Popkiss: The Life and Afterlife of Sarah Records

ISBN-13: 9781628922189 / Angielski / Miękka / 2015 / 280 str.

UK) White Michael (Independent Scholar

Opis

From 1987 to 1995, Bristol, England's Sarah Records was a modest underground success and, for the most part, a critical laughingstock in its native country-sneeringly dismissed as the sad, final repository for a fringe style of music (variously referred to as "indie-pop," "C86," "cutie" and "twee") whose moment had passed. Yet now, more than 20 years after its founders symbolically "destroyed" it, Sarah is among the most passionately fetishized record labels of all time. Its rare releases command hundreds of dollars, devotees around the world hungrily seek out any information they can find about its poorly documented history, and young musicians-some of them not yet born when Sarah shut down-claim its bands (such as Blueboy, the Field Mice, Heavenly, and the Wake) as major influences.Featuring dozens of exclusive interviews with the music-makers, producers, writers and assorted eyewitnesses who played a part in Sarah's eight-year odyssey, Popkiss: The Life and Afterlife of Sarah Records is the first authorised biography of an unlikely cult legend.

Recenzje

Fascinating ... [A] detailed history of the cult Bristol-based indie ... [White] puts forward a strong case for its worth. MOJO 20151029

Spis treści

AcknowledgementsIntroductionChapter One: Songs of Innocence and Inexperience: The Roots of SarahChapter Two: "Let's Just Communicate!": The 1980s Fanzine UndergroundChapter Three: "How Much Do One Thousand Flexidiscs Weigh?": When Matt Met ClareChapter Four: "Come to My World": The Sea Urchins and the Beginning of SarahChapter Five: "A Constant Source of Bemusement and Wonder": The OrchidsChapter Six: "Another Fucking Harvey Band": The Ubiquitous Harvey WilliamsChapter Seven: "Sarah Records Unequivocally Supports a Fully Integrated Light-Rail Rapid-Transit System for the Greater Bristol Area": Expressions of Civic PrideChapter Eight: "A Diary of Sorts": The Field Mice, Northern Picture Library, and the Quicksilver Bobby WrattenChapter Nine: "I Sometimes Feel So Lost": BrighterChapter Ten: Safe Harbour: The Wake and The Hit ParadeChapter Eleven: "I Am Telling You Because You Are Far Away": Internationalism and Sarah's Written CommuniquésChapter Twelve: "Atta Girl": Heavenly, Riot Grrrl and FeminismChapter Thirteen: Sadness is Unisex": Blueboy and "the Best Album" Sarah ReleasedChapter Fourteen: An Economy of Ambition: Sarah's Short-Term VisitorsChapter Fifteen: "We Had an Outsider's Perspective": Sarah's Foreign VisitorsChapter Sixteen: "A Day for Destroying Things.": The End of SarahChapter Seventeen: The Afterlife of SarahThe Sarah DiscographyIndex

O autorze

Michael White has been writing about music and popular culture, for publications in his native Canada and around the world, for more than 20 years. A longtime resident of Vancouver, British Columbia, he recently became senior editor of Vancouver magazine. Popkiss is his first book.