On 30 May 1961, Dag Hammarskjöld gave a lecture in Oxford about the international civil service. Now, 60 years later, the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation (DHF) has reissued the lecture with Hammarskjöld’s original footnotes, a new introduction and a note on the text.
The cover of the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation’s reissue of Hammarskjöld’s Oxford lecture, which includes his original footnotes, a new introduction and a note on the text.
One of the many surprises of the archival research phase was receiving a package of information from Oxford University Press, including details of the process leading up to the publication of the original chapbook version.
I also produced blog post that barely hints at the wealth of information I uncovered about Hammarskjöld’s trip to England, and a two-and-a-half-minute video courtesy of Different Films, which you can watch below.
I’m not sure which of these activities has involved the most work, but if I had to pick the one that has proven the most rewarding I’d say the video has it all.
From conception to treatment, selection of media and sequencing, it’s probably the only video about a publication I’ve ever been involved in but I am certain it won’t be the last.
While the history of Dag Hammarskjöld’s Oxford lecture could fill a book, my blog post explores the untold stories behind three known versions of the text.
One day I will write that book.
A screenshot of the Eksell WordPress portfolio theme by Anders Norén.
It feels like I only changed the WordPress theme for this site a week ago. But I’m doing it all over again today, by installing an early version of the Eksell WordPress theme by Anders Norén.
At the time, I claimed I made that switch because of the number of spam emails I was getting from WordPress developers offering to redesign my site. In reality, those emails haven’ stopped, and I guess they never will.
And … that’s a wrap for the decade! This time 10 years ago the K&D Stylingz crew travelled for the first time to “breezy” Karlskrona in the Swedish province of Blekinge.
The entire country was blanketed in heavy snow and, as you can see from this picture, even the sea was frozen. For, like, a very long time.
Speaking of time, little did we know then that we’d still be in Sweden in 2020 with three kids, a mortgage and a serious kanelbulle addiction (not mine—the kanelbulle addiction, that is).
While we left the wilds of Blekinge for the wonders of magical Gustavsberg (the true capital of the Stockholm archipelago) long ago, this Christmas looks set to be devoid of snow altogether.
To make up for that, I have been deep in planning mode for a trifle and mince-pie-studded extravaganza of Oztraylian dessertual bodaciousness.
Stay tuned, and hold onto your crepe partay hats, you all evebahdee!
Well, despite the seemingly unending flow of posts about Camp Davey it’s been pretty busy around here lately.
In the Intramanet industry we talk about the back end and the front end. While you’ve no doubt been entertained by the travails of Scaramouche, the D/DN boffins have been tinkering away behind the scenes to ensure that you experience the very best of Davey’s international web portal.
That’s why, if you visit the main page, you’ll notice that we’ve implemented a redesign—less is more, after all. Not that anybody ever gets here via the front page, anyway. It’s like a bloody speakeasy in here sometimes—people just waltzing in via the back door, and then wandering off to whichever part of the house they feel like. But, we guess that’s okay, as long as people don’t hang around too long, or leave their mess behind.
But speaking of mess, how tragic that Scaramouche has finally been evicted from Camp Davey? As disheartening as the whole episode was for us, we were also very grateful to be able to liveblog events as they happened, in real time. This was all due to the aforementioned boffins, who installed and configured a copy of Liveblog, a WordPress liveblogging plugin. The plugin itself hasn’t been updated for a while but it still managed to do the trick.
Finally, given the large number of posts on D/DN, and the continuing scourge of link rot, we continue to work behind the scenes to edit, clean up and rejuvenate various posts. However, as there are over 1200 posts to deal with, our efforts are pretty piecemeal, meaning that the quality of the posts varies quite a lot. But we’re hoping that by beginning to assign posts to various authors, and revamping the category taxonomy, we’ll be well on the way to a more streamlined site.
Thanks again for visiting Davey Dreamnation, and stay safe out there.
The older I get, the more clear it becomes that I’m a child of the early 1990s. I feel like I grew up with the sounds of early-1990s indie music, most of which came from the UK. So, without further ado, here is my definitive list of the top UK indie bands of the early 1990s.
1. My Bloody Valentine
My Bloody Valentine’s ‘Soon’—this is the ‘radio’ edit of a song originally released on the Glider EP in 1990 and later remixed by Andy Weatherall (RIP).
How does an Irish band formed in the 1980s top a list of 1990s UK indie bands? Well, My Bloody Valentine did an awful lot of indie, over a very long period of time. Most of it in the UK in the early-1990s. In fact, their sophomore album, Loveless, is the pinnacle of early-1990s indie. And if you don’t agree with that, I suspect you shouldn’t be here.
Taken from their second EP, Play (1990), Ride’s ‘Like a Daydream’ contained a two-chord riff eerily reminiscent of The Police’s ‘Invisible Sun’ and a continuous guitar solo by Andy Bell that foreshadowed the band’s later descent into Byrds-inspired, self-indulgent noodling.
If you’d asked me in 1990 which band was the greatest exponent of UK indie, I would have said Ride. They released three EPs in the space of eight glorious months in 1990. Their debut album, Nowhere, was a jaw-shuddering statement of intent. Ride set a standard by which critics would later judge all other UK indie bands. Including themselves.
Lush’s ‘De-Luxe’, taken from their 1990 EP, Mad Love. It doesn’t get much better than this if you’re a fan of reverb-drenched, early 1990s indie.
Lush provided a melodic antidote to Ride’s ultimate ‘fey’ boy-band aesthetic. Signed to 4AD, the band released two fantastic EPs in 1990. Their debut LP, Spooky, arrived in 1992. Lush’s music was hook-laden, harmonic and edgy. Dare I say ethereal? It doesn’t get much better than this if you’re a fan of reverb-drenched, early-1990s indie.
4. The Stone Roses
The official video for ‘Fools Gold’, which was unfortunately four or five minutes too short.
There was something peculiar about being a fan of UK indie while living in Australia. New music took a while to arrive. That’s why I’m claiming the Stone Roses for the early 1990s. Their influence was massive but delayed. Epic track ‘Fools Gold’ laid the blueprint for the ‘indie-dance crossover’ phenomenon. If only they had left things there, and retired with dignity.
Swervedriver dropped ‘Never Lose That Feeling’ on an unsuspecting listening public in 1992. Fans of the band were in for an even bigger surprise: it had a twin. ‘Never Learn’, a bodacious long-form ‘coda’, featured unironic sax and sheets of reverb-drenched guitars.
Of course, there’s something self-selecting about band lists from a certain era. Sharp-eyed readers may already see a pattern emerging. At least in the kind of early-1990s UK indie bands I deem worthy of writing about. Swervedriver is no exception to my cobbled-together rule. But boy did they know how to shred the early-1990s indie space-time continuum.
Well, this is handy for those seeking a soundtrack to a theoretical administration of herbal remedies: Primal Scream’s ‘Higher Than the Sun’, from Screamadelica.
Primal Scream, of course, pre-date the 1990s. But there was no missing their influence on the UK indie scene of the early 1990s. They took the best of ecstasy (and acid house) culture and created something unique. We all wanted to get high on music that was all about getting higher than the sun. And that’s where Primal Scream came in.
7. Verve
When ‘Mad’ Richard Ashcroft’s band, Verve, changed its name to The Verve, it signalled the end of a phase in the band’s musical development. ‘All In the Mind’ showcases just what’s possible when you discover that the drugs do actually work.
Back in the early 1990s ‘The’ Verve were still called Verve. They started off as a freewheeling, psychedelic act. Their sound was genuine 1960s heritage in timbre. I mean, it was out of step with everything else going on around them. But they did not care. And that’s why I loved them. Then they changed their name and the rest, as they say, is ‘History’.
Yes, this is Happy Mondays lip-syncing on Top of the Pops in 1989 and yes that is Kirsty MacColl gurning away on the right.
You could say that Happy Mondays, not Guru Josh, invented the early 1990s. Their appearance on Top of the Pops in November 1989 signalled a change of the guard. The fact that this new guard were absolute gurners set the scene for what would be a wild few years. Happy Mondays’ irrepressible hedonism was pivotal in the Madchester scene. Which makes them so early 1990s it hurts.
9. The Charlatans
If Mark Gardener of Ride and Tim Burgess of The Charlatans were somehow able to produce a lovechild, there is a strong possibility that said child’s lips would be larger than the London Eye.
Critics often overlook the Charlatans in favour of other more well known UK indie bands. But the Charlatans chose to bury their hard edges beneath layers of Hammond organ. They reproduced the 1960s aesthetic on their early releases with reverence. And, more than any other band, they embodied the indie-dance crossover phenomenon.
10. The La’s
The adorably mop-topped Lee Mavers of The La’s could have released ‘Timeless Melody’ as a single and then retired, and still have had a greater impact on early-1990s indie than pretty much anybody else.
It may seem ironic to include the La’s in this top 10 list of early-1990s UK indie bands. After all, they’re a band idolised by Oasis. And they only released one album. But the La’s symbolised a spirit that was both hopeful and doomed. Without the La’s, the early 1990s as an historical moment would be meaningless.
1990s UK indie bands: 10 honorary mentions
Top-10 lists are so reductive, doncha think? Well, go tell it on the Intramanet. In the meantime, I’m covering all my bases by making 10 honorary mentions. These bands were indie enough, UK enough and active early enough in the 1990s to count. But I’m not quite ready to write a full paragraph about any of them. Yet.
Teenage Fanclub deserve an entire post of their own. If you took the best bits of the Waterboys and U2, you might get The Wonder Stuff. Huggy Bear were the agit-pop answer to Bikini Kill, and DIY as all get-up. The Stairs made the Stones sound ironic and cool. And Cornershop managed to fight the power and mock Morrissey at the same time.
Slowdive were the quiet/sad-face merchants of shoegaze. Curve adhered to the ‘three EPs followed by an LP’ rule. The Wedding Present released 12 singles in a year and also recorded an album in Ukrainian. Ned’s Atomic Dustbin were worth a listen for the name alone. Oh and Pop Will Eat Itself? Mkai, Grebo.
1990s UK indie bands: dishonorable mentions
No top-10 list would be complete without its anti-list. In this case, there are at least 10 bands I’d never bother listening to again. It may sound harsh, but life’s too short to put oneself through such a wringer.
Thus, I won’t tolerate any discussion of Inspiral Carpets, even if their t-shirts were cool as fuck. Northside were a bit too Hammond for me. Cud, to borrow Shaun Ryder’s immortal phrasing, can go do one. James? I mean, come on. Adorable were up themselves and only half as good as Aussie dream-pop merchants Glide.
I can’t even recall anything The Farm put out. Chapterhouse were borderline Grebo. Moose drifted too far up their own fundament. Birdland were pathetic. I have always despised Manic Street Preachers.
And I couldn’t care less about Carter USM, Revolver, Sultans of Ping FC, Jesus Jones, EMF, Soup Dragons, Mock Turtles, Ocean Colour Scene or The Shamen. Got that?
In subsequent posts I’ll explore the musical careers of my own personal top 10 early-1990s UK indie bands. Stay tuned, as they say. Until then, please feel free to leave a comment below. Or message me with your thoughts on early-1990s UK indie!
