Manchester...so much to answer for

[Jockice]

I'm happy to get shot down by @Jockice here, but I thought Jarvis was from Frecheville, which is a sort of hinterland between proper working class Sheffield and not working class Sheffield. I mean, it's not the same as being from Manor, like Reverend from Reverend and the Makers - that's as working class as it gets.

Nah, I'm not going to shoot you down here but he's definitely from Intake. Without checking in the aforementioned Mark Sturdy book* - I can see it from here but it's a bit difficult to reach - he went to Intake junior school and then City comprehensive instead of the now-closed Frecheville school. Their first non-City member, drummer Wayne Furniss, who was in them for their first Peel session (and the first time I ever saw them) went to Frecheville though, as incidentally did Joanne and Susan from the Human League. Wayne went out with one of their younger sisters at one point.

But yeah, Intake and Frecheville aren't exactly the ghetto. There's a sort of mix of people from different classes in both. Not really posh (like Dore or Totley) or working class (like Firth Park or Parson Cross) but probably leaning more towards the latter. It's hard to tell with some areas. Like High Green, where the Arctic Monkeys come from, is generally thought to be okay but nearby Ecclesfield is considered a shithole. From my few visits up that end of town it's all much of a muchness to me.

As for Jon McClure, I don't really know the guy (like the Arctic Monkeys he appeared when I was bowing out of any involvement with the local music scene) so didn't know he was from Manor. However, I do know he went to one of Sheffield's top schools, Notre Dame, which is based on the outskirts of leafy Fulwood and although a comprehensive is a Catholic one so allowed to be a bit more selective. I went there too - admittedly a long time before Jon - in the second year when it had become a comp and let boys in and in those days a lot of the staff had an air of superiority. I know Jon also did a degree in politics afterwards and got a first.

I'm not sure if the school that most Manor kids went to, the notorious Waltheof (most famous ex-pupil Mel Sterland. Hi Kankurette) was still open when the Rev was a teenager but he definitely didn't go there for whatever reason. So wherever he lived he definitely didn't have a deprived childhood.

(*I was the first person Mark Sturdy interviewed for the book you know. He rang me up at work telling me he was planning a book on Pulp. He wasn't the first person to do that. I gave him numbers for Wayne - who is a lovely bloke - and a couple of other people and after that he'd ring me every few months, often asking the most obscure questions. There was a woman in another department at my work who had once mentioned she went to school with Jarvis - but didn't really know him well - and he pressurised me to convince her to speak to him. She wouldn't but he kept asking me. I thought he was off his head and the book would never come out, but it did and is a thoroughly enjoyable read. Well for me anyway, cos I know loads of people in it. I'm still in touch with Mark too. He's now a teacher.)

New page the man who really knows the stars.

[purlieu]

I must have met him at least seven or eight times before it was pointed out to me that he was the Mark Sturdy Who Wrote The Pulp Book. I gushed to him for a bit and he bought me a pint.

[Jockice]

I must have met him at least seven or eight times before it was pointed out to me that he was the Mark Sturdy Who Wrote The Pulp Book. I gushed to him for a bit and he bought me a pint.

Yeah? He's a nice bloke. I didn't actually meet him until Pulp's last gig before their extended break (the Auto festival at Magna in Rotherham in 2002). He was interviewed for that film based on their last ever concert in 2012 but it was cut from the final film. He had a ticket for the first screening and the do afterwards which was attended by Pulp but he had to go back to Leeds on childcare duty, so gave his party pass to me (although I also got another couple from Nick's wife)..

 As far as I know the only time he's met Jarvis was at a signing session for his lyrics book when he queued up for an autograph and mentioned his book to him. Jarvis apparently just coolly raised an eyebrow.

I admire him for sticking at it anyway. He certainly covered the subject in depth. The other books on Pulp were very surface level and just said the stuff that everyone with the slightest bit of knowledge about the band already knew anyway.

[kalowski]

When you think of the ultimate working class warrior, Ian Brown, he spent most of his youth in Timperley, Altrincham and the road he grew up on Sylvan Avenue is not exactly Gorton. I imagine everyone is a homeowner in that part of town.

[JaDanketies]

The only interesting and original thought I have about Manchester music is as follows:

If you name other cities in the UK, you can name famous heavy metal bands that hail from that city. Birmingham - Black Sabbath, Napalm Death. Liverpool - Carcass. London - Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden. But for how big Manchester is, the biggest heavy metal band that comes from here is Ingested. My theory is that Manchester had the Madchester music scene going on back when all the Carcasses and Napalm Deaths were about, and we missed the boat. And the way the scene is now, we'll never have our Cradle of Filth.

[buzby]

When you think of the ultimate working class warrior, Ian Brown, he spent most of his youth in Timperley, Altrincham and the road he grew up on Sylvan Avenue is not exactly Gorton. I imagine everyone is a homeowner in that part of town.

The Brooklands estate that it's part of has always been private housing - it's named after Samuel Brooks, the developer who bought the land off the Earl of Stamford in the 1850s. It was like the 'Metroland' estates in the suburbs of London - once the railway station opened in 1859 it was marketed as a suburb for office workers in Manchester. Sylvan Avenue is part of the Riddings Road Estate, one of the last phases with semis built in the 1930s (there's an aerial photo of the area from 1927 where they are just starting to build Heyes Lane and Framingham Rd, filling in the Railway/Brooklands Rd/Park Rd triangle)

[Art Bear]

When you think of the ultimate working class warrior, Ian Brown, he spent most of his youth in Timperley, Altrincham and the road he grew up on Sylvan Avenue is not exactly Gorton. I imagine everyone is a homeowner in that part of town.

I grew up just the other side of the railway/canal from there and it's as middle class as you can get.

[kalowski]

The Brooklands estate that it's part of has always been private housing - it's named after Samuel Brooks, the developer who bought the land off the Earl of Stamford in the 1850s. It was like the 'Metroland' estates in the suburbs of London - once the railway station opened in 1859 it was marketed as a suburb for office workers in Manchester. Sylvan Avenue is part of the Riddings Road Estate, one of the last phases with semis built in the 1930s (there's an aerial photo of the area from 1927 where they are just starting to build Heyes Lane and Framingham Rd, filling in the Railway/Brooklands Rd/Park Rd triangle)

It's a nice bit of town. We looked at a semi down there but pushed the boat out to get a terraced house in Hale (so my children will not be working class musicians). Sylvan Road is next to.th3 canal and leads to some allotments and the playing fields of Unicorn football club. If Ian Brown grew up there and Warrington beforehand, his Mancunian accent is a total fake. He probably copied Mani who is from a proper working class bit of Manchester, Crumpsall.

[The Culture Bunker]

his Mancunian accent is a total fake. He probably copied Mani who is from a proper working class bit of Manchester, Crumpsall.

I mentioned earlier that Mani was the only one of the band who had a long-standing interest in football - I could half believe part of the reason he got in the Roses was to help out their working class "creds". I've read before that they were boosted by the Chameleons splitting up in 1987 - who had a large North Manchester fanbase of working class males, who apparently all clicked onto the Roses soon after. Whether having "one of their own" in the ranks helped, I don't know.

Probably just saying this as an excuse to mention the Chamleoens, really.

[Jockice]

When you think of the ultimate working class warrior, Ian Brown, he spent most of his youth in Timperley, Altrincham and the road he grew up on Sylvan Avenue is not exactly Gorton. I imagine everyone is a homeowner in that part of town.

I'm not really trying to defend Ian Brown here, but I've never seen him claiming to be working class. I reckon, like Paul Heaton - who lived in a very middle class area of Sheffield as a child - people are just making that assumption because of the way he looks. Like a bit of rough basically.

[kalowski]

Uncut magazine

It is 1977, and Ian Brown has just met the soulmate who will become his closest friend and, in time, worst enemy. John Squire, the taciturn and introspective mirror to Brown's bolshie livewire, lives on the same street in the leafy south Manchester suburb of Timperley – Sylvan Avenue. Bright young kids from working-class homes, sticking out like sore thumbs at the largely middle-class Altrincham Grammar School.

[Jockice]

Uncut magazine

That's something that always amuses me - in fact I've just written a bit for a playwriting course I'm taking on that very subject - when members of popular bands claim to have been 'outsiders.' You really weren't lads, take it from me, you have absolutely no idea what it feels like. Someone who looked like Jarvis I can understand but Brown and Squire, no way. And I know that's not an actual quote from them.

When this sort of thing comes up I'm always reminded of one of my favourite quotes of all time made by Andy Cairns from Therapy? who pointed out that the real angry outsider isn't the tall, slim, good-looking guy with a few tattoos and piercings - it's the little fat bloke with specs and an anorak...

[Art Bear]

To be fair, in those days you only needed to pass the 11-plus to get into Alty Grammar - none of this Academy entrance exam stuff that happened in the 90s onwards. So it might be "largely middle class" now but it was more representative of the wider catchment area in the early 80s.

[holyzombiejesus]

That's something that always amuses me - in fact I've just written a bit for a playwriting course I'm doing on that very subject - when members of popular bands claim to have been 'outsiders.' You really weren't lads, take it from me, you have absolutely no idea what it feels like. Someone who looked like Jarvis I can understand but Brown and Squire, no way. And I know that's not an actual quote from them.

When this sort of thing comes up I'm always reminded of one of my favourite quotes of all time made by Andy Cairns from Therapy? who pointed out that the real angry outsider isn't the tall, slim, good-looking guy with a few tattoos and piercings - it's the little fat bloke with specs and an anorak...

That's why Misshapes (and especially the accompanying video) is my least favourite of Pulp's 'mainstream' stuff.

[Jockice]

That's why Misshapes (and especially the accompanying video) is my least favourite of Pulp's 'mainstream' stuff.

The thing about that video is that the 'mis-shapes' are all good-looking ones (and I really don't want to get into this argument again after the thread that Barry doesn't want me to mention anymore, but good-looking people - male and female - have it so much easier in life, no matter what fashions they follow) and it's a bit hard to tell who they are and who are the bullies. Zammo's girlfriend from Grange Hill is in it though, as is the singer of Orlando, an act I'd totally forgotten about until last week, until he popped up on an academic friend's Twitter timeline. He now has a PhD you now.

To be fair to Jarvis though, he is speaking from experience in that song. Because he did stick out in Sheffield as a youngster, so he went for it because he knew he'd be noticed anyway. But he did sit crying under a table after an early gig because the crowd was laughing at him rather than listening to the music.

[Brundle-Fly]

I remember Jarvis being taken to task about his infamous Brits stage invasion with Mishapes. The journo claimed that Jacko is one of the very outsiders he defends in the song, the ultimate misfit outsider, in fact.

[buzby]

I'm not really trying to defend Ian Brown here, but I've never seen him claiming to be working class. I reckon, like Paul Heaton - who lived in a very middle class area of Sheffield as a child - people are just making that assumption because of the way he looks. Like a bit of rough basically.

Former Stone Roses frontman Ian Brown has slammed branded rockers Kasabian as frauds, because they hide their middle-class roots.

Brown is disgusted by the band's carefully cultivated image and has blasted them for turning his beloved working class philosophies into an ugly caricature.

He says, "They're like a tribute band to the worst baggy bands. It's like they've watched all these videos and are trying to recreate that era - but it's not real.

"They're nice guys, but that is all they are - nice, middle class guys.

"They're feigning this stance of being working-class rebels from the north - when they're from the Midlands."

https://www.contactmusic.com/stone-roses/news/brown-slams-kasabian

This article in the Independent more accurately describes Brown & Squire as "lower middle class kids from Timperley".

To be fair to him, he left home at 17 and flitted back and forth between the Hulme Crescents and Withington, depending on which girl he was shacked up with at the time.

[kalowski]

It is quite natural to accentuate your working class roots, of course. I often talk about growing up in Edgerley even though moved to the comparatively middle class Hazel Grove when I was 7.
Still working class in the sense that we needed my dad to be working so we could live, of course. Like Laura Piddock's definition: "we have no savings, because we cannot save, we own nothing that could allow us not to work and therefore we are working class" we were still working class in a sense.

[kalowski]

To be fair, in those days you only needed to pass the 11-plus to get into Alty Grammar - none of this Academy entrance exam stuff that happened in the 90s onwards. So it might be "largely middle class" now but it was more representative of the wider catchment area in the early 80s.

I don't know what you mean. The nature of the entrance exams haven't changed. Maybe there's increased tuition now, I don't know what is was like in the 80s but I can't believe it was much different.

[Brundle-Fly]

Hey kalowski, can you go back to your old Martin Brennan avatar or something? Your new Pistol one is making me very irritable.

[kalowski]

Hey kalowski, can you go back to your old Martin Brennan avatar or something? Your new Pistol one is making me very irritable.

Ha. It makes me very irritable too! That's why I picked it. Hopefully I can create a Brennan + "Sid" hybrid.

[Ballad of Ballard Berkley]

I live in the heart of Kinksville, but you'd never know it. Not a single clue that they had even existed round 'ere, apart from spotting a wizened Ray Davies occasionally wandering about Highgate Village.

What about The Clissold Arms with its dedicated (follower of) Kinks room?

[Ray Travez]

we'll never have our Cradle of Filth.

You've clearly never been to Wythenshawe precinct

[Kankurette]

It's funny, Manchester does have a big rock/metal community. And yet the only Manc metal band I can think of is Kill 2 This. I think the Brummies win on that count.

[Nice Relaxing Poo]

It's funny, Manchester does have a big rock/metal community. And yet the only Manc metal band I can think of is Kill 2 This. I think the Brummies win on that count.

Winterfylleth is the only one I can think of.

[Kankurette]

Hyena Kill as well, I saw them in Satan's recently.

[JaDanketies]

Foetal Juice
Pist
Wolfbastard
Burial
Wode

[Jockice]

Hyena Kill as well, I saw them in Satan's recently.

Satan's? Sounds like hell.

[Brundle-Fly]

What about The Clissold Arms with its dedicated (follower of) Kinks room?

Yes, somebody else mentioned the Clissold Arms earlier. I've heard of the boozer but never had a pint in there as it's a tiny bit of a schlep for me. It's in Muswell Hill which I suppose is the absolute pinpoint of Davies Bros territory. I'm nearer the Archway Tavern that adorns the cover of The Muswell Hillbillies LP. On the strength of this Manchester thread, I shall visit the Clissold soon and bathe in the Kinkness.

[Icehaven]

It's funny, Manchester does have a big rock/metal community. And yet the only Manc metal band I can think of is Kill 2 This. I think the Brummies win on that count.

Until very recently they hadn't really made enough of a thing about metal heritage in Brum. A few years back I met a Portuguese bloke who'd moved here because he was a huge Black Sabbath fan and couldn't wait to visit Aston. I didn't have the heart to tell him there wasn't an awful lot of Ozzy related stuff to see or do there, unless you were desperate to see some streets he might have walked down.