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You may have heard of this lot so i'll keep it short, I
first heard about the Manics via a bloke called Lol
Prior who had got a copy of their first single via the NME
small ad's, I sent off for a copy and got a really nice
letter from James with it, the single was 'Suicide
Alley' which they had released themselves with a bit
of help from a local studio. The single was great, really
refreshing at a time when even the mention of the word PUNK
was treated with total derision, they were young, punk and
very exciting, they mentioned that they had a gig at a pub
in Great Portland street called the Horse and Groom.
This was not a venue i'd been to before basically a small
room upstairs via the back of the bar, god knows how they
got it but I went along and they were great, full of energy,
chaotic, even in a room with no stage and a crap p.a.
After the set I asked them if they wanted to do a single,
they said they would let me know, a few weeks and letters
later they came up to London and came round my house to
discuss it and have a game of EA Hockey on the Megadrive.
Even then they knew exactly what they wanted, most bands
at that stage are just happy to get something out, they
made sure everything was right and on their terms. They
went up to Redditch to Workshop Studios to
record, this was one of the only studios I knew at the time
and recorded four songs in two days. In the meantime they
had some great reviews in the papers and a huge interview
in the NME. They had basically slagged off most of
the big bands around at the time, which was great, things
were pretty safe at the time. A lot of people really hated
them, people were asking me why I was doing a single with
that bunch of arseholes, I just said they were a great band
I liked them.
Anyway the single came out in May 1990, it got great reviews
in almost every weekly paper and hit the top 100. Lots more
gigs followed and two months later they had become the most
dangerous band in the UK. A follow up was discussed but
they really needed a bigger label to take them to the next
level, Heavenly stepped in and the rest as they say,
is history.
For the collectors out there here's some facts...
First release was a 12Ó black vinyl with black & white
labels (around 1500-2000 copies) then same thing with orange
and silver labels, then a limited pressing of 3000 on Pink
vinyl (there is only one pressing of this, some of them
a bit dull and slightly mixed up on the colour) and a first
time release on CD single, the first pressing had a black
and white photo of the band on the label. From then on it's
been a 12Ó with silver and green labels and a cd single
with the three single reviews on it.
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