So said music journalist Andrew Collins of C86, the legendary NME tape bookended by Primal Scream and the Wedding Present that became synonymous with indie pop. Much like the first Velvet Underground album and the Sex Pistols' 1976 gig at Manchester's Lesser Free Trade Hall (if perhaps on a slightly lesser scale), the mail-order cassette has had an outsized cultural impact and influence.
Confession time: until recently, I wasn't that familiar with the compilation, having had an arguably unfairly jaundiced view of it, and I'm still not that much of a fan. But I'm a sucker for a good music book, and when Nige Tassell came to town to talk about Whatever Happened To The C86 Kids? (recounting his quest to track down members of all 22 featured bands), I knew I had to be there.
As I discovered, it's little wonder that the book has been well received - you don't need to particularly like or even know the featured artists to be able to enjoy the very human stories that Tassell tells about bands forming and falling apart and what came after.
Buzz report here.
As someone used to glancing enviously at the line-up for the Walthamstow Rock 'n' Roll Book Club, I'm very much hoping that this marks the start of a series of similar events at Pop 'n' Hops.
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