In May/June 1986, the New Musical Express issued one its regular mail-order cassettes, five years on from the inaugural C81 release, but this one came to define a generation.
The C86 generation. Primal Scream. The Pastels. The Mighty Lemon Drops. The Wedding Present. Half Man Half Biscuit. And loads of bands maybe not even John Peel played. It sold 40,000 copies and was then reissued on vinyl and cassette by Rough Trade the next year. So, what was C86 music? Cherry Red Records have sought to expand the definition by adding two more discs, another 51 tracks in all, not on cassette this time but CD, giving you the chance to wonder whatever happened to 14 Iced Bears, Stitched-Back Foot Airman, Laugh and North Of Cornwallis while rediscovering early Happy Mondays and The Weather Prophets.
Yet why do so many of these bands sound like a less tuneful Orange Juice, all spindly guitars and over-stretched singer drones, and why were there so few women-fronted groups, Talulah Gosh and Shop Assistants aside?
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