Altered State Matthew Collin · Serpent’s Tail

8

the chemical generation

Superclubs, casualties and the culture going overground

13 works, in the order the book names them

  • 001Song

    White Rabbit

    Jefferson Airplane

    In 1967, Jefferson Airplane had revamped the psychedelic classic ‘White Rabbit’ as ‘White Levi’s’ for an advertising campaign, and over a quarter of a century later the same denim company would employ techno tricks and tripped-out iconography to sell its jeans.
    Open in YouTube ↗
  • 002Book

    Alternative London

    Nicholas Saunders

    In the early seventies, Nicholas Saunders had written Alternative London, a guide to bohemian pursuits in the capital.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 003Book

    E for Ecstasy

    Nicholas Saunders

    Saunders’ trilogy – E for Ecstasy, Ecstasy and the Dance Culture and Ecstasy Reconsidered – became an underground success story.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 004Book

    Ecstasy and the Dance Culture

    Nicholas Saunders

    Saunders’ trilogy – E for Ecstasy, Ecstasy and the Dance Culture and Ecstasy Reconsidered – became an underground success story.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 005Book

    Ecstasy Reconsidered

    Nicholas Saunders

    Saunders’ trilogy – E for Ecstasy, Ecstasy and the Dance Culture and Ecstasy Reconsidered – became an underground success story.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 006Book

    Trainspotting

    Irvine Welsh

    In 1993, aged thirty-five, he delivered his masterwork, Trainspotting, a narrative of incandescent brilliance tracking the blind hopes and crazy dreams of a group of Edinburgh youths: junkies, AIDS victims, ravers, brawlers, boozers and losers.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 007Book

    E by Gum!

    Lifeline

    The year before, Manchester drugs agency Lifeline had issued the first edition of its public-information comic E by Gum!, featuring cartoon hero Peanut Pete, a pop-eyed scally perennially buzzing off his nut, pulling on a spliff while simultaneously dispensing no-nonsense advice.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 008Book

    Smack in the Eye

    Lifeline

    The idea for E by Gum! had grown out of Smack in the Eye, a comic for heroin users which Lifeline had produced in 1987.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 009Book

    Furry Freak Brothers

    Gilbert Shelton

    The strip was designed as a Furry Freak Brothers-style underground comic and employed the black humour and street vernacular of the junkie to get information across without sermonising.
    Open in Goodreads ↗
  • 010Song

    Wonderwall

    Oasis

    Soon after the election, Blair invited pop stars and DJs to a drinks party at 10 Downing Street, including Oasis songwriter Noel Gallagher, the subject of tabloid condemnation over his prodrug statements (and whose song ‘Wonderwall’ had been played at Leah Betts’ funeral).
    Open in YouTube ↗
  • 011Song

    The Red Flag

    Jim Connell

    As his election campaign theme, Blair had chosen to replace the socialist standard ‘The Red Flag’ with a dance anthem, ‘Things Can Only Get Better’, written by a self-confessed Ecstasy user, Peter Cunnah of D:Ream.
    Open in YouTube ↗
  • 012Song

    Things Can Only Get Better

    D:Ream

    As his election campaign theme, Blair had chosen to replace the socialist standard ‘The Red Flag’ with a dance anthem, ‘Things Can Only Get Better’, written by a self-confessed Ecstasy user, Peter Cunnah of D:Ream.
    Open in YouTube ↗
  • 013Book

    Brand Failures

    Matt Haig

    In his book Brand Failures, marketing analyst Matt Haig suggested that when Cream started to be perceived as a business rather than a nightclub, it lost its ‘cool factor’ among a younger generation of teenagers who didn’t want to feel that they were simply part of some canny entrepreneur’s marketing scheme.
    Open in Goodreads ↗