Named after New Order's hit song "Blue Monday", the Happy Mondays consisted
of five scruffy Mancunian clubbers -
Shaun Ryder (vocals/lyrics), his brother Paul (bass), Paul 'PD' Davis
(keyboards), Gary 'Gaz' Whelan (drums), and
Mark 'Moose' Day (guitar) - each of whom wanted to take his interest
in dance music a step further. Before long, they had
recruited a new member, Mark Berry (percussion/dancing), better known
to everybody as Bez.
Like their hometown heroes Joy Division and New Order, the Happy Mondays
sprang to success on the back of a talent
contest, a 'Battle Of The Bands' at Manchester's Haienda club; unlike
their idols, the Mondays won a rigged event. On the
back of this devious success, they were offered a deal with Manchester
independent label Factory Records, whose chairman
Tony Wilson was to help mastermind their phenomenal rise. Wilson's
masterstroke was his insistence that the band work with
established producers and remixers, but the band's success also had
much to do with their authenticity - they were genuine,
hedonistic, sexist, druggy louts, out to have a good time, all the
time.
Former Velvet Underground luminary John Cale produced their debut LP,
the catchily titled Squirrel And G-Man Twenty
Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carnt Smile (White Out) (1987).
Acclaimed by the British music press, it hit
controversy within weeks; although the Happy Mondays would always liberally
borrow riffs and lyrics from other sources, it
was felt that "Desmond" was a little too similar to The Beatles' "Ob-La-Di,
Ob-La-Da". The LP was withdrawn, and later
reappeared without the offending track.
The Happy Mondays teamed up with Factory's in-house producer Martin
Hannett for 1988's brilliant Bummed, which
presented a slightly more accessible mix of rock and funk, most impressively
on the near-hit "Wrote For Luck". After this had
been remixed for dancefloor appeal by Erasure's Vince Clarke, Wilson
arranged for the band to be produced by Manchester
DJs/remixers Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne. Out of this collaboration
emerged the group's distinctive 'Madchester' noise.
The subtle change in their sound brought the Happy Mondays closer to
mainstream success. An inspired performance on BBC
TV's Top Of The Pops guaranteed Top 20 success for the Madchester Rave
On EP (1989), led by the anthemic
"Hallelujah". For a couple of years afterwards, the British music scene
was dominated by Manchester acts like the Stone
Roses, the Inspiral Carpets, James and 808 State, perhaps the most
exciting movement to hit British music since the Two-Tone
explosion of the early 80s.
Further hits followed, most notably the cover of John Kongos' early
70s hit, "He's Gonna Step On You Again", which was
shortened to "Step On", and became a Top 5 single. Like its follow-up
singles, "Kinky Afro" and "Loose Fit", it was included
on their third, and biggest-selling album, Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches
(1990).
By now, the Mondays were playing sell-out stadium concerts, which were
baffling events, with the various band members
looking as if they each belonged in other bands. Sometimes these unpromising
scenarios were transformed into magical, if
incoherent, spectacles, and the double LP Live (1991) captured some
of the highlights from Leeds' football stadium, Elland
Road.
However, as the Happy Mondays hit a peak in 1989-90, stories of their
drug addictions and boorishness filled the tabloid
press, while the music press, once so supportive, turned against them.
They hoped to reclaim lost ground with a new album,
recorded in the Bahamas with producers Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth
from Tom Tom Club and Talking Heads. The costly
result - ...Yes Please (1992) - cost a quarter of a million pounds,
and was a critical and commercial failure. As if all this weren't
bad enough, a disastrous UK tour to promote the album succeeded in
boosting support act The Stereo MCs, but sinking the
Mondays. Shaun's inability to kick his heroin habit exacerbated the
band's problems, and after Factory Records filed for
bankruptcy in November 1992, the Happy Mondays were all but finished.
When Shaun Ryder left, there were rumours that backing singer Rowetta
would replace him on lead vocals, while keyboard
player Davis would take over as songwriter. Neither came to fruition,
and in March 1993 the Mondays officially announced
their split. Ryder went into rehab, and silence reigned until he reunited
with Bez, and Kermit from the Ruthless Rap Assassins,
to form Black Grape, who made one of 1995's best albums, It's Great
When You're Straight . . . Yeah!