What became known as Madchester had a few antecedents, but musically if you want to go back, at least some of it’s DNA can be found in the Happy Mondays 1986 single, Freaky Dancin’. In an era where pointy shoes, paisley shirts and counterfeit Rickenbacker guitars were the zeitgeist, here was a sloppy, funk sodden tune that came on like the soundtrack to a porno film; about to collapse at any moment, you could happily shuffle to it, throw your arms around like you didn’t care and mumble to the nonsense lyrics. It sounded like almost nothing contemporary.
The Mondays‘ stars would align three years later as part of a snowball effect that at one point seemed to mean you could busk outside the Arndale and be supping pints with a cockney A&R man twenty minutes later; lots of bands formed, many got signed, a few lingered, but none for very long.
Northside it had to be said didn’t seem like a Factory outfit. Despite the organisation’s pivotal role in making it all happen, supremo Tony Wilson seemed not much more than bemused by it all, as opposed to wearing the pseudo-mantle of Madchester’s godfather. A tribe of scruffs, the quartet he signed’s first single Shall We Take A Trip rode a tide of tabloid outrage to a Radio 1 ban, but success was relative.
The jury was out on Chicken Rhythyms long before it was released, partially because by the time it arrived in the middle of 1991 Factory were flirting with bankruptcy and un-fresh faced yoof standing around not doing much had lost some appeal. That’s not to say that it didn’t have a certain charm via the likes of Yeah Man and in Take 5 there was a genuine cause for swagger.
Now reissued for 2024’s Record Store Day, Chicken Rhythyms is a reminder of how the other ninety-five percent sounded, but whether you’re old enough to remember or just dreamed it, it’s still got some Freaky Dancin’ for ya.
You can read a full review here.
The Voice Of Unreason 