SCENE 10: The Hacienda, 1984

The Tube are filming in Manchester for Channel 4. Jools Holland is interviewing Mike Pickering while Madonna is preparing to perform. In the background Tom Hingley is collecting glasses.

Jools Holland
‘Tis the bitter month of Lenaion
When winter seems to drag her barren heels
A January Friday afternoon
Outside raining, yet inside we’re aglow
With heavy hues of music, within
This Whitworth Street basilica of song,
Where we have now return’d, advertisements
Over, so lets speak to Mike Pickering
The man who books the Hacienda bands
Hello Mike

Mike Pickering
Hello Jules, thanks for coming
To Manchester

Jools Holland
Our pleasure, so tell us
What was the Factory All-Star line-up
Just seen on Channel Four

Mike Pickering
Yes, they were great,
Our label’s finest soldiers, some were drawn
From A Certain Ratio, Quando Quango,
Durutti Column added to the blend

Jools Holland
So when you’re booking bands, what kind of spice
Dost tease thee most, enticing to invite?

Mike Pickering
Let us make the timing tangible, Jools,
For fashionable, unfashionable,
Just shortest hours divide, Fame’s fickle house
No mercy shows, for us the transition
Twyx adulation & irrelevance
The time most prime, when crossing Rubicon
The perfect stage, some barge with full back line,
The Hacienda senators behind
Upon the banks, off-waving to the wars

Jools Holland
& what of Manchester, Mike, I have heard
Of streets full of Pickering’s rich pickings

Mike Pickering
Tis truth indeed, this city doth posess
The best young band collection in the land
All pregnant with phenomenality
Here groups are plants, whom daily harvesting
The primary energy of music,
Trapping its rays like epos did the bards,
Whose evolutive offer’d leaves freely
To every community who loves
To eat this holy herbage of the North

Jools Holland
That’s excellent, Manchester’s one to watch
As is our next performer, Madonna
Pray tell us how she came to Manchester

Mike Pickering
Well, Jools, I was gallanting up New York
With Quando Quango, our song, Love Tempo,
Mark Kamins remixed deftly, & was heard
By DJ Larry Levan, he loved us
& let us play his Paradise Garage,
A live PA, we met Madonna there,
As Kamin’s girlfirend she thrives on the scene,
Whose overwhelming inner light lets shine,
& so a strong connection was assured
Twyx northern cities & their sattelites,
So we welcome their first ambassadress
Futurity’s iconaclast assur’d

Jools Holland
This is her first show beyond New York, yes

Mike Pickering
It is, yes

Jools Holland
So, from northern Michigan
Via New York, once a backing singer
With disco legend Patrick Hernandez
Fairest in voices, fortunately met
With moves to make a ballerina blush
Proud upon her first album’s pinions
Oer oceans rovethose gods made destinate
As when Charles Lindbergh soloist spirit
Hover’d, those three score years, less three, ago
Over waves of a vasty Atlantic,
As Lucky Lindi lands at Le Bourget
We give you the divine & the lovely
Daughter of the goddesses, Madonna!

Madonna performs ‘Holiday’ on the Hacienda dance floor with backing dances – at the end of the gig she is approached by Rob Gretton

Rob Gretton
That was great! Amazing even! Stunning!
& I stand antiblanch’d by style’s import
My name is Rob, Rob Gretton

Madonna
& you are

Rob Gretton
I run this place, & if you’re still around
Tonight, we’ve got an excellent DJ
When, if you want, you could perform once more

Madonna
How much

Rob Gretton
Eh – fifty quid for half an hour

Madonna
Fuck off – lets go guys – step out from this dump’s,
Damp, shovelboard floor, I’m here for TV
Not some drunken, dirty hoard of vikings
I fucking hate Manchester, Les goddams !

Exit Madonna & her backing dancers

Jools Holland
Madonna, hey Madonna, wait for me

Rob Gretton
She’s so fucking cool, Mike

Mike Pickering
Yeah, I know, mate

---

SCENE 11: Feb, 1984, Drone Studios, Chorlton

Tony Wilson enters the studios where The Smiths are winding up rehearsals. He is being filmed for television.

Tony Wilson
Welcome to downtown Chorlton-cum-Hardy
Seeking the verve of this week’s NME
Upon whose velvet cover I there see
This charming man, Morrissey, from The Smiths
Whose group voted these year’s first ranking band
Whose album slots, directly, number one,
What is it all about, this fandango?
This sheer quirky, mandrake electrolier
Seducing thro’ Manchester’s monotones
Well, let’s see, the troops are in the plaza
The city’s pride & joy, as cross the land
Young broadsheets proclaim their fame in ballads
Whose nation-tour commences in a week
Their farther stars approaching ever near
For they are four, as corners form a square
& squares the very brickwork of our lives,
There is to bands an alchemie of minds
Each wielding inorganic instruments
Whose spirit-sound develops & evolves
Lives of their own, more perfect & alive
Behold the very bedrock of all groups
The drummer & the prince who who plays the bass
Mike Joyce & Andrew Michael Rourke, hello

Michael Joyce
Hello

Andy Rourke
Hi

Tony Wilson
Telle me do you get annoy’d
That all attention smiles on Morrissey

Andy Rourke
Well we know we are appreciated,
But if we’re not on TV every hour
Delevering endless interviews – fine

Michael Joyce
We are happy to be in the background
Our time will come

Tony Wilson
Elucidate yourselves
Via your album, The Smiths by The Smiths

Michael Joyce
Diligence increaseth the fruits of toil
& gratitude’s a cultivated fruit
Its great to hear the truthvein thro’ our sound
We’ve taped a few rehersals, heard them back
As sonic dirt in dirges, then pristeen
& clean our songs, when heard did startle all,
There’s bliss in an old scrap of poetry
But paradise in a freshly printed page

Tony Wilson
So how would you define the sound you heard

Andy Rourke
The Smiths sound like, well, The Smiths

Michael Joyce
Its just us
We cover lot of bases versatile

Tony Wilson
If every rhythm section is the sea
& singers are the steerers of the ships
Then whom the vessels form’d by floating chords?
If ever, then, the cult of Morrissey
Was under any formal threat, there grows
An acolytic worship-moat around
The tuneful fretwork prun’d by Mister Marr
So, Johnny, what makes this group so special

Johnny Marr
We are very strong will’d – what we want, know
Expansive in our vision to invade
The very charcuterie of Britain

Tony Wilson
So, now the tide’s retreated, & the brine
Transfer’d from the rockpools onto vinyl
What regard, do you hold, for your album

Johnny Marr
Felicitously blissful, clear sky rare
Tis a dual signal post in music
Guitars are good & songs can still be sung
If you have something & youre very sure Of all its meritous glaciation
Why hide its wonders, let the wide world hear!

Tony Wilson
What is your style, your playing style, what say?

Johnny Marr
I would say my style’s basic influence
Immixes sequences of impulses
American blues, English folk guitar
There’s a lot of space to fill, especially
Live, & so I ramp up my aggressives
With rockabilly scatter’d thro the sound

Tony Wilson
Congratulations, Johnny, you have brought
The old guitar to fashion’s brow once more
But can you tell me of your melodies
From whence they spring?

Johnny Marr
The answer I don’t know,

Tony Wilson
That’s exactly what Mozart used to say

Johnny Marr
Mozart

Tony Wilson
Yeah

Johnny Marr
Hip guy

Tony Wilson
& here’s the singer
Stephen from Stretford, now more pros’prous known
By an inflaming surname, Morrissey
The clutcher of the philosopher’s stone
When rendering opinions, & so
Stephen, I mean Morrissey, we can talk Of art, or the gladioli hanging
From thy back pocket, let us talk instead
Of scandal – your latest controversy
Begins within the needles widest grooves
Opening lines of the opening track
Belligerent ghouls run Manchester schools
Was taken injurious, upsetting
Manchester’s education committee

Tony Wilson
I’m not surprised?

Morrissey
Why art thou not surprised?

Morrissey
Because it proffers an attack on them
Fullermost deserv’d, their pupils treated
Contemptuous, as cash-calves in a drove

Tony Wilson
Is this your personal experience

Morrissey
Entirely so, a widespread sentiment
I’m sure, as from the amount of letters
Penn’d to us, of this track the sole concern
It seems to mean a great deal to people
& that the album’s perch’d at number one Means more must be in favour than against

Tony Wilson
I must now ask you what right does the fact
That being now a successful pop star
You comment glibly on local concerns
& quip on politics with nocturne phrase

Morrissey
My opinion’s if popular singers
Say not such things then who is left to cry
Fiend, foul, corruption, whichever sin
Society’s improvers have absorb’d
& when the floods of rotten deeds subside
We can’t have faith in playwrights any more
We can’t have faith in film stars, young people
Barely care about these dying artforms
Implications popular music
Is that of tender foals agraze in fields
Or wives coddl’d by Victorian oafs
It can be there, but let’s not say anything
Terribly important, just stick to disco
Or whatever – there’s an obligation
Felt by us in our duty’s cosmic core

Tony Wilson
There’s something I’ve always wanted to ask
On seeing the the genius in your eyes
I always thought you’d be our novelist
Our dear Dostoevsky of Davyhulme
But why did you want to be a pop star

Morrissey
Many reasons, it doesn’t make life worse
It’s quite interesting, try it one day

Tony Wilson
Perhaps I shall, it has been a pleasure
Stephen, & the rest of the band… The Smiths

The filming finishes

Cameraman
That was great Tony, well done,

Tony Wilson
Thank-you Keith
Where’s the best pub round here, lads, I’m buying

---

12: February 1984, Decibel Studios, Ancoats

Ian Brown, Pete Garner & John Squires are preparing for rehearsals

Ian Brown
Did you win a ballblast, last night, Peter

Pete Garner
Too right I did, this village Manchester
Turns up odd nights of impudicity –
I was leaping & dancing, sentient
With all around me, man, speed & acid
Are quite the cocktail combination boys

John Squire
Had any kip

Pete Garner
Not really, but I’m reyt
Nothing another little dab won’t sort

Enter Andy Couzens with Reni who is wearing a big long coat, stretch denim jeans & big furry moon boots

Andy Couzens
Gentlemen, I give you Alan John Wren
Or Reni as he teold me he preferr’d
Alright lads

Ian Brown
Alright

John Squire
Welcome to Ancoats

Pete Garner
You saw the advertisement in A1

Reni
I’ve still got it in my my pocket

Ian Brown
You what?
Some natural compulsion made me tear
It from the wall, I hope that you don’t mind

Pete Garner
How conspiratorial

Andy Couzens
That’s funny

John Squire
But if you’re shit, promise to put it back

Reni
I’m not shit, lads, promise

Andy Couzens
Al-, ehm reni

Andy Couzens
Ian, Pete & Johnny; vocals, bass, guitar
I play rhythm, we are all set up
The kits fully furnish’d with breakables
So off we go when you’re ready

Reni
Nice one
Who writes the songs?

John Squire
Me & Ian mostly
Living vague, unsubtantiated lives
Enhances entrancing spectaculums
Where life & deep ambitions interweave
In perfect purpose, yinlyanging thro’
Days of dreaming music, bandmates, brothers,
Fully focuss’d on crafting artefacts
Seignory over immortality

Ian Brown
What about you, Reni, what’s your motif

Reni
I’m Stinker, I’m Smelly, New Wave Metal,
Join Donnington’s rock monsters every year
I’m Gorton born, play in local rock bands
Roaming pub circuits upon mini tours
But once the evalesco’s blown it’s storm
I rush to my vocal harmony group

Pete Garner
Wow, soft & hard mate, perfect for the band

Ian Brown
We could do with some backing harmonies
So, who’s your fav’rite band?

Reni
AC/DC

John Squire
AC/DC?

Reni
They’re great

Andy Couzens
Yeah, whatever, but you’re ready to jam now

Reni
Yep, that’s me

John Squire
This one’s Tragic Roundabout

Pete Garner
I’ll just set the tape going

Ian Brown
So listen
We’ll start off without ya, have a listen
A few minutes, however long it takes
Then join us when you’re sailing on the sound

Reni
Alright

Andy Couzens
Alright gentlemen,… two, three, four

The band begin playing Tragic Roundabout. After ten seconds Reni begins playing like Keith Moon, full of effortless double hits – at the end of the song there is a stunn’d silence

Reni
Too much, eh?

Ian Brown
No mate that was fucking great

John Squire
That might be the best we’ve ever sounded

Andy Couzens
That’s some proper mad hatter, Keith Moon shit!
The kit seem’d an extension of thyself

Reni
Your music made me truly ruminate
On Schubert’s D minor, Death & the Mains,
Which opens, a sharp call to attention,
Bold rhythm pushes forwards the idea
Like passionganger angry, remorseless

Andy Couzens
What did you think, more to the point, of us
I mean, it feels like you’re in the band now

Reni

Yeah, why not, you’ve got something going here
I’m not quite sure what, as yet, but sense
Streams of silverdust lacing the racket
I love your tough integument & vibe,
While anyone committed as you are
To making music, men of my own style
That sense of belief I feel in you all
Infectious, you seem a solid band
There’s a tall one, thin one, hard one, soft one,
A well-rounded mix

Ian Brown
We’re going to be
The biggest band on the planet one day

John Squire
Shall we try another?
Lets play Adored

Pete Garner
This is a good one Reni, nice bass line
Repeats itself the epic songscape thro

The Stone Roses play I Wanna Be Adored