can you feel it?
1988. είναι λίγο πριν το δεύτερο 'καλοκαίρι της αγάπης', το acid house κυριαρχεί, το ecstasy δίνει και παίρνει και το hacienda ζει ένδοξες μέρες, ίσως τις τελευταίες στιγμές δόξας.
λίγο μετά το manchester γίνεται madchester, το απόγειο, και μοιραία ακολουθεί η πτώση.
είναι η εποχή που ο tony wilson είναι παντοδύναμος, η factory πουλάει, οι happy mondays αρχίζουν να ανεβαίνουν και βγάζουν το bummed, οι stone roses έχουν βγάλει το elephant stone, αλλά δεν μπορούν να φανταστούν ακόμα τι θα επακολουθήσει.
ο πιο καυτός ήχος είναι ο ήχος των club, ο a guy called gerald, οι 808 state, η μουσική που ακούγεται στο hacienda.
το as long as i got you και το voodoo ray όταν πρωτοκυκλοφόρησαν μπορεί να μην έγιναν top 10 επιτυχίες, αλλά ήταν οι πραγματικοί ύμνοι της χρονιάς, τουλάχιστον για μια πολύ μεγάλη μερίδα του κοινού που χαπακώνεται και διασκεδάζει σερί από παρασκευή βράδυ μέχρι κυριακή απόγευμα, τους μετέπειτα 'weekenders'.
το north, the sound of the dance underground είναι η συλλογή-φετίχ του '88. ήταν το δεύτερο άριστα που έδινε η melody maker εκείνη τη χρονιά και από τις λίγες που τα κομμάτια της ακούγονται το ίδιο φρέσκα και 'ξεσηκωτικά', κι ας κοντεύουν 20 χρόνια από τότε. είναι μια συλλογή εξαντλημένη εδώ και χρόνια, που βρίσκεις πια πολύ δύσκολα -το διπλό βινίλιο με τα δυο τραγούδια σε κάθε πλευρά είναι πανάκριβο αν το πετύχεις σε καλή κατάσταση.
ο προχθεσινός χαμός του tony wilson σηματοδοτεί και το τέλος μιας εποχής. μπορεί η factory records και το hacienda να μην υπάρχουν εδώ και καιρό, ο θάνατός του όμως κλείνει για πάντα το κεφάλαιο madchester. μόνο όσοι πρόλαβαν και έζησαν έστω και για λίγο τις τελευταίες χρυσές μέρες του μάνστεστερ μπορούν να καταλάβουν γιατί είναι τόσο σημαντική απώλεια για την περιοχή και για τη μουσική σκηνή της πόλης.
οι τίτλοι των κομματιών είναι με τη σειρά οι εξής:
A1 Annette Dream 17 [Producer: R. Rouge, T-Coy]
A2 T-Coy I Ain't Nightclubbing [Producer: T-Coy]
B1 D C B House Fantaz-ee [Producer:T-Coy]
B2 ED209 Acid To Ecstacy [Producer: Rope, Johnstone, Moscrop]
C1 A Guy Called Gerald Voodoo Ray [Producer: Gerald]
C2 Masters Of Acid Megagrip [Producer: S. Gorton, T-Coy]
D1 T-Coy Carino [Producer: T-Coy]
D2 Frequency 9 Get On One [Producer: Pickering, Close, Topping]
north, the sound of the dance underground
We were handed the capsules at about ten o’ clock. I cupped the little gelatin bullet in my palm and took a surreptitious look: it had an opaque white casing, just over a centimeter in length, slightly sticky with the heat and the perspiration of my fingers.
It was just a capsule: its appearance offered no clues as to what its contents might bring. Well, here goes… I popped it into my mouth and crunched it between my teeth, feeling the gelatin splinter like cracked plastic and the white powder ooze out.
Bitter, not like the queasy taste or Paracetamol, but a sharper chemical tang which spread unpleasantly over the tongue and teeth. I washed it down with a mouthful of Coke, which didn’t quite rinse away the repulsive aftertaste, and we sat down at a table on the balcony overlooking the dancefloor.
Ten minutes and counting. We were both slightly edgy, trying to make small talk, lapsing into fretful silence, both wondering what would happen next. Neither of us knew much –if anything- about this stuff, what it would do, what its after-effects were, whether it could harm us in any way. Where would it take us? Were there demons in this other world? Would we come back unharmed? Would we still be the same people when we returned? None of these thoughts took real shape, they just flitted darkly around the corners of our consciousness.
Twenty-five minutes. Another sip of Coke. Rather have a beer –not Red Stripe, the only sell Breaker here- but we’d been told that this stuff didn’t really mix with alcohol. Sip the Coke. Sip, sip. Wait… was that something? A twingle? The lights seemed to shimmer strangely, just for a millisecond, a flutter in the belly, a tiny glow. I searched my metabolism for signs of weirdness. No?
Forty minutes. Almost imperceptibly, everything shifted, like an elevator accelerating upwards. An overwhelmingly powerful charge surged through my body, rising through the veins and the arteries and the bones and the teeth, pushing me down into the plastic chair. Sit back… fuuuuck… sit back and hold on, let it carry me… My mind began to reassure my body: ride it, ride it, go with it. You’ll be all right, it’s good , ride it.
Then it eased slightly, and I felt a desperate urge to talk –to voice the babble of feelings that were welling up inside me. We exchanged a few, brief words, hardly a conversation, but it seemed infused with an intensity of meaning it never had before- like no conversation we’d ever had before. I understood his faults, his hopes, his dreams, his pain and joy, what he had been through, what we had been through together, what we had all been through, and I knew he felt the same. Now, in this moment, it was all resolved… it was going to be all right. Everything was going to be all right.
Then that wave crashed over me again and I was dumb-struck… Oh… the feeling… soooooo strong… I couldn’t speak but my emotions raged more intensely than they ever had before. Need to be touched… my skin felt clammy but sensitised beyond belief. “Are you all right?” Paralysed, I found it difficult to nod yes. “It’s OK,” he held my arm. “It’s OK.”
The light caress felt glorious. We clenched hands. Sensuous. Great. “I’m alright.” I tried to sip. Couldn’t. not possible. The rush seemed to last for hours but it must have been only a few seconds.
Suddenly the music that had been pounding out of the speakers suspended above the dancefloor flashed right into focus, searing into the consciousness. It felt like the sound, each gorgeous slash of the riff, was slicing through every single cell in my body, transmuting its physiology. The drums seemed to sparkle in midair, reverberating as if in a cathedral, and the bass… it was as though I’d never heard it before. It resonated through to the core, pulsing from both inside and outside simultaneously. The tune separated out into its constituent parts, a lattice of textures, each ringing with angelic clarity, each sliding right into me, locking, holding, releasing…
The pressure in my head lifted dramatically and I felt warm all over; stroking my arm gently I realised I’d broken into a sweat without even moving. The world had opened up all around, the blank warehouse somehow changed into a wonderland designed just for us, glistering with a mystic iridescence that I couldn’t see earlier. New world. New sound. New life. Everything felt so right. A huge, glowing, magical YES.
The friend who’d given us the capsules came back to our table. It was like seeing him again for the first time after a long absence; we’d all changed, but the elapsed time –could it be that it was only an hour?- made us realise how much we loved him and missed him. “Are you alright?” he asked, gauging the response from our smiles. “The music’s great, isnt’t it? You’ve got to stand up, you’ve got to move, we’ve got to go and dance. Otherwise, you’ll just sit here all night.” We stood up unsteadily, and we negotiated the stairs down to the dancefloor, we began to slide into the contours of the rhythm, becoming immersed in it, the bass curling round the spine which felt like it had been loosened of its inhibiting rigidity, like it had slipped the bounds of all that was holding it –us- back, and could just flow, loose, warm, alive… And in a second we were amongst the throng, synched right into the matrix of bodies and sound; transported, transformed, together. All right, the feeling resonated through us as the drums thrashed upwards towards climax, let’s go…
[η εισαγωγή απ' το altered state, the story of ecstasy culture and acid house του matthew collin]