The immediate post punk years carried with them a surfeit of ‘miserablism’, a dead end of despair. In the summer of 1980, shattered by the death of Ian Curtis, there was a search for something life affirming, for something different. Everything about Orange Juice immediately felt different. The Glasgow group’s very name was refreshing, the music, a spring heeled shambles of Byrd’s and Velvets, felt like a tonic too. And when a ‘new pop’ course began to coalesce around their label Postcard Records with the addition of the wiry, clanking Josef K, and boy genius Roddy Frames Aztec Camera, independent pop emerged all shiny and bright from the dark. Unwittingly Postcard became the blueprint for most future labels of any worth: Creation, 53rd & 3rd, Subway, Sarah, collectable singles purveying an easily definable sound and graphic sensibility.
In the early days Indie pop threw up a gaggle of exciting mavericks exploring the poppier side of post punk but post punk nonetheless. For many of us sad, burnt out, punk vets, the sounds they introduced reminded us of the early days. And yet, by 1985, it seemed like all that old post punk energy had dissipated forever. The really depressing thing wasn’t the mainstream tyranny of nouveau riche pop promoted by the orgiastic spectacle of Live Aid and Thatcher/Reagan’s world view, so much as the lacklustre state of the alternative scene. The heroic phase of the Independent movement was long gone and there began to be a semantic shift from ‘Independent’ to ‘Indie’, from futurism to retro. For the first time there was a widespread impulse to look to the past, aided and abetted by the NME’s C86 cassette.
Built on a self-serving nationwide network of underground guitar music and fanzines, the movement was a ‘Revolt into Childhood’, a cult of innocence reflected in the school kid clothes, the duffel coats, outsize sweaters, bows, ribbons and ponytails and pale thin bodies. Infact, the whole look was jokingly termed ‘anoraksia nervosa’, and was written large in the group names: The Woodentops, Mighty Lemon Drops, Soup Dragons, Railway Children, The Pastels, Close Lobsters, Sea Urchins and the ultra-naïf Tallulah Gosh. It was a revolt in the truest sense against the glossy, black influenced, dance orientated chart pop of the day. Indie pop made a fetish of the opposite characteristics: scruffy guitars, white only sources, weak folky voices, undanceable rhythms, lo-fi or Luddite production and a definably sixties slant. Even hardcore hedonists like Pop Will Eat Itself, The Stone Roses and the House Of Love got dragged in, seizing the marketing opportunities, albeit unconsciously.
In hindsight, by the late eighties/early nineties and the final collapse of Rough Trade and the Independent distribution network, there was a desperate need for change again. Rave and dance culture began to inform a different mentality. There was no longer a hankering for a present, shaped and moulded by the past. Instead there was a sense of inclusion. Indie popsters were all looking for a home excluded from the mainstream but the new baggy, Madchester bands, busily chomping E’s were the opposite. They embraced, and were embraced, by everyone. Even Primal Scream, the shamblers shining light, had ‘I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have’ reworked into ‘Loaded’. And for the next couple of years everyone was!
01. ORANGE JUICE ‘Blue Boy’ (A Side August 1980)
02. JOSEF K ‘Sorry For Laughing’ (A Side February 1981)
03. FIRE ENGINES ‘Candyskin’ (A Side May 1981)
04. THE CHILLS ‘Pink Frost’ (A Side July 1982)
05. THE PALE FOUNTAINS ‘There’s Always Something On My Mind’ (A Side July 1982)
06. THE GO BETWEENS ‘Cattle & Cane’ (A Side February 1983)
07. MARINE GIRLS ‘Love To Know’ (Lazy Ways LP March 1983
08. FELT ‘Penelope Tree’ (A Side June 1983)
09. JUNE BRIDES ‘Every Conversation’ (A Side September 1984)
10. JESUS AND MARY CHAIN ‘Upside Down’ (A Side November 1984)
11. THE PASTELS ‘Baby Honey’ (B Side November 1984)
12. JASMINE MINKS ‘Ghost Of A Young Man’ (1234567 All Good Preachers Go To Heaven LP December 1984)
13. THE LOFT ‘Up The Hill And Down The Slope’ (A Side April 1985)
14. THE WOODENTOPS ‘Move Me’ (A Side April 1985)
15. THE DENTISTS ‘Strawberries Are Growing In My Garden’ (A Side June 1985)
16. JAZZ BUTCHER ‘The Human Jungle’ (A Side August 1985)
17. SHOP ASSISTANTS ‘All Day Long’ (A Side August 1985)
18. THE PRIMITIVES ‘Thru’ The Flowers’ (A Side May 1986)
19. WEATHER PROPHETS ‘Almost Prayed’ (A Side June 1986)
20. SOUP DRAGONS ‘Whole Wide World’ (A Side June 1986)
21. RAILWAY CHILDREN ‘Gentle Sound’ (A Side July 1986)
22. THE FLATMATES ‘I Could Be In Heaven’ (A Side August 1986)
23. THE WOLFHOUNDS ‘Anti Midas Touch’ (A Side September 1986)
24. POP WILL EAT ITSELF ‘Sweet Sweet Pie’ (A Side January 1987)
25. THE CHESTERFIELDS ‘Ask Johnny Dee’ (A Side March 1987)
26. STONE ROSES ‘Sally Cinnamon’ (A Side May 1987)
27. TALLULAH GOSH ‘Tallulah Gosh’ (A Side June 1987)
28. CLOSE LOBSTERS ‘Pimps’ (Foxheads Stalk This Land LP October 1987)
29. SEA URCHINS ‘Pristine Christine’ (A Side November 1987)
30. THIS POISON ‘Poised Over The Pause Button’ (A Side November 1987)
31. THE VASELINES ‘Jesus Doesn’t Want Me For A Sunbeam’ (Dying For It EP March 1988)
32. HOUSE OF LOVE ‘Christine’ (A Side April 1988)
33. McCARTHY ‘Should The Bible Be Banned?’ (A Side April 1988)
34. CUD ‘Make No Bones’ (B Side September 1988)
35. WEDDING PRESENT ‘Why Are You Being So Reasonable Now?’ (A Side September 1988)
36. DARLING BUDS ‘Uptight’ (Pop Said January 1989)
37. THE SUNDAYS ‘I Kicked A Boy’ (B Side February 1989)
38. THE FIELD MICE ‘Sensitive’ (A Side February 1989)
39. INSPIRAL CARPETS ‘Butterfly’ (Train Surfing EP March 1989)
40. PRIMAL SCREAM ‘I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have’ (Primal Scream LP September 1989)