I think you have to remember the times to put the impact that the Rises had into context.
It was the arse end of Thatcherism. Youth had very little to cheer about for most of that decade. The popularisation of Ecstasy had much to do with it. The football crowd started necking it and became more interested in clothes than punch ups and Manchesters gangs were still dishing out kickings rather than shootings in 87-88. Dance music was replacing the turgid MTV rock with its dinosaurs like Phil Collins and everyone wanted to be in a band all of a sudden.
The Roses came along just at the right time. They were just lads like us- same clothes, same attitude and had been brought up on the same records- the good stuff from our parents collections.
The music was fresh, exciting, combining the best elements of rock, pop and dance. We really thought they were on some unholy mission to wipe away all the dire dross we had put up with since the demise of The Smiths. The jangling guitar riffs and funky drums were so in tune with those warm hazy summers spent lazing around in that golden time between the oppression of school and the tedium of the 9 to 5.
The arrogance, the swagger, the tight gang mentality, coupled with the music made you think they would actually be bigger than the Beatles (without them having to say so every two minutes like those gobshite brothers from Burnage a few years later). The contradictions were rife- the stone and the rose, the loved up vibe underscoring a bitterness, love and insurection, shades of dark and light, life, death, optimism and destruction- often all in the same song, the cool as **** frontman, Mani's amazing rounded bass lines, Reni's awsome drum work and Squires magic cascading through those Messa Boogie Amps were such a powerful tonic.
They could have had it all.
They were the shot in the arm that British youth culture needed and there aren't many bands over the last 20 years that havent been influenced by those four dodgy looking characters from South Manchester.
It was the arse end of Thatcherism. Youth had very little to cheer about for most of that decade. The popularisation of Ecstasy had much to do with it. The football crowd started necking it and became more interested in clothes than punch ups and Manchesters gangs were still dishing out kickings rather than shootings in 87-88. Dance music was replacing the turgid MTV rock with its dinosaurs like Phil Collins and everyone wanted to be in a band all of a sudden.
The Roses came along just at the right time. They were just lads like us- same clothes, same attitude and had been brought up on the same records- the good stuff from our parents collections.
The music was fresh, exciting, combining the best elements of rock, pop and dance. We really thought they were on some unholy mission to wipe away all the dire dross we had put up with since the demise of The Smiths. The jangling guitar riffs and funky drums were so in tune with those warm hazy summers spent lazing around in that golden time between the oppression of school and the tedium of the 9 to 5.
The arrogance, the swagger, the tight gang mentality, coupled with the music made you think they would actually be bigger than the Beatles (without them having to say so every two minutes like those gobshite brothers from Burnage a few years later). The contradictions were rife- the stone and the rose, the loved up vibe underscoring a bitterness, love and insurection, shades of dark and light, life, death, optimism and destruction- often all in the same song, the cool as **** frontman, Mani's amazing rounded bass lines, Reni's awsome drum work and Squires magic cascading through those Messa Boogie Amps were such a powerful tonic.
They could have had it all.
They were the shot in the arm that British youth culture needed and there aren't many bands over the last 20 years that havent been influenced by those four dodgy looking characters from South Manchester.
