The Stone Roses Reunion: Manchester's Second Coming

As the winter months are drawing closer it appears that the music industry is huddling together, warming its cockles on reformed bands of yore. So far we've seen Pulp, The Libertines and Steps (arguably a tragedy) cast aside their differences in aid of ushering in a resurgence in record sales. Yet perhaps the greatest teary consolidation of the last decade has revealed itself in the form of a revitalised Stone Roses, yesterday confirmed to be embarking on a series of UK tour dates followed by an 'extensive' world tour. What with Noel Gallagher currently rinsing Matt Cardle in the pre-order stakes, it appears that we may be witnessing a return to genuinely good music with a Mancunian edge bred deep within the heyday of The Hacienda.


But why is the revitalisation of a band that split fifteen years ago so important in an age of electronica where guitar led  music is often considered dead? Well for precisely that reason. There is an air of artificiality to the last decade, bred through the metamorphosis of manafactured pop groups into talent shows prepping lemmings to fly off the one hit wonder cliff . This is a band who fed up of their low profile embarked on an extensive graffiti campaign in 1986 and deliberately turned up late on stage to grab the headline slots; all part of a landmark career that burned hard and fast leaving just two studio albums in its wake. Ian Brown and company were notoriously volatile but that is precisely what made them so pivotal to the genesis of the era of Brit-Pop. The Stone Roses paved the way for the anarchic fancies of Oasis and Blur whilst engaging in practices that would make Brother blush like a prepubescent school girl. In a way they were a victim of their own musical fury and were swiftly swallowed up by their own chaotic outlook embodied by growing musical differences and an equally ferocious scrutiny from the press along with British audiences.


Yet the legacy that was left behind is an undeniably timeless one, both their self titled debut and The Second Coming are absolutely stunning. Because many were still waddling around in diapers during the Stone Rose's big break it's best not to pretend to be old school but to harken back to the first time you heard Fools Gold. Whether it be through virgin ears during Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barells or on a borrowed tape, it's undeniable that the track sounds just as fresh as the day it was mixed down. I'll never forget the first time I put The Second Coming into a CD player after a few too many beers at the pub. When the second track (a cover of Jimmy Hendrix's Driving South) blasted out of my speakers I knew I had found something truly special. 

Now it really is The Second Coming, how long it will last and whether any new material will emerge is a precarious question that only time will answer. However I strongly advise anyone who is on the fence to get down to Heaton Park in Manchester on the 29th and the 30th of June to witness this definitive cult outfit make musical history.

As for the rest of you I'll leave with an appropriate quote from Ian Brown in 2009: "We were called arrogant, but that arrogance was 100% self-belief - knowing what we were going to do and what we could achieve with it."

Tickets for the shows go on sale on Friday (October 21) at 9.30am.

You can purchase tickets from the following ticket outlets -

Gigsandtours.com/ 0844 811 0051

Ticketmaster.co.uk/ 0844 826 2826

Ticketline.co.uk/ 0161 832 1111

For more details and to buy The Stone Roses tickets, check out Gigwise Gig Tickets.