by Steve Brennan

Created on: March 22, 2009   Last Updated: March 23, 2009

In the sleeve notes to this 18-track compilation culled from the best of the vast array of music featured in the eponymous movie, the late Tony Wilson (former boss of the legendary Factory Records) noted "these are the songs which shape the film and the songs which shaped a few lives". Very true. The album follows, as does the hilarious movie, the development and influences of the fertile UK Manchester music scene, from the 1976 dawn of British punk to the birth of acid house, and the eventual collapse of Factory in the early 90s, driven into the ground by its own folly.

Consequently, this is a predictably fantastic collection of some of the most classic pieces of music the UK ever produced, ranging from the Sex Pistols, The Clash, Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays, and 808 State, amongst others, and there is something for everyone on here.

A little background: Manchester TV presenter and local eccentric Tony Wilson founded Factory Records in around 1980. A truly anarchic organisation, the label was founded on the principal that the artists owned all their work, were under no legal obligation to Factory, and all who participated did so as part of a "grand experiment in human nature", in Wilson's words. Early signings Joy Division gave Factory their first success, and following lead singer Ian Curtis's tragic suicide, New Order would provide the main source of income for the label.

Wilson ploughed most of this cash into the Hacienda Club, a venture that would prove to be epoch-making in the British music scene, and ultimately calamitous for Factory. The Hacienda was the birthplace of the UK rave & dance movement, and it was here for the first time that many well-known DJs such as Andrew Weatherall (later to produce Primal Scream's "ecstasy concept album" Screamadelica) and Dave Haslam began their careers.

The Hacienda never made a penny in profit, as everyone who went there consumed recreational drugs by the bucketful, and never bought any alcohol. Its fate was sealed when local gangs moved in to gain control of the drugs trade, resulting in dance floor shootings, which led to the closure of the club and the bankruptcy of Factory. Their predicament was exacerbated by the Happy Mondays going to Barbados to record an album and blowing the entire budget on crack cocaine, before selling the studio equipment and holding Wilson to ransom for the master tapes, which contained no usable music.

As Wilson had never legally signed any of his bands, London Records obtained

• 1
• 2
• 3
• Next Page >>