Madchester

The late 1980's saw a shift in the artistic/innovative center of world Dance music. 70's Disco was centered in the clubs and parties of New York City's Manhattan borough. The 80's House revolution emerged out of Chicago. The hot sound of 1990, a blend known simply as Madchester, emerged from the most unlikely of places, the rusting industrial center of northern England, the city of Manchester.

Manchester did play an important role in the U.K. Dance music scene early in the 1980's. Through the innovations of DJs Greg Wilson, Mike Pickering, and others, Manchester became a center for the emergence of Electro-Funk, a fusion of contemporary Hip-Hop and Electronic sounds with traditional Soul. As Electro-Funk caught on, it shifted the focus of Tony Wilson's famed Hacienda club from Post-Punk and Alternative Rock to Dance music. Later in the 80's as Acid House relocated from Chicago to the U.K., Manchester became the hotbed for a new sound dubbed Madchester that combined Acid House beats with recycled Pop sounds from the 60's and 70's. The two bands often identified as leaders of the Madchester movment were Happy Mondays and the Stone Roses.

Happy Mondays centered around lead vocalist and songwriter Shaun Ryder. The group was always chaotic in both sound and behavior. Signed to Factory Records, home of New Order, the band eventually ended up costing the label money even though their sales were good. The band frequently headed off on drug-soaked holidays or failed to deliver recordings when promised. Despite all of the confusion, the band's music entranced its strong club following. The band's amalgamation of classic Rock, Disco, Funk, and Hip-Hop provided a perfect soundtrack for a club culture that would soon be participating in all night rave parties. The band reached it's peak with 1990's Pills, Thrills and Bellyaches album. Among the tracks included on the album was the band's U.S. Dance hit Step On. The peak did not last long as the band began to fall apart in the wake of Shaun Ryder's heroin addiction. The band's former fans also lost interest as the focus of Dance music moved away from Manchester.

The Stone Roses worked their way up through the local Manchester music scene in the 1980's with a blend of 60's Psychedelia, Pop Guitar, and an occasional Goth influence. The group's first album Stone Roses, released in 1989, took the U.K. by storm. The music was not overtly Dance music but used similar rhythms attached to irresistible Pop hooks. The group's music was played frequently in Manchester clubs and by 1990 the Stone Roses were acknowledged leaders, along with Happy Mondays, of the Madchester scene. Instead of a spectacular collapse like the Happy Mondays, the Stone Roses faded through the difficulty of getting additional music released. A legal dispute with their record company and problems completing work resulted in a 5 year gap before release of a second album. The second album received a lukewarm reception, a planned world tour failed to materialize, and the band slowly disintegrated.

Other bands profited from the focus of the world's attention on Manchester. The Charlatans (UK added to their name in the U.S.) distinguished themselves with swirling psychedelia anchored by the Hammond organ and Dance beats. Their first album debuted at the top of the charts in the U.K. in 1990. The Inspiral Carpets also embraced psychedelia but with a little less focus on Dance beats. The band drew attention as much by their clever marketing, a smoking-cow logo and t-shirts emblazoned with 'Cool as F*ck', as their music. The band itself was more stable than many other Madchester headliners and continued to release hit singles until group members parted ways in 1995.

The Madchester scene's dominance of Dance music began to fade almost as soon as it began. Drug gangs began to feed on the atmosphere of the Hacienda and soon guns were rampant in the club. In 1991 a dancer at the Hacienda died from ecstasy poisoning. The Dance scene in Manchester began to be identified more with thugs and drugs than music and dancing. By 1992 local police had temporarily closed the Hacienda and the music press were beginning to recognize the end of Madchester. The musical influence of the Madchester bands lives on in the guitar-based Pop of groups such as Oasis and Blur, but by 1993 the focus of Dance music had moved again.