The 10 best English bands ever... or Prince Andrew?
IMAKE a point of avoiding books or films that offer a “dystopian” vision that presents us with some post-apocalyptic world in which characters are doing a lot of postapocalyptic things, in a postapocalyptic style.
I always feel it’s a cop-out, a failure of the imagination — yes, these works are usually hailed as being triumphantly imaginative, yet I tend to feel that these authors or film makers are just not imaginative enough to see what’s in front of them in the present day, and to turn that into their “dystopian” vision.
I mean, why do you need to be inventing some futuristic fantasy to get the old dystopian juices flowing? Have you not been listening to the news lately?
England in the time of Michael Gove and Nigel Farage and Prince Andrew — is that not dystopian enough for you?
I was moved to reflect on this by a list of Great British (but really ‘Great English’)
Bands put together by The
Telegraph’s music writer
Neil McCormick, with whom I used to wander through the post-apocalyptic world of Hot Press.
It was a deeply shocking list, in a good way. But we’ll get to that in a moment. Here is his Top Ten:
1. The Beatles
2.The Rolling Stones 3. Led Zeppelin
4. The Who
5. Pink Floyd
6. Queen
7. The Clash
8. Radiohead
9. The Sex Pistols
10. The Smiths.
I would put a line though Queen there, and replace them with Dr Feelgood, but otherwise it’s a solid selection.
He followed up with 10 more “arguables”:
11. Roxy Music
12. The Kinks
13. Oasis
14. Blur 15.The Jam
16. Coldplay
17. T Rex
18. The Cure
19. Black Sabbath
20. Arctic Monkeys. Again, I would put a line through Coldplay and replace them with Fairport Convention. But then... the deluge. Then there was Joy Division, Cream, Muse, Echo and the Bunnymen, The Animals, Stone Roses, The Faces, Slade, King Crimson, Depeche Mode, ELO and Pulp...
Ah, what a mighty civilisation was there. Ian Dury and the Blockheads, The Specials, Dexys Midnight Runners, Madness... I’ll stop now.
It’s when you put them all together in the one place, that you realise the enormity of it all. And you’ll note that McCormick wasn’t even bothering with individual giants such as Bowie or
Steve Winwood or Elvis Costello. He might even have thrown in The Pogues, most of whom were born and raised in what can only be described as England.
What is truly shocking here, is that up until quite recently England was clearly putting out such an abundance of cultural treasures, it made the glories of Italy during the Renaissance seem like the more dubious outpourings of our late Country’n’Irish period — and maybe the early period too.
And then something must have happened, something... apocalyptic, something so beyond human comprehension it has hardly been registered. All we know is that this country which was recently sending out Paul McCartney and Bryan Ferry and Ray Davies, is now best known for men such as Michael Gove and Nigel Farage and Prince Andrew.
That’s your dystopia.