04 November 2013
Newsdesk
‘A true believer in the power of music and more importantly a believer in the people that make music. He gave me and many more like me a chance to change your life. Pity he supports Rangers.’ Noel Gallagher
‘McGee was our Malcolm McLaren & Tony Wilson. An instigator & motivator, a born upsetter. I've never met anyone like him & neither have you. This is his story.’ Bobby Gillespie
‘Essential reading for anyone interested in the heady, vulgar, marvellous miasma of British music and culture in the nineties, before it was all swamped by the surgical spirit sterility of the global marketplace.’ Irvine Welsh
Alan McGee's role in shaping British musical culture over the past thirty years is hard to overstate. As the co-founder of Creation Records he brought us the bands that defined an era. A charismatic Glaswegian who partied just as hard as any of the acts on his notoriously hedonistic label, he became an infamous character in the world of music.
In Creation Stories he tells his story in depth for the first time, from leaving school at sixteen to setting up the Living Room club in London which showcased many emerging indie bands, from managing the Jesus and Mary Chain to co-founding Creation when he was only twenty-three. His label brought us acts like My Bloody Valentine, House of Love, Ride and Primal Scream. Embracing acid house, Alan decamped to Manchester and hung out at the Hacienda, and took Creation into the big time with Screamadelica.
His drug-induced breakdown, when it came was dramatic. But as he climbed back to sobriety, he oversaw Oasis's rise to become one of the biggest bands in the world. Alan himself became one of the figureheads of Britpop. Having sold the label to Sony to stave off bankruptcy, he became disenchanted with the increasingly corporate ethos and left in 1999. Since then he's continued to be an influential figure in the music industry, managing the Libertines and most recently setting up a new label, 359 Music, with Cherry Red.
A fervently unapologetic exploration of what drove the angriest man in rock to deliver the most exciting music around to a generation. We thank you Mr McGee.
