It's almost impossible to explain to people how important the Stone Roses were and how awful the 80s were until they came along. There's nostalgia too now, of course. That bastard always creeps in.
People going on about The Blitz Club, electro pop and goth. But believe me it was shite. I know, because I was there.
I caught The Jam too late. I bought Going Underground and Snap but they were already multi-million sellers by then. I still love Weller of course, but he belonged to my older brother. Him, The Clash, The Pistols and all the new wave, well, it was his.
I'd missed it. Instead I got an endless parade of plastic drivel on Top of the Pops and the only chinks of light in my grey, cloud riven, world were The Smiths and John Peel.
There have been better bands, like The Beatles. There have been bigger bands, like The Rolling Stones. But not that many as important, just two. The previously mentioned Beatles and the Pistols.
It's these two, along with The Stone Roses that changed everything in the UK. Not just musically but culturally too.
I can still remember the day I first saw their name. I used to read the NME. I loved and hated it in equal measure. Written by self-important wankers who wouldn't have a clue in the real world, but it was still better than the Melody Maker and my beloved Sounds was on it's last legs.
It was a single they had written about. Sally Cinnamon it was called. They hated it. They hated everything unless it was The Smiths or New Order. But a mate of mine had it. Richie Collins. A John Peel disciple whose range went from The Butthole Surfers to Sisters of Mercy. He put it on... and I fell in love.
It was love at first listen. It was sparse, haunting and sounded like the Byrds in their heyday with a Manc Lou Reed singing over the top. I wanted to find out more, but in the days before the Internet you couldn't.
They were as mysterious as they sounded. I didn't even know what they looked like. Then came Elephant Stone. It was even better. A shimmering guitar driven anthem that was ridiculously tuneful. I mean, it literally sounded like the sun shining softly on your face.
I played it for days. I started getting pictures of them. Like a night time radio controller picking out Morse code, I was getting bits of information on this band and when I finally saw them it took my breath away.
They looked like rock stars. Bowl haircuts, Mani's terrace scally flick, chippie t-shirts, flares and a cricket hat for fucks sake. In a sentence... they looked like us. Only cooler.
I got the album from Spillers in Cardiff. I was like a South Wales PR machine. I copied it to people. Mark on the fanzine. Tony Rivers (later of Soul Crew fame) and the Cynon Valley boys.
They did the same. It was everywhere that summer. I watched like a contented mother bird as her chicks flew the nest. South Wales went from grey to happy day-glow almost overnight.
You'll probably never see a transformation like that again. It killed heavy metal, goth even punk (which had clung on) dead in it's tracks. They were like beached whales being dragged onto a beach and slaughtered mercilessly. Acid house hit the same time. It was a perfect storm. That moment when all the chemicals hit at the same time and some weird genius alchemy happened, and everyone was out raving.
Driving all hours of the night to look for places that played what was quickly dubbed 'Madchester' or 'House'. The drug E was everywhere. People who had all this angry energy were suddenly 'loved up', as the expression goes, and hugging in muddy fields. It was beautiful and at the centre of it all was the Stone Roses.
This album of acid bleached guitar, rubbery Beatle bass lines and drumming that only James Brown's drummer had given us before. The song's lyrics were angry, and I loved that. Songs about riots. Songs about wanting to be adored. Songs about executing the Queen.
Ian Brown had done for singing what punk had done for musicians. It didn't matter he couldn't sing. Who cared? He looked fuckin' magnificent. He was our Scally Manc Leader. Our King Monkey. Everyone tried to do his pimp roll walk. Grow our hair like him. Dress like him. Be him. We'd got our band. Our generation had the band we could show to our older brothers and say "check this out."
And it worked. My older brother's favourite band is still the Stone Roses. And that's why there's so much excitement about them reforming, because they are but one of three bands that had this cataclysmic effect on everything. Music, fashion and culture.
We all know the end. The descent into madness. The 'five years in coming' second album. The brilliant Oasis filling the void. It Doesn't matter. It's even more rock and roll. As Jerry Lee said.. "Rock and roll's genius is also it's tragedy... that it always ends in tears."
The Roses split after an awful Reading gig and years of rancour and acrimony took over. But that's the way it should be. Who wants U2? Endlessly peddling the stadium market. To burn brightly is always so much more beautiful.
I went to Spike Island. You couldn't hear much... but the vibe there that day was everything.
That 'energy' thing again. It was where the 90s started really. Everything else, for good or bad, started there. Britpop, New Lads, The Sky Football boom even New Labour. It all began with a generation coming through that was sick to the back teeth of a Tory government, being told you were nothing, of The Sun, of the establishment.
Of course we know now that New Labour were as much a bunch of bastards as any Tory government, but in that moment at the start of the new decade the Roses told us to come out from the shadows. That we were at the vanguard now. And plenty did. Actors, writers, musicians, entrepreneurs... they all began at that moment to shake off the shackles of a miserable 70s and 80s education in battery farm comprehensive schools. And at the forefront off all that were The Stone Roses.
And that why, even for a fleeting moment, it's fucking great to have them back.