The Top 20 Manchester Albums of All-Time

By: SoundProof Magazine

^{November 16, 2009 – Manchester, United Kingdom}

Manchester. Few cities in the world have had a bigger impact on the course of popular music than the industrial city in the north of England. And so it's not surprising that a quick dash through Mancunian musical history is like a giant game of Six Degrees of Separation, with the tightly-knit local scene stretching long tentacles out across the globe.

The shining centre of those connections is, of course, the legendary Madchester era of the late-'80s and early-'90s, when musically-speaking, Manchester was the most important city in the world. And at the centre of that is the moment it's all said to have been born-during The Sex Pistols' poorly-attended Manchester debut. The Friday night show at the Free Trade Hall in June of 1976 was, without exaggerating, one of pop music's most important. Organized by The Buzzcocks' Pete Shelley and Howard Devoto (who would also go on to form Magazine) it was seen by a whopping 40 people or so, most of whom, it seems, went on to form their own bands. Morrissey was there; so were future Joy Division and New Order members Peter Hook and Bernard Sumner (who would also later team up with The Smiths' Johnny Marr in Electronic). Tony Wilson went on to create Factory Records and open the Hacienda club, where rave culture was born. Mark E. Smith formed The Fall. Mick Hucknall formed Simply Red. Martin Hannett became a ground-breaking producer/gun-wielding maniac and wound up working with nearly half of the bands on our list. In fact, the people in that room that day directly contributed to 13 of the 20 records who made the cut-and indirectly contributed to and influenced many of the rest.

But Manchester's impact on the world extends far beyond the Madchester years. It reaches back to the pre-war days of the '30s-when Music Hall acts like Gracie Fields and George Formby used Manchester's working class spirit and sharp, sarcastic sense of humour to turn their city into the genre's epicentre. That set the stage for the beat clubs of the late-'50s, the debut of Top of the Pops in the early-'60s, and the city's contingent of British Invaders like Herman's Hermits and The Hollies (whose influence extended far beyond the UK even before Graham Nash set off for California and his rendezvous with Crosby, Stills and Young).

In the '70s, there would be the disco of The Bee Gees and the ambitious art-rock of 10cc, who would also start Strawberry Studios, creating a local recording hub for '80s greats like The Smiths, Joy Division, Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses. Then, in the wake of Madchester's drug-fuelled implosion, came the city's most successful band-Oasis-and the rest of the Britpop. There was Badly Drawn Boy. And Doves. And The Verve. And now Elbow and Liam Frost and The Whip and Jim Noir and The Ting Tings and Nine Black Alps...

As a result, practically any music nerd in the Western world would be able to pull together a meaningful list of their favourite albums by Manchester-based artists. But for ours, we turned to native Mancunains. We asked a cross-section of local bloggers, journalists, artists and bookers for their picks. These folks were kind enough to get back to us with theirs: Alan McGee (Creation Records, The Guardian), Liam Frost, Martin Coogan (of The Mock Turtles), DJ Fat Roland, Matt Davies (The Manchester Evening News), Rob Dobson (Northern Comfort), Simon Ashton (Cosmic Disco), Lyndsey Hayes and Marie-Claire Daly (Helen of Troy Does Countertop Writings), Cath Aubergine (Manchester Music), Sean Smith (expletive undeleted), Northern Nights, New Ears, Matt from Guestlist, Richard Cheetham (formerly of the Night & Day Café) and Jay Taylor (The Ruby Lounge).