It’s Mercury Music time again, and as usual I’m forced to ponder the pointlessness of the whole endeavour, as music is reduced to commodity, and so on. “Forced?”, one might enquire, conjuring images of me being held at knife point and being made to listen to Amy Winehouse’s album, (frankly, the only way I would do it). Yes, ‘forced’ I say, due to the fact that I am one of those unfortunate people who’s life is dominated by the notion of popular 20th century music, and it’s decline in the 21st century.

Amongst the astoundingly obvious choices on the list, and the astoundingly obvious ‘off-beat’ choices on the list, there is a chap that goes under the name of Maps, and he falls into that whole category of, “You probably haven’t heard of this feller, but don’t worry, he’s very cutting edge, and you might learn to like him.” Maps, aka James Chapman, dabbles in the dark waters of Shoegazing, a much maligned genre from the early 90’s. Shoegazers were renowned for their tendency to stare at their feet whilst playing, in a desperate attempt to keep track of their hordes of guitar effects pedals. The definition was also linked to the fact that ‘shoe-gazers’ tended to be shy, retiring, middle-class boys and girls, who hid behind their fringes and their shoes to avoid contact with the audience and the outside world. The majority of the key players originated from the Thames Valley, and as they generally knew each other and were supportive of each other, shoegazing was also known as “The Scene That Celebrates Itself.” So, in a way, the Mercury nomination of Maps is a celebration of a celebration of ‘The Scene That Celebrates Itself”, if you follow me.

Which, I suppose, is good news for shoegazers. We’re fashionable again, and will have to deal with all the ups and downs that come with being in the proverbial limelight again. I say “we’re fashionable” with good reason, because yes! I was a teenage shoegazer! (I am, of course, using ‘Teenage’ as a highly subjective term…) My fringe reaching heroic angles, I would stare ever downwards at my increasingly beat-up shoes, as I tried in vain to stamp on the appropriate guitar effects pedals, (I am cursed with bad eyesight, and my aim isn’t always the best), to help create epic streams of noise and beauty from very poor equipment. Song-writing was out, and soundscapes were in (mainly because I wasn’t very good with the ol’ writing part of it, and with enough effects pedals at your disposal, these things practically write themselves).

Perhaps the only thing more unfashionable than being a shoegazer in the early 90’s, when it seemed the entire music press and every other musician in the country hated you, is being a shoegazer in the early 00’s, purveying sounds that people had forgotten about, dragging a deeply submerged musical genre out of the mire, and into the light. My shimmering constructs of pure sound would frequently be met with complete ambivalence, if indeed they were met at all. But I struggled on, and mastered the settings on my humble delay pedal, to take music to the stratosphere.

But, as I mentioned earlier, whilst shoegazers looked to the clouds, they plummeted to earth in a fairly spectacular fashion. Their fall from grace was sudden and harsh. An oft’ quoted rumour about Slowdive, one of the dreamiest, prettiest and most narcoleptic bands to ever use a delay pedal, is that they were dropped from their label because Oasis said they would never be on the same record label as them, (which is strange considering that they’d already released their first single before Slowdive’s last album came out). Not to mention the Manic Street Preacher’s Nicky Wire saying that he hated them more than Hitler. They split up, formed the very pretty alt-country band, Mojave 3, and then lovely, beautiful Rachel Goswell developed hearing problems and took a break from music.

Ride, one of the more popular bands of the era, arguably suffered even more indignities than Slowdive, crashing and burning in a fairly horrible fashion. After being almost universally lauded by the music press, Ride embarked on a number of stylistic departures in an attempt to branch out a bit and distance themselves from the shoegazing back-lash. Nice try, guys! Their final album, ‘Tarantula’, was withdrawn from sale a week after it had been released, and the band fell apart. Then, the real degradation kicks in, with guitarist and song-writer Andy Bell forming a new band, Hurricane #1. Andy Bell was one of the most inventive guitarists of his generation, equally capable of crafting moments of shimmering prettiness and jagged ugliness. To hear him plodding away in a band that defined mediocre, (providing the soundtrack to an advert for The Sun! I ask you…), was a crime against music. Hurricane #1 disappeared without trace, and are now best remembered for the following joke:

Q: What was the closest Hurricane #1 ever came to number 1?

A: Their name. (A joke rendered all the more poignant by Andy Bell’s brash claim in a music magazine in the mid-90’s that every single one of their songs would be a number one hit single).

However, the most damning moment in the Ride story can be found in the present day. Andy Bell, as mentioned before, one of the most talented and inventive guitarists of his generation, now plays BASS in Oasis. Saints preserve us…

But the big granddaddies of shoegazing, My Bloody Valentine remain an enigma. Acknowledged as the band that kick-started it all with their fusing of dreamy atmospherics and buzz-saw guitars, the Valentines were always at the front of the pack. They led the charge, and others followed, trying to find ways to replicate the simply awesome sound they were able to produce form a four piece rock band. Their single, “You Made Me Realise”, left seismic shockwaves when it was released in 1988, and their two albums, “Isn’t Anything” and “Loveless” are the unarguable classics of the genre. Then they just disappeared from sight in 1992. They never officially split up, but the faithful have been waiting an incredible SIXTEEN YEARS for their next album. There are always rumours, but rarely, if ever, does anything come of it.

So, it strikes me as a sign of the times that shoegazing seems to be finding its moment again. After all, when we’ve finished looting all the popular genres for ideas, we only have the unfashionable ones left to turn to. And what could be the perfect antidote to all this ‘quirky’ observational/social commentary/ ‘just say what you see’ song writing that’s flying about these days? SONIC ARCHITECTURE!!! (In an aside, I promised myself that I wouldn’t use that term, but the keen eyed reader may have noticed my other feeble attempts to convey the grandeur of shoegazing, and seen that it was only a matter of time before that old, tired, hackneyed phrase entered into the proceedings.)

Yes! Throw aside all of your, “Yeah, there was this bloke, an’ I saw him dahn tha boozer”, half spoken with a ‘regional’ accent over choppy guitars or tastefully ‘diverse’ pop, and get ready for an icy wall of sound that just screams “Sex!” This is music for the senses rather than the feet, and as such it relies more on texture and rhythm, and as such can convey feelings of….you know? Naughty things. And in these troubled times, isn’t that exactly what we all need? With all the doom and gloom and whatever, some soothing sounds that will wrap themselves around you, caress your earlobe, and tickle you where you like being tickled, could be just what the doctor ordered. (And of course, I mean a metaphorical medical doctor, rather than THE Doctor. He’s too busy messing about with the likes of Catherine Tate to be too concerned with shoegazing. Where’s the episode where he uses the TARDIS to go back to see My Bloody Valentine’s legendary 1992 tour? Take note BBC, this is the episode the fans demand to see.)

So, even though they call it “Nu-gazing” these days (well, the NME do, anyway), I still thing it’s long overdue for a return. The world can be a bleak and unforgiving place, and personally, I think when bands decide to ‘sing what they see’, it all gets a bit too much for me. Better that I can lie on my bed, floating up towards the ceiling whilst a pretty girl coos in my ear, riding on a wave of sound. That’s a reality I’d rather explore.

Bringing the story full circle, now that shoegazing’s cool again, the man who is singularly responsible for the vast majority of it has popped up again to share his thoughts with us. Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, please welcome a man who is loved and reviled in equal measures, the man who brought us Oasis and the Britpop wars of the 90’s, the man who has changed the shape of British indie on several occasions…..Mr Alan McGee!

After that kind of build-up, one might be inclined to think that I had secured an exclusive interview, full of earth-shattering revelations, but I haven’t. I haven’t even tried. McGee’s career within the music industry has been dominated by hype. He has repeatedly picked up on trends and movements that are happening in music, and attempted to turn that into something. In fact, the bands I mentioned earlier, Slowdive, Ride, and My Bloody Valentine, were all signed to his record label, Creation Records. The bands that killed off shoegazing? Yeah, they were all on his label as well. Fair play to him, I guess, but it also means that the Alan McGee of today tends to say the same things over and over again, or, as the following quote exemplifies, he tends to say attention grabbing ‘controversial’ statements that are hollow and vacuous, causing the keen reader to become even more suspicious of his intentions:

Bloody nonsense. My Bloody Valentine were my comedy band. Ride were different – they were a rock band, really, a fantastic rock band – but My Bloody Valentine were a joke, my way of seeing how far I could push hype.[1]

These words come from a man who has said a number of unkind things about My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Sheilds, a man whose attention to sonic detail almost bankrupted the label apparently….depends on who you ask, etc, etc), but has always tempered these barbs with statements which ultimately amount to: Kevin Sheilds nearly bankrupted me and caused the beginnings of my nervous breakdown, but he is also a visionary genius, but one that I will never work with again.

When McGee was managing the Glaswegian post-rock band, Mogwai, he attempted to hype their album “Mr Beast” by stating that it was the best art rock album he had been involved with since “Loveless”. So, given that My Bloody Valentine were a “comedy band”, does that mean that Mogwai are the punch line?

And here we are now. Shoegazing’s sort of hip again, people are reinvestigating it, and Alan McGee thinks its “Bloody nonsense.” And if McGee thinks its “Bloody nonsense”, and he’s a master of hype….doesn’t that mean that he ACTUALLY thinks it’s brilliant? Ah, Alan McGee, where would the kids be without you?

1 Alan McGee, The Guardian (27/07/07)