Cuttings

50 GREAT MANCHESTER ALBUMS From the Buzzcocks to Doves, Britain's second city has unleashed a succession of albums that changed the face of music. Here's your guide to the best of them.... THE DURUTTI COLUMN The Return Of The Durutti Column FACTORY 1979 Cult miserabillst plays super-sad instrumental guitar. For a movement that was meant to be about free minds and expression, punk dogmas were quick to harden. The Durutti Column, aka guitarist Vini Reilly, kicked against them profoundly with nine meditative instrumental pieces, augmented by minimal programmed rhythms and the judicious use of an Echoplex unit, courtesy of producer Martin Hannett. The seemingly improvised results were delicate and melancholic. But there’s still comfort and even joy here. IH JOY DIVISION Unknown Pleasures FACTORY, 1979 Stark and atmospheric - this is their solemn, definitive st...

THE HAPPY PRINCE Morrissey - Wildean, gladioli-waving Smiths frontman turned rock royalty in self-imposed exile - tells Andrew Male about crippling shyness, celluloid escapism and finding there really is more to life than books. MORRISSEY WAS ALWAYS pulling away from Manchester. Growing up in the south of the city during the ’60s - rain, urban decay, Brady, Hindley - young Steven Patrick Morrissey would regularly, and perhaps understandably, immerse himself in a romantic, fictional netherworld of film, music and comic books. By the mid-’70s this rag-bag of escapist stimuli had coalesced into some kind of philosophy and battleplan, based on the conviction that, in Manchester at least, there was no one else quite like Morrissey. Look back at the lyrics Morrissey wrote with The Smiths between 1983 and 1987 and you discover a romantic soul forever looking for an emotional way out of this cold, industrial hell, like some ...

Before I embark on the next stage of this blog, namely posts on concerts I attended with relevant clips, etc, I've taken the opportunity to update the following posts with better quality scans: New Order 1982 Feature Mist 1983 07 23 NME Feature 1983 07 The Face Feature 1984 06 Zigzag Feature 1984 08 23 Radio Times  1985 05 17 Powerhouse Melbourne 1985 11 16 NME Feature 1986 04 12 Sounds Feature 1986 09 06 Sounds Feature 1986 10 04 Melody Maker 1986 10 18 NME Feature 1986 10 Mix Feature 1986 11 The Face Feature 1986 Record Mirror Feature 1987 12 19 NME Feature 1987 12 19 Wembley Arena NME 1988 07 Sky Feature 1988 12 03 Melody Maker 1989 01 07 NME 1989 01 28 "Technique" NME Review 1989 01 28 NME Feature 1989 02 04 NME Feature 1989 04 01 Sounds Feature 1989 07 01 NME Cover Referring to FAC 227 1990 05 NME England Poster 1990 08 04 NME Hacienda 1992 01 Vox Tony Wilson 1993 05 08 Melody Maker 1993 05 Q Feature 1993 05 Q "Republic" Revie...

'THE BEAUTIFUL MORRISSEY LOOKED AT ME' The tears! The screams! The bizarre marriage proposals! For the first time ever in Britain MORRISSEY took the plunge and ventured out to meet his devoted public... Nearly 5,000 of them turned up last week, in London and Manchester, queueing for hours in miserable weather, all for an autograph and a heart-stopping glimpse of their idol. Lacing up our red DM's, the NME joined the heaving crush at the crash barriers. Over the next four pages, we document these emotional meetings and delve into the minds of his adoring legions: do they think 'Vauxhall And I' is better than The Smiths7 Do they know who the mysterious Jake is? How do they feel about Moz’s flirtation with nationalist imagery at Finsbury Park? ANGELA LEWIS in London and STUART BAILIE in Manchester join the melee for a fan’s-eye view of the spectacular love-ins. PICTURES: KEVIN CUMMINS and ROGER SARGENT TUESDAY, MARCH 15, LONDON THERE ARE 20 people on the pavement ...

ANGST EDITED BY ANDREW COLLINS RIGHT OR WRONG - MOZ HOGS THE POST BAG THOSE THANK YOUS IN FULL Re: Morrissey: Flying The Flag Or Flirting With Disaster? NME , August 22. Thankfully, the NME didn’t take their usual defensive, often sycophantic position with Moz, and instead offered an extremely impressive, investigative piece of music journalism on this most urgent issue. It’s an insult to the re-release of ‘This Charming Man’ to hear that the very same singer has a skins backdrop at Finsbury Park. I’d like to dupe myself into believing that Moz’s interest in all this sad shit is merely a plot on his part to regain attention lost during the release of certain inferior singles - but I think not. The NME aren’t trying to ruin his career, the man’s digging his own grave. To refuse an interview; to not care to defend himself against recent racist allegations . . . what are we to conclude? Victoria Cullen, Hull How can Morrissey say you’re trying to ruin his career? For someone who’s been ...

ANGST EDITED BY IAN McCANN SURPRISE, SURPRISE! THIS WEEK, A VERITABLE MOZ SPESH! An open letter to the NME and Morrissey from Johnny Rogan THE MOMENT Morrissey unfurled that Union Jack I knew he was in trouble. I assumed that the ‘Is Morrissey A Racist?’ debate was a discredited old chestnut, but now it's back, bigger than ever. The allegation is dangerous and insulting to Morrissey, especially when you consider that he has never publicly espoused racist views. In the aftermath of the unfortunate furore over ‘Panic’, the Smiths played an Anti-Apartheid gig. a fact which deserved a passing mention in your round-up. However, the NME is right to stress the alarming cumulative effects of Morrissey's flirtation with right-wing imagery. It is extremely disconcerting, and the Madness debacle provided a salutary lesson for Morrissey, as well as ourselves. What the NME's five-page article really underlines is the contradictory and capricious nature of Morrissey himself. Yes, he ...