Britpop: The End

I've finally come to the end of my Britpop retrospective, after spending many pounds buying and several months listening to a whole bunch of albums, and many hours watching YouTube clips. I could have gone on forever really, but I really can't be bothered, and I think I covered all the important stuff really, but there were some artists I didn't cover, The Verve, Embrace, Kenickie and Catatonia probably being the main ones.

MP3s not pictured

The Verve pre-dated Britpop by several years and broke through as Britpop ended, so I didn't include them. Embrace and Catatonia I would consider as post-Britpop bands really, even though they are often included by some people. As for Kenickie, they were a band I loved at the time and will do a look back on them at a later date.

Overall, I enjoyed looking back at what was essentially the music of my youth. There were few surprises, most things were pretty much as I remembered them, good and bad.

If one thing was noticeable, it was that there were a lot of good singles, but most of the albums were fairly average.

Despite having reservations when I began, I would now conclude that Britpop was a good thing. No big cultural movement has really happened in Britain since then; the coverage Britpop got was fairly remarkable, and given what has happened to the media in Britain since then (few remaining independant radio stations, the decline of the music magazine industry, the lack of music coverage), one is unlikely to happen again. With all the coincidences involved with the rise of Britpop, such as the arrival of satellite TV, the move towards the mainstream of "alternative" comedy and the seeming return of British nationalistic pride, it makes it all the more amazing. If for no other reason, Britpop will probably be the last in the line of youth cultural movements (following things such as rock 'n' roll in the fifties, the swinging sixties, punk etc) to really sweep through Britain in such a big way, though I'll be happy to be proved wrong. The closest thing we have had recently I guess is the increasing obsession with celebrity culture and the rise of reality TV.