Luke Haines's Britpop memoir Bad Vibes wasn't exactly what I expected. That's not to say I didn't enjoy it; Haines is a witty, intelligent storyteller with a stubbornly individual streak, and he well deserves his Grumpy Old Man of Britpop crown, even though I never actually considered the Auteurs a Britpop band myself... then again, neither did they.

Britpop became the albatross around Luke Haines's neck. The Auteurs released their first album in 1993, in time for the music press to cheerfully lump them in with Suede and Pulp as the next big thing that was going to pop over the Atlantic and kick the arse of grunge. This was long before Oasis, way before Blur decided to drop the trippy shoegazing of their debut album and go all chirpy cockernee guvnor, years before Menswear and Echobelly and Marion and Cast.

Read the full review at my blog. ( )

I never really got The Auteurs. I have two tracks by them that I love, but I don't remember anything else being much good... maybe I was wrong, having recently heard praise for their New Wave album.
Anyway, this book makes me want to check them out.
So Luke Haines was the singer with The Auteurs who were in the mix with Suede at the start of Britpop. Although you have the obligatory tales of drugs and debauchery (yawn) you also get some wicked insight into how Britpop developed, the Haines ego, the motivations of a major label and what it is to be top of division three in the Britpop league (surely some mistake!).
This book is everything Renegade was not. It is witty and cutting, but because it's also self deprecating enough, that approach is acceptable. And it's entertaining and insightful, so you get more than most music biogs!
It helps that although Haines is not so likeable, his heroes and villains largely coincide with my own and he lets us know what judgements are the result of hindsight (including some changes of opinion).
If, like me, you found the whole Britpop thing a bit annoying, you'll love this... but if you are a fan of Oasis, you might want to find something else. ( )