Introduction by Paul Morley

 

It all began at the beginning of time, it all began in the twelfth century, it all began in the 1800s, it all began after the war, it all began in the 1960s… and then it all began again with the Sex Pistols, who came, once or twice, to Manchester in 1976…  It was a hell of an adventure, and the rest is local history, the rest is everyday hysteria, the rest is story upon story about music, and life, and love, and the night, and the morning after.

The madness involved in making a film about music, about a city, about a group of individuals who all felt that they were at the centre of the universe, about a movement, about a series of dreams that came true and/or turned into nightmares, is itself in the spirit of a Manchester madness that has given the city a mythical quality ever since Johnny Rotten stared, with sheer nerve, at a few self-chosen representatives at the exact moment the story began.  Whatever it was that he meant, man, meant a lot to those representatives, these anti-disciples, and they went out and they spread, they savaged, they screamed, they smashed, they beat, they timed, they sold, they drank, they snorted, they wired, they reworded the word.  Everything that has happened in the Manchester music scene this last quarter of a century can all be traced back to the time Johnny Rotten raced out of nowhere to announce, with volume, that there was a world out there, a world that needed to be changed, a world that could be changed.  And so some people tried to turn the rest of the world into Manchester, and they almost pulled it off.

The story of Manchester from the Rotten moment to the moment when the stories he inspired came to an end - even as other stories began, because Rotten's energy will transmit to the end of time, or at least pop time - should not be filmed.  Therefore it has to be filmed.  Too much happened.  Too much to collect, to store, to control in a mere movie.  Therefore it has to be turned into a movie.  Too much chaos and story telling and self-examination and too many moments for a film to even begin to interpret.  Therefore a film has to be made to begin to interpret all this chaos and all these stories and all those moments.  People discovered themselves, and created themselves, and turned dreams and love and hate into music, all in the space of a 'Manchester' that was outside itself and inside itself and beside itself. The space of 'Manchester' slips from view as soon as it becomes visible.  'Manchester' is a rumour that can only be glimpsed the other side of the music.  It is impossible to film the music, and the movement, and the movement of the music.  It is impossible to film a rumour.

So film the impossible, and what happens around the edges of the impossible, in the darkness, and the light, and the next day.  Turn the film into a rumour.  Manchester was about a madness that you cannot ever capture in a film: so try and capture it in a film.  Capture the way Buzzcocks said it all - ALL - inside three minutes.  The way The Fall still can't stay still.  The way Jon the Postman was raving not drowning.  The way Joy Division put life and death to music.  The way Vini Reilly turned tears and dreams into chords.  The way Martin Hannett piloted a recording studio through the space of 'Manchester.'  The way A Certain Ratio put the blood into funk. The way Happy Mondays made every day seem like a happy monday.  The way Factory Records mixed anarchy and business and crisis.  The way Tony Wilson put the space of 'Manchester' in between every word he spoke.  It can't be done, there is no way a film can be made that gets across the sound, the suicide, the intoxication, the drama, the merchandise, the obscenity, the stress, the rain, the ego, the trousers, the designs, the lust, the landscape, the business, the silliness, the gossip, the catalogue numbers, the art, the dancing, the dawn, the drinks, the heat, the building, the mayhem, the murder, the haunting… the fucking philosophy, the doomed heroes and the final beauty.  You can't make a film about a geographical location, a chunk of the planet, a space called 'Manchester' that was all in the mind.

So there has to be a film.  The film has to be made.  This stuff really happened, these people lived, those people died, that music was written, long fast nights were beaten up and the next day just kept coming.  So turn it into a film.  Turn it into fiction.  Turn it into myth.  Into costume comedy about collective consciousness.  You cannot be nostalgic about something that fought against nostalgia. So turn yesterday into tomorrow.  Make them laugh.  Make them cry.  Make believe.  Make it as real as it never was.  Manchester the myth is absurd. Making a film about the myth is absurd.  It won't work.  It can't fail.  All that can go wrong is that they get it wrong.  Which, in a Manchester way, would be kind of getting it right.

This is the film that should never have been made so it had to be made about a post-punk Manchester music scene that was as close to hallucination as reality can get.  Viva the North.  Viva the stupid magnificent dream.  Viva the freedom to act.  Viva the impossible.

Paul Morley
June 2001