[Afterword] 

 

 The beginning of the 80s was a very exciting time. I was 17, working in a clothes shop in Manchester's city centre, selling a take on the London King's Road rockabilly style, the kind of clothes sold in Johnson's, and I was looking for people to form a group with. The club Scene was busy: there was a gay club calld Heroes, which was seminal , then the Hacienda. That became a really key place, obviously, but what it's known for - people with no shirts on with their hand in the air - came later, in 1987-88. In 1981-82 it was a great place to see the bands of the day with just seven other people. People forget that there were really good '80s bands. I saw The Gun Club there, The Birthday Party, A Certain Ratio, Theatre Of Hate, Killing Joke. What's now known as post punk, it was the letter A in the new lexicon. To me, and a lot of people of my generation, punk rock was the letter Z in the old lexicon, just warmed-up pub rock. What came afterwards was a reductive, clean, fresh, lean new aesthetic and that pretty much describes my early guitar sound and the guitar sound of Colin Newman and Edwyn Collins.

 John Peel and his producer John Walters were very important. Peel's radio show was like a bulletin for ideas for like-minded people. Because this was pre-internet it was a centralised hot spot, so a Dundee musicain and a Brighton student would be tuning in and listening at the same time. The whole nation was being brought together by this quirky, passionate, subversive character who was in a position of power but was bold enough not to compromise. And for bands themselves it was vital; it allowed us to formalise new ideas and get them out there.
 But there was much to rail against, too - the Tony Hadleys and Simon Le Bons. Level 42, Living In A Box, Tear For Fears on The Tube, dominating Friday night TV. Politically there was a prevailing sense of things getting beyond the control of ordinary people. The miners' strike summed up the crushing power of Margaret Thatcher and everything the Tories had stood since the '60s. Solidarity was destroyed with the cooperation of the media. Mrs Thatcher wasn't just implementing an economic strategy on the miners, but enforcing it with an absolute brutal lack of compassion. There was a terrible lack of innocence involved, and that created a massive sense of helplessness.

 After 1986, if the indie scene had got any feyer the records would have been made out of liquid and petals would have flown out of the speakers. Things needed to change and dance informed a different mentality in graphic design, technology, drugs, clothes, sense of inclusion. The Smiths, we were looking for a home, feeling excluded from the mainstream, and the bands who were chomping E, they were the opposite, they embraced and were embraced by everyone.

 And did the '80s make me a millionaire? Probably, but someone else got their fingers on it...

Johnny's Fave '80s Singles
1. The Beat Save It For Later [Go-Feet, 1980]
2. Talking Heads Burning Down The House [Sire, 1983]
3. The The Heartland [Epic/Some Bizare, 1986]
4. S'Express Mantra For A State Of Mind [Rhythm Hing, 1989]
5. Psychedelic Furs Dumb Waiters [CBS, 1981]