100 Greatest Songs of the 90’s #40 Supergrass – Caught by The Fuzz

Released : 1994

Like all movements, Britpop also created for a platform for artists that didn’t really fit; despite their pivotal role in it and them comically legging up against Blur, Oasis would still most likely have happened without it, whilst Pulp were a thirteen year overnight success by the time the class tourism of Common People shook the charts.

Whilst known as The Jennifers Gaz Coombes and Danny Goffey seemed to be in possession of a one way ticket to nowhere. But after being reincarnated as Supergrass they immediately became the movement’s youth wing, distilling it’s peculiar jingoism into a furiously kinetic music just as likely to nod at The Buzzcocks as it did T-Rex or The Kinks. Hobbled by the cheery nonsense of accidental monster hit Alright, their debut I Should Coco alternatively pegged out a template for the trio as guitar pop wizards, one that they would spend the rest of the decade repeatedly confirming.

Back in the day though Caught By The Fuzz didn’t hint much at future expansiveness. With an obvious debt at the top to the Sex Pistols Pretty Vacant, at just over two minutes it packed a lot in, from the wide eyed paranoia of having your collar felt whilst under the influence to it’s daft Bolan/Shelley harmonies and finishing off with an ear pinching from mum. Three years later the Union Jacks had been folded and put away ready to be hijacked in the next century, but Supergrass were doing just fine thank you, revealing themselves as much more than just the racket over which you ordered a pint of lager top.