Yorkshire Music

Somehow last night I'd managed to earworm myself with 'Will You Stay Tonight' by Sheffield band, The Comsat Angels and so dug out the albums ready to play this morning. I'd not listened to them for a while and it's always good to renew an acquaintance with music as good as that. Searching round for something to read, I spotted 'I'll Go To T'Foot Of Our Stage - The Story of Yorkshire Pop Music' by Craig Ferguson sitting on the bookshelf where it had lain for over a year without me getting round to reading it. And so came about a theme for the day.

The book's a good read*, chronicling the pop and rock music of my home county from Ronnie Hilton to Richard Hawley. Early on it poses the question: ‘Why have so relatively few Yorkshire pop acts been successful?’ and glibly answers: ‘Because most of them are crap’. The author then spends another 225 pages proving this wrong and given that it’s inspired my listening today, I have to agree.

It’s got plenty of anecdotes and interesting facts too. Did you know that Ian Reddington who played Vernon Tomlin in Coronation Street, was once in a band called Musical Vomit with Ian Craig Marsh and Glenn Gregory of Heaven 17? As I was working through it, band names and artists that I associate with Yorkshire kept popping into my head and he dealt with nearly every one of them. Sadly he missed out that great prog-folk-rock act from Harrogate, Wally who were the first band I ever saw live. Shame.

So far today I’ve listened to: The Comsat Angels, New Model Army, The Wedding Present, The Mekons, Scars, The Human League, Gang of Four, 2.3, Black Star Liner, The Redskins and Pale Saints.

Ready and waiting for another day, in no particular order, are: Wally, Delta 5, Pulp, Terrorvision, Babybird, Shed Seven, Heaven 17, Kaiser Chiefs, Be Bop Deluxe, The Cribs, Arctic Monkeys, The Music, The Cult, The Sisters of Mercy, Jake Thackray and The Housemartins.

*and an easy one too, it's taken me less than a day to read it, though I did miss out TNWOBHM