July 1999 Part 1 - Manic Street Preachers, Star Wars, Festival Season

April 1995 Part 2 - Oasis, Snoop Doggy Dogg

In which we catch Oasis at the exact moment they become unavoidable, trace the strange emotional pull of Some Might Say, consider Snoop Doggy Dogg’s Murder Was The Case multimedia empire, and revisit the brief mid-90s boom where music VHS releases became essential cultural artefacts rather than landfill.

April 1995 Part 1 - The Stone Roses, Scott Walker

In which Scott Walker returns from self-imposed exile with Tilt, a record so confrontationally out of step with Britpop Britain it feels beamed in from another reality. While the Stone Roses attempt to reclaim their throne via a legendarily ropey Oslo comeback show, woollen knitwear, and several metric tonnes of cocaine-era optimism.

July 1999 Part 2 - Landfill Wu-Tang, Mr. Scruff

In which we revisit Mr. Scruff’s Keep It Unreal, trace the path from Ninja Tune curiosity to permanently licensed British institution, and ask whether any late-90s album has worked harder in service of TV background music, car adverts and graphic design degree coursework. Elsewhere, we conduct a full spreadsheet-assisted audit of the post-Wu-Tang Forever collapse: RZA’s disappearing production credits, the rise of landfill Wu-Tang, Ghostface’s lone quality-control operation, and why Beneath The Surface deserves rescuing from the great late-90s rap mulch pile.

July 1999 Part 1 - Manic Street Preachers, Star Wars, Festival Season

In which the Manic Street Preachers attempt to survive peak overexposure, Melody Maker desperately tries to make festival season feel culturally decisive, and Star Wars crosses the invisible line between treasured generational reference point and permanently monetised corporate property.

October 1992 Part 2 - Sonic Youth, Dr. Dre, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Eazy-E

In which Eazy-E sues pretty much everyone in sight, we trace the origin story of Deep Cover (and its many afterlives), and a small news item quietly reroutes the entire future of Death Row, Interscope and several billion dollars’ worth of hip hop history. Elsewhere, Sonic Youth attempt to weaponise the alternative nation moment with Youth Against Fascism — a major label push that mistakes cultural weight for crossover potential, and raises the eternal question of whether some bands are simply too cool (or too dissonant) to ever properly land.