The Britpop Hour
We may not be able to easily define a Britpop band, but we all know one when we see it.
In many ways, Marc Burrows's Britpop Hour is the perfect Edinburgh show. It is, indeed, an hour long and so doesn't outstay its welcome. It straddles the genres of comedy and lecture, so stands out in a sea of largely indistinguishable shows. And it's drenched in nostalgia, and so appeals to the now middle-aged enthusiasts who can afford to attend the festival. Conditions in the chill wind of provincial touring, judging by the modest audience the evening attracted, are more challenging, however. This is a pity, as there was much to enjoy in his analysis of nineties music.
Calling his show an hour perhaps didn't help. Folk do hanker for a full evening out, after all. This made it doubly frustrating that Burrows recognised this and bumped up the run time to double that. He added a brief warmup routine from himself, followed by surprise support from Juliette Burton. Burton is herself a stalwart of the Fringe. I've very much enjoyed her shows about identity and self-affirmation over the years, and, much like Burrows, what she talks about is often more engaging than the comedy she makes out of it. On this occasion, she tackled the bewildering attraction (to those of us not on-side) of cosplay. Dressing as a fantasy character would be a fair description. The costumes are as impressive as they are bonkers, with women often scantily clad. The jury is still out whether this is objectifying, empowering or straightforwardly nuts. As always with Burton's ruminations, the answer is likely somewhere in between. To find out, you'd need to attend her show at the end of the month.
After the interval, we got the show proper. I presume it was largely in its original form. This was fair enough - it did say an hour on the tin, after all. However, given the extra elbow room Burrows had, and his encyclopaedic knowledge, I could have happily dived deeper into the subject. As it was, we got a whistle-stop tour of a brief period in the nineties, when it became fashionable to sing in a British accent about British things. Not that this properly defines Britpop. It remains an elusive genre, which Burrows cleverly pointed out was less to do with music, and more to do with the times. All manner of whimsical charts and diagrams were produced to better identify what made a band a Britpop band. So it's no surprise he's been likened to Dave Gorman. I think this does him a disservice, though. Gorman's shtick is to take the inconsequential and analyse the life out of it. By contrast, Burrows' strength lies in his genuine and passionate enthusiasm for something so important to him. It practically defines him.
Britpop wasn't for everyone, of course - it wasn't for me. So I wasn't surprised that one of the few bands associated with the movement that were producing music of worth - Kula Shaker - is the one act he singled out for robust criticism. They were shit, apparently, so that tells me. This all fits, to be fair. We may not be able to easily define a Britpop band, but we all know one when we see it. What I really admired about Burrows' analysis was how readily he accepted the criticisms that made, for some of us, the movement such a problem. As he pointed out, it was the first time British music looked back, not forward. It was monocultural and parochial and - as he demonstrated with his Union Jack guitar in a show highlight - the songs were all rip-offs of other people's work. In the case of Oasis, it was occasionally rip-offs of other Oasis songs!
None of this mattered to the teenage Burrows, and so doesn't matter to him now, despite being painfully aware of the music's "whiff of gammon". Who can blame him? Who, after all, doesn't have a soft spot for whoever caught their attention in their teens? To my mind, it's why there has been such a resurgent interest in the likes of Oasis, Suede and Blur. Not, as Burrows postulated, because in divisive times we need a unifying force. They didn't unify me at the time. I was too busy marvelling at Hawkwind's influence over Spiritualised, so I doubt they'll do it this time. Far more likely, it seems to me, that fans of Britpop have now grown up and have the disposable income needed to see a live gig. Who knows, some might even put on a show about it.
