In the early 60s, the first wave of Japanese students born after the Second World War entered university. Japan is then in economic expansion and takes part in this new consumer society. These young people became the Miyuki-zoku – the “Miyuki tribe”, named after a trendy street in Tokyo. The gakuran: traditional uniform of Japanese […]

“In [Joy Division’s] songs, ordinary life achieves an epic grandeur. There’s no bombast or emotional theatrics; instead there’s a modernist starkness as pared down as a Samuel Beckett play.” – Simon Reynolds, The New York Times Joy Division (originally titled Warsaw) formed in Salford, Greater Manchester, in 1976. After a slight re-shuffle on drums, it […]

“Marquee Moon is a 24-carat inspired work of pure genius, a record finely in tune and sublimely arranged with a whole new slant on dynamics.” – Nick Kent, NME 1974. New York. East Village. CBGB. A young band by the name of Television surface on a dead Sunday night. They hint at what is to […]

Mike Smith: “Britpop in general encouraged competitiveness – it was a clash between art school traditions and classic British R&B.” England. Mid-1990s. Music was reinvigorated with the rise of Britpop: a thrilling new style which soundtracked youth, subculture and class defiance. Among the big players were Pulp, Suede, Elastica and Supergrass. But the biggest battle […]

Manchester, late 1970s: cotton mills are closing one after the other, workers’ brick houses gradually give way to concrete housing estates. Manchester has just entered the post-industrial era, and becomes the catalyst for a new musical and aesthetic vision. 1976: Sex Pistols shockwave On June 4th, 1976, the Sex Pistols suddenly filled the cultural vacuum. […]

Sheffield is a city of seven hills – rural, bleak and bursting with wavelengths of sound. It cracked the codes of Northern post-punk but it purveyed more: blues, synth-pop, electronica, industrial, dance, techno, indie rock, baroque pop. The style in the city transitioned with the sound. An integral timeline, in order of formation: 1963: DAVE […]

Ex-NME staffer Andrew Collins called it “the most indie thing that ever existed”. C86 was a cassette compilation released by British music magazine NME in 1986. It had two sides: A and B, each with 11 tracks. The bands featured came from Britain’s underground guitar pop scene: all kindred spirits but all largely unknown. C86 […]

« Minets : fake beatniks, dandy hating everything that is french – the Bande du drugstore is first and foremost anti-yéyé. » Jean Monod, Les Barjots, 1968. The term “minets” appears in 1965 and designated young Parisians smitten with English culture. Janson de Sailly Schoolboys or SciencesPo students who listened the Who and Animals. At […]

“Dressed from head to toe with a consciousness close to obsession and a luxury of details, mods were work of arts wrapped in mohair.” Paolo Hewitt Born in the 50s, the mod subculture has nerve centre the Carnaby Street district in London. Mods, apocope of ‘modernist’, often son of workers who aspired to more ease […]

Jean-Pierre Melville movies are dominated by loneliness, failure and death. Movies that are said « films noirs » : Le Doulos, Le Deuxième Souffle (Second Breath), Le Samouraï, Un Flic, Le Cercle Rouge (The Red Circle) all witness for a particular style, a precise and recurring mecanism. Betrayal is omnipresent, the movie is focused on […]