Death To Trad Rock (faster! louder! harder!)

I scuppered the first draft of this review. Too personal, too tangential. It mentioned ancient rivalries that could only be of interest to fading music critics. It touched upon the fact that control of the past becomes increasingly important, the less one does.

I scrapped the second draft. It was all about bouncing off walls and pillars down the basement at Leigh's Woolwich Polytechnic gigs in the mid-80s; and an overnight stay in a hut in the middle of a Hebden Bridge field. It attempted to reclaim old ground and in reclaiming it, renew it, and in renewing it, make it come alive for a fresh generation. It was all about attempting to link the dots together, and trying to describe the concept of a (semi-)underground in independent music to a trans-local audience. It noted the fact that music papers weren't played up so big in John Robb's much-welcome book Death To Trad Rock (faster! louder! harder!), but they probably should have been because they were the centre that everything revolved around, whether we wanted it to or not. Anyway, this draft was unworkable and way too worthy and fucking presidential.

The third draft got binned, because I became totally diverted by the girl from Bo Ningen yapping on my headphones.

The fourth draft was going swimmingly... all "the clique versus the bleak" this, and Committee that, and Nightingales the other, and The Wolfhounds the other, with specific reference to an extremely scary walk myself and Dick Green (later of Wichita Records) took home in the early morning following a visit to a hospital's A&R department to try and fix a busted finger that I'd broken during a Membranes performance... but I forgot to save that one.

Fifth draft? A brief summary of incidents leading up to the recording of The Legend!'s first 12-inch in Rochdale (released on John Robb's Vinyl Drip records, sold out its first pressing) - the same recording session as Bosghed - where myself and Allison the drummer (the two main members) weren't even speaking to each other: for the life of me, even today I still can't understand what the fuck Tom from the Mekons was doing playing guitar for us: I was only on Vinyl Drip cos me and McGee had a bad falling-out that led to John Robb and Stephen Pastel taking my part, and...what, I end up at the fucking NME??? What was that all about? All I wanted to do was dance, and dance furiously, and dance fast, and scream at the bands down the front - a big show meant there were more than 100 people present - and dance even more, till I was shaking from sated sexual frustration with the sweat dripping from every pore, my legs a jellied mess...me and Geoff the Postman had competitions with each other to see if we could dance as fast as Big Flame could chase chord sequences, we liked to think we could, we were even as fast as the intro to "Mad Flies, Mad Flies" (Laughing Clowns), and speed was certainly a factor in my love for Dog-Faced Hermans, when I absurdly, ridiculously, had a label with Jamie for about three minutes. But wait. That draft got dropped as being incomprehensible to even myself.

Sixth draft. Yeah, the sixth draft was a doozy. It mentioned how shit all these bands' records actually sounded because all of us fucking hated being in the studio and... extreme? Extreme? Extreme meant turning the treble up as far as it would go, and the bass as distorted as fuck. But I then realised I didn't know what the fuck I was talking about, never really had a chance to listen to the records anyway and, um. Yeah.

The seventh draft owned up to the fact that my second single, the truly appalling "Legend! Destroys The Blues" (nice sleeve though - and I still rate the B-side) was a complete and deliberate rip-off of The Three Johns' "AWOL", musically. Then, once again, I realised no one cared.

By the time the eighth draft came round, I was full of disgust for myself and my prevaricating, realising that in the old days of the "clique versus the bleak" Big 3 of fanzines (John Robb's The Rox, James Brown's Attack On Bzag and The Legend!'s The Legend!) I deliberately wrote everything first time round on my typewriter and refused to go back and change anything, believing it was way more honest to act that way. (Of course, when it came to actually writing 200-word reviews it would often take 15-plus attempts. I was fastidious about how the final typewritten review should look.)

So I started a ninth draft, realising that where all the above had failed was that they hadn't even begun to mention John Robb's new book, out now on Cherry Red, £14.95 and there's a companion compilation album to match, just haven't received a copy yet, can't comment on that so I say stick with the A Witness-compiled Commercially Unfriendly that came out a few years back instead cos it covers the same territory, even if there's no Legend! present (no one has ever taken my music seriously, no one. Well, except John and Stephen and David Keegan and, um... well, fuck you all then), but once again, I found myself lapsing into incomprehension.

The 10th draft even mentioned the title. Death To Trad Rock. It mentioned the fact that John was smart enough to leave all the interviews in the speaker's own voice, and barely edit them - just throw in a little commentary where he deemed it necessary: and, as such, it's a brilliant capture of a certain mood and spirit during the mid-80s when it felt like the mainstream and certainly the politicians held nothing for folk like us - awkward, motivated, angry, lovers of plastic bags. It's a brilliant capture of a certain underclass of bands that would otherwise had gone into the dark night unsung. Tons of potted histories and varying viewpoints, and details, the occasional genuine riot and insurrection, and EXCITING! EXPLOSIVE! CHARGED! ANGULAR! FRANTIC! music. So yeah, I had that draft but it felt odd tapping all that out on my keyboard in sun-stroked Brisbane with the A/C turned on full at 9.30pm, so I scrapped that one too.

The 11th draft wanted to mention the Membranes gig above the pub next to the ice cream shop in north London where we'd been instructed there was a very real danger of the floor collapsing if we danced with our usual vigour, so we all lay down on the floor and kicked our arms and legs in the air, the entire fucking set.

The 12th draft listed a few favourite songs. "Spike Milligan's Tape Recorder". "Myths And Legends". "Anti-Midas Touch". "My Favourite Dress". "Fat Lad Exam Failure". "Motorcity". "Timebomb"...but I very very quickly gave that one up for several reasons.

During the 13th draft, I revealed the fact The Membranes are one of the very few bands I journeyed the length of Great Britain to see (as a fan). In fact, the only band. Why? If you'd been there, you wouldn't have needed to ask.

The 14th draft just stated the following facts. Death To Trad Rock by John Robb. It's out now. It's a searing, spasmodic, discordant, inspirational collection of memories from a collection of searing, spasmodic, discordant, inspirational bands who existed at a time when the pressure all around was to play it safe, keep it quiet, conform...and, Bangs wept. I just can't believe someone's published it!

Fucking top marks, lad. Fucking top marks.