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JOHN ROBB

John Robb

Punk Rock Ruined My Life : And Other Stories

    The irresistible story of a one-man cultural phenomenon. Minister for the Counterculture, Mancunian mainstay and alternative national treasure John Robb has lived a life in music. In this book he charts his adventures on the cultural frontline, chronicling the making of a DIY icon.

    Robb’s quest began in his hometown of Blackpool – where punk was a battle against the odds – and went international when he toured the world with his band. The first person to interview Nirvana, he also discovered The Stone Roses for weekly newspaper Sounds and did early interviews with The Jesus and Mary Chain and The Manics, before moving on to legends such as Mark E. Smith, Nick Cave and Patti Smith.

    Along the way, he became an on-screen commentator and author of bestselling books. Robb’s memoir tells of deep friendships with figures from Poly Styrene to Chris Packham. Packed with riotous stories, it provides an alternative account of British musical and cultural history and a triumphant blueprint for a punk rock life.

    John Robb

    Live Forever : The Rise, Fall And Resurrection Of Oasis

      The finest book on Britain's most celebrated rock 'n' roll band – and why they were destined to reform.

      Think Oasis was just Britpop and brawls? Think again. In this, the definitive book on Britain’s biggest band, John Robb peels back the layers of Manchester's best known musical export, revealing a tale of ambition, ego, talent, and a whole lot of attitude. From the gritty pubs of Manchester to the dizzying heights of global stardom, this unauthorized biography is a rollercoaster ride through the Gallagher brothers' turbulent lives and the music that defined a generation.

      But it is also a portrait of Britain around the turn of the millennium and the cultural forces and places that shaped, and were shaped by, two cocksure autodidacts from Burnage – from art to fashion, and from football to politics. Playful, funny and irreverent, and drawing on dozens of interviews and first-hand stories, Live Forever puts Oasis squarely in the Pantheon of Rock ‘n Roll royalty as the last great band of the pre-internet age. So, grab your parka and shades, perfect your swagger, and prepare to be amazed, amused, and maybe even just a little bit shocked.

      John Robb

      The North Will Rise Again : Manchester Music City 1976-1996

        The Buzzcocks. Joy Division. The Fall. The Smiths. The Stone Roses. The Happy Mondays. Oasis. Manchester has proved to be an endlessly rich seam of pop-music talent over the last 30 years. Highly opinionated and usually controversial, stars such as Mark E. Smith, Morrissey, Ian Brown and the Gallagher brothers have always had plenty to say for themselves. Here, in John Robb’ s new compilation, Manchester’ s gobbiest musicians tell the story of the city’ s thriving music scene in their own words. When the Buzzcocks put on the Sex Pistols at Lester Free Hall in 1976, they kickstarted a musical revolution and a fervent punk scene exploded.

        In 1979 the legendary Tony Wilson founded Factory Records, the home of Joy Division/New Order and later the Happy Mondays. The Hacienda, the Factory nightclub, became notorious in the late 1980s as a centre of the influential Madchester scene, led by the Mondays and the Stone Roses, with a unique style and sound of its own. Then, from the ashes of Madchester rose ü ber-lads Oasis, the kings of Britpop and the biggest UK band of the 1990s.

        John Robb is a leading music journalist and the author of the bestselling biography of the Stone Roses. His other books include Punk: An Oral History, The Charlatans … We Are Rock and The Nineties: What the F**k Was That All About? He lives in Manchester.

        Robb Johnson

        Pennypot Lane

          January 2024 looked endless; I needed to do some recording to cheer myself up. The studio I usually use was booked all month, but before the disasters of Brexit & Covid I’d met pianist Yves Meerschaut in Gent, and he’d shown me his recording studio, Room 13, and that did have a couple of days free in January…

          I decided to make a record of old songs that other people have liked, and / or that I play differently now, and / or that haven’t appeared on vinyl before. So, here, there’s:

          “Pennypot Lane”, a fox song that people like, “Winter Turns to Spring” that was Tony Benn’s favourite song, “The Blue Sea Says Yes”, a song about how the sea welcomes us all, heroic or fragile, equally in our mortality (something like that anyway) , that I had forgotten about till people started saying how much they liked it, “More Than Enough”, that Roy Bailey and Martin Simpson have kindly rescued from the obscurity of its previous appearance on a CD in 1992, “Babbecombe at the Closing of the Day”, a song about going to Babbecombe model village, “At the Siege of Madrid” which quite a few people like, but is one of those songs that always somehow eludes a definitive performance, “A True History of Couscous”, a song I like that is more or a less fictionalized autobiography, and lastly..

          “You Don’t Have to Say Goodbye”. This is a song from my first CD; Thames Valley folk-stalwart Terry Silver used to enjoy performing it so that afterwards he could shock audiences who’d been happily singing along to it by revealing it had been written by that dreadful lefty Robb Johnson, It’s also, more recently, a song our son Arvin likes very much too, and he graces this version with his characteristically modest tasteful Spanish guitar playing. He also nagged me into doing the artwork for the cover.

          Three of these songs are lucky enough to have Yves’s breathtaking, exquisite piano playing embellishing them, and Sian Allen gifts “Madrid” some beautiful trumpet accompaniment too. But primarily, for good or ill, it’s mainly me with an acoustic guitar. Robb Johnson, May 24.

          TRACK LISTING

          Side A
          Pennypot Lane
          Winter Turns To Spring
          The Blue Sea Says Yes
          More Than Enough

          Side B
          Babbecombe At The Closing Of The Day
          At The Siege Of Madrid
          A True History Of Couscous
          You Don't Have To Say Goodbye

          Robb Johnson

          Minimum Wages / Bodger: My Part In His Downfall

            Last year Robb released the vinyl-only album Minimum Wages, 9 songs performed on acoustic guitar, with guest appearances from Boff Whalley, Fae Simon & John Forrester on vocals, Jude Abbott on brass, Jason Pegg on accordion & Jenny Carr on piano. The album was very well-received; “a timeless album for the times” (****RNR), Folk Radio UK named it as one of their top 10 albums of the year, & Ian Anderson said it would have been one of Podwireless’s CDs of the year – if it had been on CD.

            The album has its CD release as part of a double album with Bodger: My Part In His Downfall, a collection of 20 songs chronicling the events of the last three years – “the worst of possible times to have the worst of governments too.” There are voice & acoustic guitar based tracks, 2 ukulele songs, & various contributions from Irregulars Sian Allen (trumpet), John Forrester (bass), Ali Gavan (drums), Arvin Johnson (drums), Linze Maesterosa (clarinet), Fae Simon (b/vox, lead vocal on track 190, & from Irregular Records recording artiste & award-winning poet Roger Stevens (piano). The recording of the album’s last track “Goodbye” was finished on July 6th - & the following day the Prime Minister resigned. Irregular Records decided to release the album to celebrate the departure of this most murderously lazy, corrupt, mendacious & incompetent of Prime Ministers. The double album includes a 12 page booklet with notes for all the songs. 

            TRACK LISTING

            Minimum Wages:
            1: Fiddler In The Rain
            2: Last Night Of The Proms
            3: Hartlepool ASDA, Saturday Morning
            4: Great Aunt Gladys
            5: My Quiet Flame
            6: Sister Reynardine
            7: This Is Your History
            8: Minimum Wages
            9: My Very Best Of Friends

            Bodger: My Part In His Downfall:
            1: Well Done Little England
            2: The Cheese & Wine Of Privilege
            3: Barry Bucket
            4: Common Sense
            5: Don’t Forget To Wash Your Hands
            6: Tony Skinner’s Lad
            7: Blue Light On A Red Brick Wall
            8: When The Leaves Have All Fallen
            9: Jack & Jill Are Good For The Economy
            10: Chipping Sodoffbury
            11: Shut Up & Just Go Xmas Shopping
            12: We Can All Join A Union
            13: The Plague Ship
            14: What A Week It Was When The Pubs Reopened
            15: Freedom Day
            16: You’ve Only Got Yourself To Blame
            17: Well Done Little England
            18: The Worst Prime Minister In The World
            19: Sunlight On The Wall
            20: Goodbye

            Robb Johnson & The Irregulars

            The Mystery Gets Your Number & The Poetry Makes The Call

              Recorded as soon as the 2021 Covid restrictions allowed, this album expresses both the delight at being able to make some noise again, to be working with other musicians live again, & the anger at having had to endure both a pandemic & a useless, heartless government at the same time. Songwriting, vocals & guitar by Robb, The Irregulars on this album are John Forrester, bass & b/vox, Arvin Johnson, drums & percussion, & Fae Simon, b/vox, percussion, & lead vocal on “Start Counting”. Recorded by Ali Gavan at Brighton Road Studios, the album was manufactured by Press On Vinyl in Middlesborough – the cutting engineer said it was the best album he’d worked on, & Robb thinks the Press On pressing is the best sounding album he’s had manufactured.

              TRACK LISTING

              1: Scream Till The Walls Fall Down
              2: Danny Kustow’s Gibson
              3: Lost In Space
              4: One Day We Go To Wembley
              5: Yes Please Louise
              6: Start Counting
              7: From Tolpuddle To Timbuktu
              8: Anytime

              Robb Johnson & The Irregulars

              Stay Cool, Keep Left, Shine Bright

                This album grew out of the recording sessions that produced the “Mystery / Poetry” LP, adding brass & violin parts, new songs, new recordings of three audience favourites, & reworking three songs that appear on the LP. Core Irregulars John Forrester (bass), Arvin Johnson (drums & percussion) & Fae Simon (vocals & percussion) are joined by Sian Allen (trumpet), Linze Maesterosa (saxophone) & Lorsey Tillbrook (violin). Together they create a truly fine album showcasing some of the best of Robb’s songwriting for electric band performance. “The most joyous & life affirming set that I watched over the weekend” – audience response to recent Irregulars festival appearance.

                TRACK LISTING

                1: Win, Lose Or Draw
                2: From Tolpuddle To Timbuktu,
                3: Brown & Black In The Union Jack
                4: One Day We Go To Wembley
                5: Fiddler In The Rain
                6: Start Counting *
                7: When I Look Up*,
                8: The Summer Time Is Coming
                9: Be Reasonable
                10: My Very Best Of Friends.

                * Lead Vocal Fae Simon

                Robb Johnson & The Irregulars

                Pandemic Songs

                  Packaging will be a gatefold card wallet & will include 16 page lyric booklet. Pandemic Songs is songwriter Robb Johnson’s chronicle in song of the unprecedented events of the first half of 2020. His critically-acclaimed family histories of the 20th Century Gentle Men & Ordinary Giants use song to dramatise past lives & narrate significant historical events & processes. Pandemic Songs uses songs to provide a media-free perspective of contemporary history, with thirteen tracks written between March & June of this year, that record & comment on the global pandemic, from Robb’s local UK perspective. The songs are angry, sad, affectionate, elegiac, satirical, anxious, & compassionate. They celebrate our lives in lockdown & the endurance of our keyworkers, & catalogue the vanities, incompetence, hypocrisy & failures of those in power. Pandemic Songs was recorded with a socially-distanced pared-down version of The Irregulars; John Forrester on bass & vocals, Arvin Johnson on drums, percussion & Spanish guitar, & Fae Simon on vocals. The result is a powerful, visceral album, a significant creative response to these very significant times. Robb Johnson is now widely recognised as one of the UK’s finest songwriters: 

                  TRACK LISTING

                  1. Saint Mary (a Fable About The Origin Of A Virus),
                  2. Monday Afternoon In The Paris House (March 16th, & A Last Gig Before Lockdown),
                  3. 422 (lockdown Has Begun),
                  4. One More Lockdown Day (lockdown Continues),
                  5. 5373 (the Number Of Deaths From COVID 19 Continues To Rise),
                  6. 89p (the Government Responds By Promoting A Care Badge),
                  7. Disinfectant (President Trump Promotes A Cure),
                  8. The Highlight Of My Week (the Weekly Lockdown Shopping),
                  9. All The Bells Were Ringing (the Nightly Lockdown Dreaming),
                  10. Lockdown Jokes & Stories (three Sad Stories- Belly Mujinga, Railworker, Mervyn Kennedy, Bus Driver, Louisa Rajakumari, Teacher, & One Bad Joke – Dominic Cummings Drives To Durham) 
                  11. Victory In Europe (May, & The UK Achieves The Highest Rate Of COVID 19 Deaths In Europe),
                  12. The Days We Don’t Forget (a Proper Remembrance)
                  13. In Palmeira Square (June 17th, & Lockdown Is Ending)


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