Bad Vibes: Britpop and My Part in Its Downfall

by Luke Haines (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2009

  $3.51

  First, you fail. After four years of gigs no one attends, songs no one hears, perfect haircuts no one sees ...London in the late eighties - where the pubs still close in the afternoon and dance music rules - is no place for an avant-garde songwriter like Luke Haines to be. Luke Haines, after all, has never been to a rave. One near-death experience later and there's nothing left to lose. With just a ruined piano and a couple of cardboard boxes, you record a demo in your flat, form a new band and give it a pretentious name. Forget Blur/Oasis and Cool Britannia, none of that actually happened. This is the real story of English Rock in the nineties. Luke Haines has the inside line: from the teenage rampage of the early tours with Suede, mainstream success in France and failure in America, to the break-up of The Auteurs, the death of Britpop (the idiot runt-child of all music genres) and the birth of strange and frightening new projects Baader Meinhof and Black Box Recorder. In scathing and worryingly funny prose, Haines presents the evidence: Pulp, Elastica, Iggy Pop, Kurt Cobain (and his hatred of mushrooms), and the dark studio magic of Steve Albini. Plus the sackings, the surreal self-medicating procedures, how to be a bad loser at the 1993 Mercury Music Prize, and what it's like to be attacked on stage by a vicious, drunken dwarf. Bad Vibes is a pitch-black comic memoir from a legendary figure in the music world, variously described as pioneer, godfather or forgotten man of Britpop.

• New

  Paperback
  2010

  $12.67

  Forget Blur/Oasis and Cool Britannia. None of that actually happened. Bad Vibes is the true story of English Rock in the nineties. Written with wit, brio and no small amount of bile, Luke Haines recounts how it felt to ride a wave of self-congratulatory success in a world with no taste. As frontman of The Auteurs, Haines tells of supporting Suede, conquering France, and failing to break America. Of knuckle-headed musos , baffling tours and a swiftly unravelling personal life. And of what it's like to be on the cusp of massive success. Funny, honest and ridiculously entertaining, Luke Haines attacks anyone within rifle range, and is more than happy to turn the gun on himself. Bad Vibes is a brilliant memoir from a man who tells it how it was - and how he wishes it hadn't been.