Uncommon People

Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs

Miranda Sawyer

$59.99

Hardback

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English

John Murray Publishers Ltd
28 January 2025

When Miranda Sawyer interviewed Noel Gallagher in 1995, his gag wishing Damon Albarn would die of AIDS became front-page news. This fascinating pop history, exploring the mid-90s moment when British music suddenly meant everything, explains why. Picking out twenty key songs, delving into the surprising stories behind them and their unlikely creators, Uncommon People takes us back to when Jarvis Cocker became a national hero, Trainspotting was a global hit, fire-starting seemed like a good night out - and it felt as though the revolution was happening.

Initially a music press nickname, Britpop became an unexpected musical movement centred around outsiders and misfits, drop-outs and weirdos who refused to compromise on their ideas, even when they were thrust into the international spotlight. Not just a scene for white guys with guitars, but something wilder and more interesting, with songs that have proved timeless. Exploring the era's key artists - Oasis, Blur, Tricky, Pulp, Underworld, Manic Street Preachers, The Prodigy, Suede, Chemical Brothers, Garbage, Supergrass, Radiohead, PJ Harvey and more - through their definitive anthems, Miranda Sawyer transports us back to the beating heart of the nineties.

Uncommon People re-lives the mad exhilaration of what it was like to hear these songs for the very first time - and what it was like to make them. With amazing new interviews, and I-was-there insights, this book offers a backstage pass to all the most interesting bits of Britpop's Greatest Hits.

Forget New Labour, forget earnest trend theories, this book is all about the music, the people and being right there, right now.

By: Miranda Sawyer
Imprint: John Murray Publishers Ltd
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 214mm, Width: 144mm, Spine: 34mm
Weight: 440g
ISBN: 9781399816892
ISBN 10: 1399816896
Pages: 336
Publication Date: 28 January 2025
Audience: General/trade , Professional and scholarly , General/trade , ELT Advanced , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Miranda Sawyer has written about pop music since 1988, beginning on Smash Hits before moving to Select, The Face and the Observer. She's interviewed everyone from Liam Gallagher to Tricky, PJ Harvey to Pulp, Stormzy to Billie Eilish (some of these people do not feature in a book about Britpop). Her first book Park and Ride explored the British suburbs, her second Out of Time exploded the midlife crisis, Uncommon People, her third proves that going back in time can bring you right up to date. She lives in London.

Reviews for Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs

Miranda Sawyer was at the heart of the golden era . . . and bears thrilling yet thoughtful witness to the oddity and ambition of the awkward outsiders who briefly got the nation humming their tunes, equally enthralled by the usual headliners and unclubbable mavericks like Keith Flint, Tricky and P.J. Harvey * Mojo *