Turns Into Stone

I missed Stone Roses eponymous debut album in 1989, but then, I was only 13. Two years later, in 1991, I was buying the NME and Melody Maker every week, listening to the Evening Session and discovering albums like Teenage Fanclub's Bandwagonesque, Nirvana's Nevermind, Primal Scream's Screamadelica, Massive Attack's Blue Lines and R.E.M.'s Out Of Time. What a year for music that was!

The fifth year common room was ripe for music tapes and I fell for the magical melodic guitar pop of The Stone Roses big time. Over a year or so, I bought up all their old 12-inch singles, also on 7-inch, CD and sometimes even cassette tape. I was hooked ... line and sinker.

The Stone Roses are the most perfect band I have ever fallen for. Their music, artwork, hair, clothes, personalities ... I bought the Live At Blackpool Empress Ballroom film on VHS and must have nearly worn it to death. How could a band be this cool?!

International, Continental - Ian Brown in Blackpool. Photo by Justin Thomas

Virginia Galleries in Glasgow had a shop that sold old music magazines, so I collected NME and The Melody Maker's that told of the Roses court hearings with their record label Silvertone. 

Ah ... Silvertone. The label that promised so much. Following the release of Sally Cinnamon on FM Revolver in 1987, and after years of building a collection of songs, The Stone Roses were courted by several labels, most notably Rough Trade, who funded the recording of Elephant Stone, with Peter Hook on production duties.

However, the Roses, thanks to a slap up Italian dinner, signed an 8-album deal with Zomba Records, later transferred to Silvertone (a subsiduary). The Roses were able to buy the Elephant Stone tapes off Rough Trade as part of the deal.

The Silvertone years were golden ... pardon the pun. 

• 1988 - Elephant Stone 
• 1989 - the impeccable run of Made of Stone, She Bangs The Drums and the double a-side of Fools Gold / What The World Is Waiting For in 1989, 
• 1990 - One Love in the July of a hot hot summer. This single was released on the back of the Roses playing Spike Island in May and Glasgow Green in June, the latter of which would be their final show for 5-years.

The whole world in his hands - Ian Brown at Spike Island

By now, the Roses had realised they had been ill-advised and hasty in signing their deal with Silvertone and they were trying to get out of it. Within a year, a period that halted the best band in the world in their tracks, the Roses were free and they signed to Geffen for a reported £1 million.

Silvertone, scuppered recordings when they appealed against the court decision to free the Roses. They also went on to release Adored, Waterfall and Resurrection as singles from the album. The court case, money, drugs, travel, deaths and births meant that it would be mid-1993 before work began properly on what would become The Second Coming. It eventually came out in December 1994.

Never Mind The Pollocks - photo by Kevin Cummins

Back to Turns Into Stone though ... another Silvertone cash in, although this was welcomed by fans - bringing together b-sides and non-album singles, it's an absolute gem of a compilation.

Reni's high-hat ushers in the sublime 12-inch version of Elephant Stone, then he is all over his drums, Mani comes in on bass (his first recording with the band) and Squire sprinkles chiming riffs like sugar over the top. Literally the icing on the cake. He places a cherry on top after a minute and 15-seconds later Brown yells break and his band take it up another notch. There is a break down and another build up, before finally Brown begins to sing, 10-seconds shy of 2-minutes. 

The second half of the first verse contains lines that meant so much to me as a teenager ... and they do to this very day.

Dreaming 'til the sun goes down

And night turns into day

Reni is on fire, Mani holds the groove and Squire is free to flow. This is an incredible single and it is little wonder that Hooky was lined up to produce the album, only timings didn't fit ... eventually leading the Roses to John Leckie, which worked out rather well.

Seems like there's a hole

In my dreams

Or so it seems

Nothing means

Anything ... anymore

From a different planet, in their own world - like all the best bands

The Hardest Thing In The World was the b-side and had been played as early as May 1986. Merging the Roses harder sound from their earlier days with their growing feel and understanding for guitar pop, it's a glorious burst of energy, wrapped up in 2-minutes 43 seconds.

Searching for a perfect day

It never happens that way 

Going Down is another gem from Squire and Brown's incredible songwriting streak of 1986-87. Melodic and melancholic, it's a real favourite of mine. I love the imagery in the lyrics, the tale of someone in love, lust and awe.

Penny's place a crummy room

Her dansette crackles to Jimi's tune

I don't care I taste Ambre Solaire

Her neck, her thighs, her lips her hair

And then of course the magical;

There she looks like a painting

Jackson Pollock's number 5

I really love the dreamy outro;

To look down on the clouds, you don't need to fly

I've never flown in a plane

I'll live until I die

Guitarist, songwriter, artist and dreamer - John Squire

The chiming guitar pop perfection of Mersey Paradise is one of the first guitar riffs I took the time to learn. Built around the D chord, Squire creates a chiming masterpiece and Reni is all over his kit - pounding, rolling and grooving. When Brown lets out an oh yeah before the final chorus, it is the sound of a singer in love with his band and music.

Lost In Music - Ian during the magnificent outro to I Am The Resurrection - Live at Blackpool

Standing Here is a real favourite of mine. I should be safe forever in your arms is a lyric that melts my heart every time I hear this song.

Starting with Squire conjuring glorious sounds from his guitar, the band then fall in behind him, Mani and Reni lock into a groove, with Reni shuffling effortlessly about the drums. Squire just sounds like he is improvising over the top of them, a beautiful jam. Listen carefully for Reni's stunning backing vocals at times.

I really don't think you could know that I'm in heaven when you smile

As a teenager Standing Here appealed to me more than any other song for a while. Lines like that described how I would feel every day if a girl I fancied smiled at me. 

The breakdown into I don't think you think like I do (another amazing lyric) then leads to arguably the most beautiful 2-minutes in the Roses cannon.

Squire's guitar is just so considerate and melodic, Brown's whispered vocals are spine tingling, Reni is just soooooooo good. The outro is very arguably the most blissful moment in the Roses discography.

I could park a juggernaut in your mouth

And I can feel a hurricane when you shout

I should be safe forever in your arms

Pollocked - Photo by Kevin Cummins

Dating back to 1986, Where Angels Play was first played live in January 1987 and remained unreleased until Silvertone releases I Wanna Be Adored as a single in 1991. Brown is steadfast and defiant in his delivery of the lyrics, while the shimmering 60-second outro is sublime. This fades out and I wonder if there is a long version sitting in the vaults somewhere.

Simone is Where Angels Play backwards. A trick the Roses repeated several times to create trippy psychedelia. 

I wrote a feature length blog on Fools Gold (12-inch version) HERE that included the intro - Fools Gold was (and is) the sound of Stone Roses at their peak, almost 10-minutes of funk groove via bass, beats, wah-wah guitar, samples and the coolest person in the world at the time on whispered vocals about friends searching for gold and ready to steal it off each other.... oh and the Marquis de Sade.

Later I would say - The beat and bass groove are in from the start, it's fresh, it's funky, it sounds like nothing 4 white boys from Manchester should be creating. But then things were changing dramatically in 1989, particularly in Manchester, a city embracing ecstasy and all kinds of music from Detroit to Ibiza - people wanted to dance and expand their horizons - international, continental.

Fools Gold on Top of the Pops

What the World Is Waiting For is a burst of guitar pop telling tales of religion, gold and greed, making it the perfect companion for Fools Gold that it was released alongside. 

He loves his brother

He'd sell him for a fistful of gold

Things move up a notch to the outro;

Any time you want it, then it's there

All you gotta do is stop it on the corner and ask

Say hey, you don't live today

Stop the world, stop the world, I'm getting off

I've also written a feature length blog on One Love and Something's Burning that you can check HERE. I describe the songs as  - Squire on guitar, Mani on bass and the effervescent Reni on drums stretched out blissfully to create almost 16-minutes of dreamy, groove based psychedelia.

Riding in on some outrageous Squire guitar heroics, Mani and Reni fall effortlessly into a groove behind him, allowing Ian to come in with a hushed promise, sung in an almost menacing whisper.

Any time you want me

Any time at all

Any time you need me

All you gotta do is call

Mani and Ian at Spike Island

The bridge to the chorus is all kinds of trippy cool. Brown sings about being a dolphin who doesn't live in the sea, before the beautiful line you feel my flow and you flood my brain , slowing things down into a delicious groove ...

Show me your vision, your wild apparition

And sink to the depths of your soul

... before Squire delivers some star spangled riffs as the band hit the chorus;

One love, we don't need another love

One love, one heart and one soul

Reflecting on One Love in 1998, Ian Brown said "The chorus wasn't strong enough. We tried for an anthem. We wanted to cover all bases and ended up covering none."

After another run through the first verse and a slightly different bridge, the chorus is then extended, ending with a lyric that would become the title of their phenomenal Turns Into Stone compilation of non-album single and b-sides.

Your fruit's in season

And these feet fall surely sound

And what goes up must come down

Turns into dust, or turns into stone

Remarkably, all of the above (and more) is delivered in 2-minutes 45 seconds, leaving the Roses a full 5-minutes to play with on the 12-inch version. Mani's bass is central to the extended outro, allowing Squire ample room to play and Reni to jam along with some kind of sample/programmed beat.

The beat goes on - Alan 'Reni' Wren - a generational drummer

Tantalisingly, the song seems to have found another groove just as it ends. It could have gone on and on. The Roses look super cool in the video, playing and grooving as flames shoot up all around them.

John Squire, One Love video shoot

Something's Burning is as fluid and trippy a song as the Roses produced. The first 70-seconds sound like the band just mucking around with programmed beats and some effects for inspiration, then Squire coaxes a gentle riff from his guitar and a whispered Ian Brown vocal comes in, singing proverbs through the first verse.

There is a lift into the chorus and I particularly love the flowing melody of the final line.

I can see the love and the hate in your eyes

Penny for the thoughts behind your disguise

What you gonna go and what you gonna day?

I'm not the only one believing there's an easier way

And then a little groove into the next section that ends with a classic Ian Brown line;

It doesn't pay to disorientate me

It doesn't cost to be someone

I am the vine 

And you are the branches

I've said it before on this blog and I'll say it again. The Fools Gold and One Love b/w Something's Burning singles are a glimpse of where the Roses could have gone if they hadn't got caught up in legal wranglings. Can you imagine an album full of blissed out psychedelic grooves, jams and beats? 

Turns Into Stone is a remarkable collection of songs and the album is a real favourite of mine. I've enjoyed revisiting it a few times to write this blog and hope that by reading it, you might be encouraged to stick it on too.

One Love

Released during the heatwave of July 1990, Stone Roses One Love b/w Something's Burning was the sound of a band completely in the zone and out on their own. 

The band were streets ahead of their contemporaries, in fact they barely acknowledged them. They had DJ's rather than support bands at their landmark Spike Island and Glasgow Green shows that year. No other band could touch them.

Fully aware of this, the Roses turned down support slots with New Order in America and also The Pixies. Ian Brown also delivered a typically memorable quote when asked why they had turned down an opportunity to play with The Rolling Stones. "It's 1990, The Rolling Who? F**king hell they should open for us. It's obscene that they're even touring."

Following the release of their eponymous album and Fools Gold single, the Roses were the band of a generation; changing the way people looked, acted and spoke. Soundtracking the times with sublime guitar pop and providing visuals through John Squire's artwork.

Check the footage from Spike Island via the link below. It's electric. 

'The time, the time, the time, the time, the time is now' declared Brown, as the band sauntered onstage at their legendary show to the sounds of Small Time Hustler by The Dismasters on a loop. Brown grooves to the song, Mani pumps the air with his fist and Cressa is dancing behind a bank of effects. 

Mani described the event as 'a gathering of the clans'. 

Spike Island footage

Their time was now! Following on from 1989's Fools Gold 9.53, Stone Roses continued to push boundaries with their sound. Squire on guitar, Mani on bass and the effervescent Reni on drums stretched out blissfully to create almost 16-minutes of dreamy, groove based psychedelia on One Love and Something's Burning across the 12-inch single.

Riding in on some outrageous Squire guitar heroics, Mani and Reni fall effortlessly into a groove behind him, allowing Ian to come in with a hushed promise, sung in an almost menacing whisper.

Any time you want me

Any time at all

Any time you need me

All you gotta do is call

The bridge to the chorus is all kinds of trippy cool. Brown sings about being a dolphin who doesn't live in the sea, before the beautiful line you feel my flow and you flood my brain , slowing things down into a delicious groove ...

Show me your vision, your wild apparition

And sink to the depths of your soul

... before Squire delivers some star spangled riffs as the band hit the chorus;

One love, we don't need another love

One love, one heart and one soul

Reflecting on One Love in 1998, Ian Brown said "The chorus wasn't strong enough. We tried for an anthem. We wanted to cover all bases and ended up covering none."

Roses fans didn't agree, pushing the song to number 4 on the charts, their highest position until Love Spreads arrived over 4-years later. However, perhaps the chorus could have been hammered home through repetition. But after one run through, Brown then sings we can have it all, easy peasy. And they had it all; the talent, the looks, the artwork, the songs and enough cool to carry a generation.

After another run through the first verse and a slightly different bridge, the chorus is then extended, ending with a lyric that would become the title of their phenomenal Turns Into Stone compilation of non-album single and b-sides.

Your fruit's in season

And these feet fall surely sound

And what goes up must come down

Turns into dust, or turns into stone

Remarkably, all of the above (and more) is delivered in 2-minutes 45 seconds, leaving the Roses a full 5-minutes to play with on the 12-inch version. Mani's bass is central to the extended outro, allowing Squire ample room to play and Reni to jam along with some kind of sample/programmed beat. 

At times Mani's bass seems to be influenced by The Doors - ironic as they don't have a bass player, but they do have some incredible bass lines sprinkled throughout their back catalogue, played by Ray Manzarek on keyboards.

Tantalisingly, the song seems to have found another groove just as it ends. It could have gone on and on. The Roses look super cool in the video, playing and grooving as flames shoot up all around them

John Leckie is on production duties, helping to take the band in a different direction than their 1989 eponymous debut album. Paul Schroeder is on mixing duties. Leckie walked out on The Second Coming due to lengthy delays and Schroeder took over.

As always, the artwork is a John Squire creation. Although this wasn't without controversy. One Love was originally scheduled to come out to co-incide with the Spike Island show but was delayed due to the suggestion that a swastika was visible in the abstract artwork. Horrified, Squire tore up the proofs and created new artwork.

Stone Roses, 1990, photo by Mike Prior

Something's Burning is as fluid and trippy a song as the Roses produced. The first 70-seconds sound like the band just mucking around with programmed beats and some effects for inspiration, then Squire coaxes a gentle riff from his guitar and a whispered Ian Brown vocal comes in, singing proverbs through the first verse.

There is a lift into the chorus and I particularly love the flowing melody of the final line.

I can see the love and the hate in your eyes

Penny for the thoughts behind your disguise

What you gonna go and what you gonna day?

I'm not the only one believing there's an easier way

And then a little groove into the next section that ends with a classic Ian Brown line;

It doesn't pay to disorientate me

It doesn't cost to be someone

I am the vine 

And you are the branches

The band run through another couple of verses and choruses before finding the refrain 

What you gonna do with the rest of your life?

Penny for the thoughts behind your disguise

Something's Burning grooves on for another 97 seconds, a dreamy jam, some spacey keyboard effects over Squire's guitar and some cool beats. 

I've said it before on this blog and I'll say it again. The Fools Gold and One Love b/w Something's Burning singles are a glimpse of where the Roses could have gone if they hadn't got caught up in legal wranglings. Can you imagine an album full of blissed out psychedelic grooves, jams and beats? 

As it was, after Glasgow Green on 9th June 1990, the coolest band on the planet didn't play live again until April 1995. After the release of One Love on 2nd July, they didn't release any new material until Love Spreads in December 1994. What could have been?

One Love official video 

One Love live on Hit Studio International TV

Fools Gold 9.53

Fools Gold was the sound of Stone Roses at their peak, almost 10-minutes of funk groove via bass, beats, wah-wah guitar, samples and the coolest person in the world at the time on whispered vocals about friends searching for gold and ready to steal it off each other.... oh and the Marquis de Sade.

This inspirational tune came beautifully presented in artwork by guitarist John Squire entitled Double Dorsal Doppleganger - everything about this release was perfect.

Although it nearly wasn't; What The World Is Waiting For, a supreme slice of Roses guitar pop was originally intended to be the single, it was then changed to a double-a-side before then to all intents and purposes (and on rerelease) being relegated to the b-side.

The Roses released their legendary eponymous debut album in the spring of 1989, perfect timing for the second summer of love. Prior to this, there was a string of incredible guitar pop singles; Sally Cinnamon, Elephant Stone, Made Of Stone, She Bangs The Drums and Adored with all the glorious b-sides that came with them like Mersey Paradise, Standing Here, Where Angels Play and Going Down - but nothing, not even the album closer I Am The Resurrection, hinted where the Roses were going to go next.

They went off on one, sampling the beat from Bobby Byrd's - Hot Pants (bonus beats) with the bass line from Young MC's Know How, which itself was loosely based around guitar from Isaace Hayes Theme From Shaft.

The bass line is inspired by Young M.C's Know How 

which was a tune we were really vibing off at the time 

Mani

Fools Gold was recorded over the summer of 1989 and released in November of that year. If the Roses album had been the soundtrack to pre and post club parties, Fools Gold became the sound of the party - the real indie dance crossover - if there really is such a thing, the Roses would pour scorn on such statements, they simply made the best music they could.

The beat and bass groove are in from the start, it's fresh, it's funky, it sounds like nothing 4 white boys from Manchester should be creating. But then things were changing dramatically in 1989, particularly in Manchester, a city embracing ecstasy and all kinds of music from Detroit to Ibiza - people wanted to dance and expand their horizons - international, continental.

Brown doesn't take long to come in the gold roads sure a long road, winds on through the hill for fifteen days

Things move up a notch for the I'm standing alone ... section and all the time the beat and bass keep grooving while Squire coaxes majestic sounds from his guitar.

By the time Brown whispers his last Foo-oo-oo-ools Gold we still have over 4-minutes left of this incredible tune and we are treated to the magical delight of Reni, Mani and Squire vibing and riffing off each other. They sound in their element. The sounds Squire generates from his guitar sound other worldly, the best and most original guitar sounds from someone in Manchester since Johnny Marr created How Soon Is Now?

The Roses were a band of their time, but so good that they have stood the test of time. Good songs always do, but it was their look, their hair, clothes, style, appearance and attitude that combined with the songs, artwork and dance culture to elevate them way beyond other bands.

Their Top of the Pops appearance where they mime to Fools Gold was a landmark, with fellow Mancunians Happy Mondays playing Hallelujah on the same show - the times they were a changing.

Brown looks immaculate, his hair is super cool, swagger and confidence apparent and he looks like the coolest person in the world. Mani looks like he is partying on stage, swinging his Jackson Pollock-ed bass, flares on and lost in the music, Squire looks like a guitar god with a Beatles mop top and Reni acts all cool and semi interested in miming.

I can't help but think what if? What if they could have recorded an album of groove based trippy material? Something's Burning was another beauty and although Ian Brown has admitted he was never happy with One Love, you think of the album that they could have been working towards. Instead they became embroiled in legal disputes over management and label contracts, moved to different parts of the country and all started taking different drugs.

Decades down the line, if anyone is researching music in 1989 and wants to see the coolest band in the world at that time, I hope they find this film.

Fast forward to Heaton Park in 2012, the Roses huge homecoming shows. I'm there on the Sunday evening, lost in the music and an atmosphere so off the scale that some Manc scallies attempted to bottle it and sell on eBay!

Fools Gold is stretched to nearly 13-minutes; kicking off with a funky jam that I first heard when I saw them in Amsterdam and wondered it if was a new tune, but then the bass riff and beats kick in and Squire matches Mani. The incredible musical trio of Squire, Mani and Reni completely own this extended live version - from 6-minutes on they take the crowd on a psychedelic funk trip like no other, Brown comes back in with one final vocal, before they go off on one.

There is a breakdown to bass and drums before Squire starts to shred his guitar Hendrix style, his rhythm section is so tight that he has time to fiddle with effects, then tease and show off by dropping in riffs like Daytripper by The Beatles, a dash of Zeppelin and even add in Driving South from the Second Coming. It's outrageous, it is the Stone Roses, it is the sound of a band at their peak.....even now.