Award-winning writer, comedian and music journalist Marc Burrows brings The Britpop Showto The Waterside Theatre on Friday 24th April.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the mega Blur vs Oasis chart battle, and The Britpop Show unpicks the rivalries, hype, absurd personalities and unforgettable music that defined the 90s Britpop era and changed the face of UK culture.
During his career, Marc has interviewed some of Britpop’s biggest stars. With wit, warmth and a knack for finding the strange beneath the surface, he charts the rise and fall of a movement that started with hope and swagger and ended in excess and identity crisis.
At its peak, Britpop was more than music – it was freedom, fun, Hooch, Union Jacks on everything, and a generation of nerdy outsiders finding themselves suddenly famous.
But what came after the Blur vs Oasis frenzy? What happened when Britpop stopped being fun? What influence did New Labour’s election victory have as the UK hurtled towards the millennium? And how did Damon Albarn sleep with so many people’s girlfriends?
Equal parts love letter and send-up, The Britpop Show is sharp, silly and surprisingly moving. It explores the legacy of the era, from middle-class pretension vs working-class grit to the way British music tried to reinvent itself in the ’90s, to what happened when cocaine, commercialisation and culture wars kicked in.
On bringing the show to Sale, Marc says:
Sale is in Greater Manchester, which means I could sit here for about four hours listing Britpop facts about this area and still not be done. This is ground zero. The Stone Roses (the John the Baptists of Britpop – they popped up early to spread the word and then messed up the second coming). The Inspiral Carpets, for whom a young Noel Gallagher was a roadie. The Haçienda. Factory Records. Oasis, who formed in Burnage, about three miles from Waterside Arts, where we’re doing the show. Noel Gallagher has said Oasis wanted to “finish what The La’s started”, but what they actually finished was the argument about whether guitar music could still be the biggest thing in the country. They settled it. 4% of the entire population applied for tickets to Knebworth. Two hundred and fifty thousand people in a field in Hertfordshire, and it all started in a rehearsal room down the road from where the show is happening. If Britpop has a spiritual home, you’re sitting in it. So no pressure on me then.
Directed by Dec Munro, the show blends comedy, cultural commentary and nostalgic chaos to remember what made Britpop brilliant in the first place and to create something uniquely fun and resonant – a show for diehard fans, curious newbies, and anyone who remembers the distinct sound of 1995. Packed with jokes, classic tunes, and a heartfelt celebration of the best (and worst) of a musical moment that still shapes British identity today, this is a joyous, raucous look back at the 90s. Remembering the music, memories and the mayhem, this show captures the spirit of a cultural moment when anything seemed possible.
