NME .... RIP

mudslide73

For balance - It didn't last long but the late 80s early 90s NME was a great read imo. Basically from Madchester to Grunge. Some rock in this issue - they probably sneered at them but they were in there.

impmann

I will miss the concept of them being there. I haven't bought a copy since the early 90s, so I won't miss the paper.
TBH, they were utter shitheads in the late 80s and early 90s - I remember trying to get one of their journos to get off his fat arse to come and see our band back in the day... getting featured in there had more to do with who you were sleeping with, who you were drinking with and who you were supplying drugs to.
I totally sympathise with Ginger Wildheart's comment - they were utterly judgemental and at one point between them and the Maker, they had new music sown up. If they didn't like you, you were sunk - they were that powerful. Not even John Peel had the clout to over-ride their opinions.

I'm sure there were some good guys that worked there, and I feel sorry for them losing their jobs. However, their legacy won't be mourned in this corner.

Heartfeltdawn

monquixote said:

I always hated the nme as a kid in the 90s

They turned their noses up at anything that wasn't ironic and art school and all the bands they championed were all about going to the right parties and wearing the right clothes but produced shit music.

I must have missed that ironic art school period when Oasis were kicking off. 

It's great seeing all the various eras of NME discussed here. Pip I know hates it but that's true of most music produced after 1976. Most of you here are older than me so you saw eras I've never really been part of. 

I started reading it in 1992. It was fucking great for about five years, fell apart from the end of Britpop, and then started trying to diversify which was a huge mistake. I actually had an interview for staff writer there in 2002 and got to the final round. The minute I walked in there, I knew I didn't want it and wouldn't get it. I wasn't hip enough for NME in those days. 

Where it worked for me was finding the writers who I'd get to trust with regard to music. Ignore the big features, go with the small reviews. 

Heartfeltdawn

impmann said:

I totally sympathise with Ginger Wildheart's comment - they were utterly judgemental and at one point between them and the Maker, they had new music sown up. If they didn't like you, you were sunk - they were that powerful. Not even John Peel had the clout to over-ride their opinions.

Yet in the 90s they actually gave the Wildhearts good reviews. Of course they're judgmental. Platitudinous copy is what PR companies and record company ads are for. 

https://twitter.com/GingerWildheart/status/971456652925861890

Funny reading some of the replies on there. Apparently NME didn't like people who could actually play their instruments... must be news to Johnny Marr, Bernard Butler, John Squire etc. 

And if NME sank bands for good, then how did the Wildhearts keep going? Rather disproves Ginger's theory. 

Heartfeltdawn

Still, can we at least agree that the Levellers were fucking awful? 

https://twitter.com/levellermark/status/971712813470224385

Sporky

Heartfeltdawn said:

Still, can we at least agree that the Levellers were fucking awful? 

I thought for a while that there was a Levellers sing I didn't utterly hate, but it turned out to be the Waterboys. I still didn't actually like it, but I didn't feel a burning desire to hunt down and kill everyone involved in its being inflicted on my ears.

not_the_dj

Wasn’t it Jeremy from the Levellers that posted a poo to the NME. 

(I did quote a Lev’s lyric back on page 1). 

MagicPigDetective

Heartfeltdawn said:

Still, can we at least agree that the Levellers were fucking awful? 

https://twitter.com/levellermark/status/971712813470224385

I agree with you on everything apart from this! I saw them play an acoustic gig last month and thought it was great. The hardcore fans in attendance were bit....odd...though must say. Must have been a few Jeremies amongst them. 

The NME was very influential in the early 90’s. The Suede ‘best band in Britain’ cover was I think before they released a single and gave them success and a huge buzz overnight. There was a lot on the us grunge thing and anything to do with Nirvana was essential. The live reviews were part of a healthy live scene. No it was not all healthy and I do have mixed feelings duch as the build em up and knock em down thing, eg the shoegaze scene. Slowdive were pretty much killed off when they released Slouvlaki, which is now considered a classic. I’d moved on from NME/MM by the time bloody britpop came round and got into metal and drum n bass. 

Sporky

I liked the sleeve note in Bleach's first album, which was something like "thanks to the British music press, who have supported us thus far, abs will now do everything they can to sink us without trace".

Turned out to be quite prophetic.

EricTheWeary

The Levellers were great. I mean no Harold Smallbones’ Melody Makers Orchestra but one of the most exhilarating live acts I ever saw. 

Philly_Q

mudslide73 said:

For balance - It didn't last long but the late 80s early 90s NME was a great read imo. Basically from Madchester to Grunge. Some rock in this issue - they probably sneered at them but they were in there.

Interesting.  Maybe Motley Crue and Skid Row were considered cool in an ironic kind of way for 5 minutes in 1989?  Or did someone who actually liked those bands somehow manage to blag his way into an NME job (presumably for a matter of weeks at most)?

Still, fair play.  Joan Sims.

SimonC

In my mind I can’t separate the NME and the horrendous Red Wedge tour, and the pontificating plastic socialists it created while I was at university.
Bunch of phoneys the lot of them, spurred on by hack NME journalists desperate to jump on any bandwagon and then claim they started a “movement”

Bucket

A mate of mine at school once earnestly told me that Queen were "a poor man's Led Zeppelin". I asked him where he could possibly have formed such an asinine and ill-informed opinion. He told me that it was true because the NME said it.

I rest my case.

EricTheWeary

Bucket said:

A mate of mine at school once earnestly told me that Queen were "a poor man's Led Zeppelin". I asked him where he could possibly have formed such an asinine and ill-informed opinion. He told me that it was true because the NME said it.

I rest my case.

Ahh, I had an NME book, can't remember the name but something like an AtoZ of British pop. I guess circa 1980.  There was quite a big section on Queen saying all that poor man's Led Zeppelin stuff. I really liked Queen at the time so I remember being a bit shocked by it. 

Bucket

EricTheWeary said:

Bucket said:

A mate of mine at school once earnestly told me that Queen were "a poor man's Led Zeppelin". I asked him where he could possibly have formed such an asinine and ill-informed opinion. He told me that it was true because the NME said it.

I rest my case.

Ahh, I had an NME book, can't remember the name but something like an AtoZ of British pop. I guess circa 1980.  There was quite a big section on Queen saying all that poor man's Led Zeppelin stuff. I really liked Queen at the time so I remember being a bit shocked by it. 

I just don't understand it... I can't think of two bands from the 1970s British rock scene who sounded less alike.

It's like asserting that "Year of the Cat" by Al Stewart is a rip-off of "Living After Midnight" by Judas Priest.

ICBM

Bucket said:

EricTheWeary said:

There was quite a big section on Queen saying all that poor man's Led Zeppelin stuff. I really liked Queen at the time so I remember being a bit shocked by it. 

I just don't understand it... I can't think of two bands from the 1970s British rock scene who sounded less alike.

It's like asserting that "Year of the Cat" by Al Stewart is a rip-off of "Living After Midnight" by Judas Priest.

The only possible explanations are either that they were trying to be cool by showing that they had absolutely no interest in either band, or that they simply didn't know what they were talking about. Or both.

proggy

ICBM said:

Bucket said:

EricTheWeary said:

There was quite a big section on Queen saying all that poor man's Led Zeppelin stuff. I really liked Queen at the time so I remember being a bit shocked by it. 

I just don't understand it... I can't think of two bands from the 1970s British rock scene who sounded less alike.

It's like asserting that "Year of the Cat" by Al Stewart is a rip-off of "Living After Midnight" by Judas Priest.

The only possible explanations are either that they were trying to be cool by showing that they had absolutely no interest in either band, or that they simply didn't know what they were talking about. Or both.

Perhaps they were referring to 'poodle perm' hairstyles.

fob

When I was a kid and started buying magazines, I used to buy Zzap!64 and any one other that would catch my fancy - often the NME. I remember liking it and it introduced me to bands/artists I wouldn't ever have heard of otherwise.

Later though, I went to a few gigs that got reviewed and thought they must have been at a different show. Places that were jumping were written off and dull affairs gushed about. I don't think I concluded that it was a power game where the reviewers were promoting their favourites and dismissing those that weren't 'in' but rather that they simply weren't going to the gigs and making up the reviews to fill space.

fob

BTW - RIP Zzap!64

Heartfeltdawn

Bucket said:

A mate of mine at school once earnestly told me that Queen were "a poor man's Led Zeppelin". I asked him where he could possibly have formed such an asinine and ill-informed opinion. He told me that it was true because the NME said it.

I rest my case.

There was a time when Queen were out of fashion and not hugely loved. That people would and did say things like "They're shit because NME said so" is demonstrative of a newspaper's power over stupid people. 

Really NME was like a long running band itself. It moved in and out of fashion, had several changes of lineup, went in new directions that didn't always work, and then blew up before the final reunion tour. 

I sold my collection last year, most of them went to a guy in Spain who was prepared to shell out good money for nearly 100 kilos of inkies. Reading back over my favourite period, 1992 to 1997... there was some good writing there. Stuart Baillie interviewing the Manics after Richey's hospitalization is wonderful. Music journalism depends on that balance between a good writer and a good subject to write about.