At the end of the Eighties it seemed we had lived through a decade which was a little bit grey and a little bit serious. That's just in retrospect because at the time we were having a great time all the time. It's just that when The Stone Roses came on the scene it was like a ball of technicolour sunshine. Everything seemed to change. It was like a door being opened where you could actually like dance music and rock music together. And as a DJ it made sense to play James Brown next to Primal Scream.
In 1990 we opened Lizard Lounge and made a small replication of what we thought was going on in London. We hung sheets up. Bed sheets I bought from this cheap material shop in Glenhuntly. And put up slides we thought were groovy. We found an oil lamp projector. Bubbles. lollies passed around. It was the second summer of love. Stone Roses were the band.
It took another 5 years before they actually came to Melbourne and played the Metro in Bourke Street. Terrible gig. Though not as bad as the Massive Attack gig at the same venue.
So expectations weren't incredibly high for the Stone Roses gig at Festival Hall last Thursday. And when they kicked off with I Wanna Be Adored and it sounded a little shaky we started to get a bit worried. That it was carried along by the whole place singing saved the day. But gradually it all came together and despite putting the boot into Fools Gold (and I blame our familiarity with the record on that one) the night was magical. The power pop magic of She Bangs the drum being a definite highlight. It was the song where the floor just bounced. The place went mad. Even I found myself with my arms aloft.
It was intolerably hot. It was summer and the Stone Roses lifted the the crowd ten feet tall. Leaving the venue everyone was just beaming!
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