, I – like many others – fell straight in with it. Blur’s follow up album ‘The Great Escape’ came out in the late summer of 1995 and I loved it instantly.

There was also a huge amount of hype that surrounded BritPop, culminating in a media / press battle going on between the two powerhead bands previously mentioned. I suppose it was a modern day equivalent of the 1960’s chart battles between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones (albeit not sales volumes wise) although those two legendary bands were actually on friendly terms with each other, and the same couldn’t be said about Blur and Oasis! It wasn’t just those two bands though – there was suddenly a ton of good music around. The Different Class album by Pulp, to name but one additional gem, had a number of songs that gave a keenly accurate soundtrack in representing the time we were living in.

BritPop has rightfully gone down in history as an immensely popular phase of music, and although it was all too short lived, it provided a helluva soundtrack for the mid-nineties.

To compound the zeitgeist I went with friends to Wembley Arena to see Blur in concert just before Christmas, and Pulp at the Brighton Centre a few months later. Bands at their peak and in their prime, and both were cracking gigs full of energy. Oasis at Knebworth was out of reach unfortunately!

It wasn’t all about BritPop though. Earlier in 1995, as a huge fan I’d been long awaiting the new Michael Jackson album, and when ‘HIStory’ was released, I wasn’t disappointed.

I’d also been to see The Rolling Stones at Wembley Stadium, and the self-styled ‘Greatest Rock & Roll Band’ could still do the business and belted out their back catalogue in some style. And for completeness, even The Beatles made something of a comeback, having a hugely successful mini renaissance with the release of their Anthology series – in fact in 1996 they ended as the biggest selling album artists for the first time in nearly 30 years. Gradually building up my massive music collection, I was grateful to receive their ‘Abbey Road’’ album as a Christmas present in 1995.

Not only that, I was also happy as Michael Jackson attained the coveted Christmas number one single (when it actually meant something!) with ’Earth Song’, holding off The Beatles’ ‘new’ track ‘Free as a Bird’, and the respective versions of ‘Wonderwall’ by Oasis and The Mike Flowers Pops.

The range of music was immense, and I could waffle on about loads more, but with the word count ticking up, I’ll summarise to say that we also had the euphoria of Three Lions, taking the already stunning Lightning Seeds further into orbit. Plus the phenomenon of the Spice Girls:

 

Not forgetting Paul Weller’s ‘Stanley Road’ and the return of George Michael – who’d been away even longer than Michael Jackson. And of course, the Return of the Mack…

Maybe it was the football?

This was also a monumental period for football. I’m not talking about Euro ’96 though, although that WAS stirring for the memory banks in many ways too, but ultimately football did NOT come home as we had ultimately wanted it to. As alluded to above, you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing the football anthem ‘Three Lions’ being played from a pub or a car that summer – very catchy and emotive stuff.

No, I’m talking about the pitch invasion at Brighton and Hove Albion’s Soldstone Goldstone Ground as fans drew attention to the footballing world about just what was happening to our club.

 

Football often provides a backdrop to my recollections, but the period 1995 – 1997 inclusive was about as intense as I suspect it will ever be in my lifetime.

In April 1996 we played York City. We’d heard rumours that ‘something’ would happen, but no-one expected the scenes that followed at around 15 minutes into the game. I was in the North Stand and watched on as thousands of fans poured onto the pitch in a bid to get the game abandoned. The national media called it a ‘riot’, which it never was. There was a family in front of us on the pitch eating strawberries and cream from a picnic basket, whilst sitting on a rug. That is NOT the scene of a riot. After a few minutes, the game was indeed abandoned as both goal crossbars were snapped in half, making it impossible for the game to be restarted.

Thankfully it became quickly evident that hooliganism was not alive and well in England again, and that Brighton’s fans protests had absolutely been a cry for help. Our club was being ravaged by money-men and wrong doers, and we – the fans – were caring for it in a very animated way. It carried on in a similar vein for another 12 months, when we ultimately proved that off the field, fans united will never be defeated.

On the field it was very hard to get behind the team with such aggravation going on, but once the directors had left the scene, the focus and atmosphere at the home games in particular was spectacularly good, as we fought for our very existence. For a passionate football fan, these were thrilling times.

Maybe it was work?

Aged 20, I’d still not decided what sort of career I wanted to have (at 40 I still haven’t!) but work was at least relatively care free and fun during this time, as referred to in some of my earlier blogs:

Trollied Part 1

Trollied Part 2

Trollied Revisited

Christmas at work in 1995 was the start of some proper responsibility based grafting. My manager had broken her ankle just before Christmas and had to take the whole period off work, so with the deputy store manager having little faith in her understudy, I was asked to run the Deli over Christmas. I loved my first taste of properly being in charge, and I pulled up trees to make the counter as successful as possible over the main period of 21^st-24^th December. Considering I was quite the novice, we did spectacularly well. I finished at 5pm on Christmas Eve absolutely knackered, but I knew I’d done a really good job and consequently I got my first ever promotion at work – with my pay rising up to all of £6.50 an hour!

 

My achievement didn’t come without an element of jealousy from others sadly. Two or three work colleagues, who up till then had been really good friends of mine, turned on me simply because I wasn’t ‘one of the lads’ anymore in their eyes. Fair play to one of them, who some months later actually apologised to me for saying I’d had an attitude problem.

I firmly believed that no-one had any grounds to be so unkind – they turned on me just for effect. It made me think of something my Dad had said to me years before, in that your work mates are never your friends – just colleagues and acquaintances, and I should always bear that in mind. Maybe it’s too much of a generalisation, but there are strong enough elements to compound the theory on occasion. Bizarrely I got a second promotion at work just 6 months after the first and the new problem I had to contend with, was being intimidated. 

The store manager was literally a larger than life guy, and in all honesty I don’t recall more than 3 or 4 conversations I ever had with him in the few months we worked together. In the interview he asked me what I thought about people with a big ego. I honestly answered that:

“I can’t stand that sort of person” – to which he replied:

“Well you and me aren’t going to get along then!”

I still have no idea if he was joking. Either way, I spent most of the first month hiding in the toilets on my own at lunch break.

And people say I wasn’t shy…!

Oh, and a top tip for y’all: Do NOT date work colleagues.

#learningcurve

Maybe it was miscellany?

In 1995 I started writing poetry. I’d never been that fussed about reading poetry, let alone composing it, but I started in earnest and began writing down thoughts and poems about relevant things to me and ended up carrying on for years. It was always written in an emotional theme and always with a lot hope and desire that one day I’d gain a particular kind of contentment and happiness. I don’t think it was a coincidence that I more or less ‘dried up’ writing at around the time my son was born. It seemed that maybe as an unwritten statement many of my hopes had been reached.

I also had a car chase in the wee small hours with my lights out one night in the summer of ’95! The least said about that the better…!

 

In 1996 I bought my first desktop personal computer. Hardly anyone I knew had one – compare that to now, where people simply cannot operate their lives without such similar derivatives. Ridiculously it cost over £2000!

I also played a lot of snooker around this time and frequently went to ‘The 147 Club’ in Brunswick Street, Hove, which was always good fun. We always used to have a great laugh at the expense of the bar staff there – in particular a guy we used to call ‘Serge’, after the Bronson Pinchot character in the Beverly Hills Cop movies. One night a few of us won the £250 ‘cash pot’ out of the fruit machine which was a nice little bonus!

Maybe it was sociality?
I don’t know what changed, but from about mid 1995 I belatedly started having a decent social life at last – even going out clubbing midweek, whereas before I wouldn’t bother going out anywhere if I’d had a bath earlier in the evening as it just felt like too much effort.

Quite often from 1995 and even more so into 1996 (even though I usually had work the next day) I would end up nightclubbing down the Event II on a Tuesday or the Paradox on a Thursday – the so called ‘student’ nights. The booze was as cheap as chips (usually no more than £1.50 a drink) and there was a heavier emphasis on playing a lot more of the music I liked. It was far more commercial than would be heard on a Saturday at the same venues, so I was more inclined to enjoy myself for that reason alone.

 

I even hit a spell of doing what most 20 year old boys should be doing – namely being on the pull! Honestly this was a relief as I was starting to think my middle name was Chastity. Friends and family even pondered that I might be gay. I think my mum would’ve loved a big gay son!

It’s fair to say that I had no idea what I was myself though as a) I had so little attention coming my way, and b) I was pretty uninclined to try as I was too shy to ask anyone out anyway!

Anyways – actually managing to occasionally pull helped my confidence no end and socially I felt I’d grown up a bit at last… though in my naivety I recall getting stitched up very early in 1996. Me and some mates were at the Paradox and I wound up buying this one girl drinks all night etc. only for her to sod off without me come 2am

#morelearningcurves

I believe this was also the night when me and one of my mates got out of our Taxi about half a mile from home and, (as drunk) fell over and had a little sleep in the middle of the road! I reckon Taxis and any cars must have just driven round us paying little attention – we must have been there for a good twenty minutes though! I would guess it was the uncommon knocking back of the Jack Daniels shots earlier in the evening that did for us…

Another nights’ exertions lead to the aerial of my first car (a 1978 brown Mini Clubman – RIP) being snapped off by one jealous colleague, and an aggressive confrontation in a Sainsburys chiller by another jealous one! If this was the norm, I’d clearly missed out on this sort of fun for years. #evenmorelearningcurves

Another funny night was had at the Irish pub ‘O’Neill’s’ (where, incidentally, Brighton & Hove Albion was formed in 1901) with a terrifically funny guy from work and his family and mates (all Irish.)

His brothers were playing in a band there, and we got absolutely slaughtered on Guinness and I knocked back ten pints in just under two hours, ‘singing’ along to Irish songs I didn’t know the words to. I’d never drunk such volume so quickly before, and I’ve not done it since either, but the atmosphere was so good and everything just flowed perfectly. At around 10pm we staggered over to the night club and had to straighten ourselves out to make sure we actually got in – I remember being ordered to stop singing in the queue, or we wouldn’t be allowed in. Nightclub bouncers were often a different breed, but I never once got refused entry.

Maybe it was the Lime Green summer?

1996 was a glorious summer – and for no other reason than everyone seemed to be wearing lime green clothes for the duration, it was forever known to me by that moniker. On the beach or seeing customers whilst I was at work… it seemed to be the colour of choice everywhere.

 

Maybe it doesn’t matter…

I know that it Definitely Maybe wasn’t Maybelline.

But it was Definitely Maybe memorable to me.

 

What’s the best England football song?

It’s been 25 years since the highly emotive Italia’90 World Cup, and it’s still so very fresh in the memory I could probably do an entire blog on that one tournament in no time. Strangely I recall more about the games of that tournament than I can about last years’ event in Brazil, even though the quality of football in Brazil ‘14 was far superior to many World Cups of recent years.

Oddly history shows that ‘experts’ believe Italia ’90 was a boring tournament apparently!?

I suppose it just goes to show that if you are in the running for winning something in sport, your memories are perhaps clouded by sentiment!

Italia ’90 for me though wasn’t simply about what was played on grass – overall, it created the roots that brought about the biggest change in football in my lifetime.

Whilst it preceded the Premier League blueprint in England by a couple of years, I believe the ‘feeling’ that exuded out of this particular tournament started a huge ground swell of change and altered perception of how football was forever to be viewed in this country.

One of England’s many heroes of Italia ’90 was Gary Lineker, and he sums it up pretty nicely:

"There's no question Italia '90 was a watershed moment for football in this country. Football in the 1980s had half empty stadiums, then we had the Taylor report and all-seater stadiums. After Italia '90, football became the place to go: it wasn't just the working classes; it was other people as well. And women and children. I think Italia '90 was significant in that."

As an attending fan of Brighton & Hove Albion since 1987 (and a season ticket holder since 1992), what Lineker states is bang on the money. I was 14 years old whilst that tournament was on, and almost overnight football stopped being a predominantly boys only topic (in general) on the playground. Suddenly many more female classmates got in on the act too. And about time too, one might say.

It didn’t stop at school either. On the terraces of Brighton’s old Goldstone Ground (RIP), and over the next few years, the boom of women and children, nay FAMILIES, was evident, and thankfully this powerful new movement attracted people who had never had an interest in the game before. Football literally became fashionable overnight, and ripped itself away from the hooligan elements of society that were prevalent in the 1970’s and 1980’s.

I digress though.

So what actually springs to mind from Italia ‘90?

From an England point of view alone we had Bobby Robson’s finest hour, Lineker’s goals, Platt’s volley...

Gazza’s tears,Waddle and Pearce’s penalty agonies…

Not forgetting what the other nations provided us with > Cameroon’s Roger Milla (the oldest swinger in town), Scotland just missing out on the second round again, Argentina’s fortuitous route to a second consecutive final, spit-gate between West Germany and Holland. Not forgetting the Republic of Ireland punching well above their weight to reach the quarter finals, only to be knocked out by a solitary goal from the host nation’s golden boy Toto Schillaci.

As stated in the title though, for this blog I’m going to steer clear of the actual football and look at aspects relating to another poignant memory jerker of this tournament, when love had the World in Motion.

As football songs go, World in Motion was an immense improvement on what had been on offer before… so whilst not a definitive list, here is a bit of a look at some England tournament songs from down the years:

England World Cup Squad (1970): Back Home

Traditionalists will always say that originals are the best. 

As simple pop songs go, it’s quite catchy so I can see why it got to number one in the charts – which in 1970 was no mean feat in what was a strong era for singles sales.

In fact, when it got to number one, other artists in the 30 included stellar artists such as Elvis, Tom Jones, Stevie Wonder, The Jackson 5 and Simon & Garfunkel, so all things considered, Back Home did rather well! It does sound dated now though...

England World Cup Squad (1982): This Time (We'll Get It Right) / England We'll Fly The Flag

There's a quality to this one that conjures up images of an oil tanker. It sort of plods away and feels laboured – much like England’s on field campaign in España ’82.

What’s noteworthy? Well this double A side (look it up kids) was part of a collection of numerous songs on a whole football themed album, which contained other audible gems like future England managers Glenn Hoddle (singing We Are The Champions) and Kevin Keegan (singing Head Over Heels)… and who could forget the theme from Grandstand as performed by The Leyland Vehicles Brass Band?

And sorry Glenn; you were my favourite player of all time, but this isn’t a patch on Diamond Lights!

Quirky, but not memorable!

England World Cup Squad (1986): We’ve Got The Whole World At Our Feet

Being 10 years old at the time of Mexico ’86, I was just getting into buying my own music. But that still doesn’t excuse why I bought the accompanying album which included this song. Frankly all songs are hilarious, and include medleys incorporating stuff like ‘There’ll Always be an England’ and ‘The Happy Wanderer’ – bizarre and fun, but not particularly good.

SAW & England (1988): All The Way

The England team had the best qualifying record of all the teams in Euro ’88. The same probably can’t be said for the promo record though. It’s dripping with the 80’s Stock, Aitken and Waterman effect (which isn’t a bad sound in my opinion) but never really caught the attention of the buying public. Besides, we didn’t go anywhere near ‘All The Way’ either. What with the illness of Gary Lineker and the luck of the Irish never being truer than when they beat us 1-0, we crashed out of the tournament with nil pois / keine punkte.

England/New Order (1990): World In Motion

Now we’re cooking.

‘World in Motion’ was huge as football songs go, bigger and better than any England football songs that had gone before, and (maybe along with one or two others) better than what we’ve had since. It was a true representation of the sound of it’s time too.

I’m not sure exactly why it was so well received – maybe because of the association with New Order? Maybe because of the iconic John Barnes rap? Or maybe because the writers recognised in the lyrics that football really IS a love affair.

Thankfully it’s been wheeled out at every tournament since 1990 to remind us all how good it was. When that happens, without fail I get the goose bumps kicking in as I’m transported back to that fantastic footballing month and all that it evoked.

As an oddity, listen out for the keyboard lick just before John Barnes does his rap. I might be totally making this up in my ears, but I’m convinced it’s 90% identical to a piece of music in ‘Vogue’ by Madonna which was released just a few weeks earlier.

So who copied who?

Baddiel/Skinner/Lightning Seeds (96/98/10): Three Lions / 3 Lions 98 / Three Lions 2010

So good, they did it thrice.

Comparable in many ways to the quality and impact of World in Motion, it’s a tough call to say which is best.

On the back of the hugely successful Fantasy Football League TV programme, the hosts of said show David Baddiel and Frank Skinner, joined forces with the Lightning Seeds for Three Lions, and together they rode on the crest of the BritPop wave at the time to produce the most incredible anthem to Euro ’96.

The song captured the imagination of the public even more so due to the tournament being held in England and in no small way this was helped by the structure of the song. The ‘It’s Coming Home’ refrain was an instant success as a terrace hit (much like World In Motion’s ’En-ger-land), whereas not many had married this bridge between song and chant so well previously.

Rewritten lyrics sent the song to number one AGAIN two years later for the World Cup in France ’98, beating off other strong contenders in their wake.

And seemingly just for fun, Russell Brand and Robbie Williams chipped in for a rehash of the original version ahead of South Africa ’10. The latter version didn’t do so well, but has enough little interesting alterations that continue to do the song justice.

England United (1998): (How Does It Feel To Be) On Top Of The World

This was the ‘official’ song for France ’98, but it really didn’t do as well as hoped (much like England on the field). Personally I think that’s a shame as I quite liked it, and still do.

I almost feel that it didn’t get loved as much, just BECAUSE it wasn’t Three Lions, which had been SO huge two years previously, but as mentioned above, was taking on all comers for a second consecutive tournament – and winning! Maybe the public had had their fill of the featured Spice Girls by then? Not me though, as I felt Melanie Chisholm’s vocals added superbly to the song – so who knows!? For whatever reason, it just didn’t catch on with the masses.

Fat Les (1998): Vindaloo

Yet another France ’98 contender – it was truly a boom year for football songs!

Lead effectively by Keith Allen (who co-wrote World in Motion) and Alex James (Blur), Fat Les produced not only another song that could be belted out from the terraces, but also a fantastic video (with cameos galore) which gently mocked The Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony – which itself has also been associated with football coverage over the years.

Guaranteed to get any decent crowd going, and for me only just falls into second place of all time great football songs behind World in Motion and Three Lions.

Fat Les (2000): Jerusalem

Yep Fat Les again.

On the back of the success of the rousing Vindaloo, the band was this time commissioned with delivering the official FA song for Euro 2000, and they went with the song that is often regarded as the unofficial national anthem of the UK: Jerusalem

It seems like it was an attempt to make an even more rousing effort than they’d created before (if that’s possible), but it somehow didn’t command the respect of its predecessors. Plus England were very poor at this tournament, which never helps the ‘build’ of a football song’s chart run. That said, we did achieve an all too rare victory over the Germans. I’m pretty sure there’s still a part of my body that’s wet from the beers that went flying in the pub when we won that game.

So there you go – just a few songs to jerk the memory. Apologies to Ant & Dec for ignoring their 2002 effort of We’re On The Ball, but this blog is already too long without opining on that one!

However, it would be remiss of me to leave this blog without mentioning my favourite two non-England related football tournament tunes.

So a special nod to the BBC for a couple of particularly good official tournament coverage themes:

The Heads (1986): Aztec Lightning

Luciano Pavarotti (1990): Nessun Dorma

Click and Listen!