Grab your rain mac and clear some major space on your shelves, because we are digging into an absolute juggernaut of regional music history. Manchester North Of England (A Story Of Independent Music Greater Manchester 1977-1993) is a massive, beautifully sprawling 7CD deluxe box set dropped in 2017 by the archival geniuses at Cherry Red Records (catalog number CRCDBOX38). Taking its name and cover art from a legendary 1988 Bop Cassettes tape, this 146-track monster was curated in a massive collaborative effort with the Manchester Digital Music Archive (MDMA) to document how a single rainy northern city completely transformed global music culture.
This isn’t just a lazy compilation highlighting the usual textbook suspects; it is a meticulously researched sonic map tracking a scene from the exact moment the Buzzcocks dropped their self-released Spiral Scratch EP in January '77 right up to the earliest guitar-heavy rumblings of Britpop in 1993. Chronologically arranged, it charts the incredible mutation of youth culture through raw first-wave punk, the dark and moody Factory Records post-punk gold rush, the jangly bedroom aesthetics of the C86 era, the sweaty, MDMA-fuelled Madchester indie-dance explosion at the Haçienda, and beyond. Packed with exhaustive track-by-track sleeve notes by legendary local music scribe Mick Middles, it is an essential, ink-stained testament to musical self-determination.
