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Music

23rd Jan 2015

JOE’s Classic Song of the Day : The Charlatans – The Only One I Know

Floppy fringes, flared jeans and music for the ages

Eric Lalor

Floppy fringes, flared jeans and music for the ages

JOE continues to look at some of our favourite all-time classic songs with a band that was one of the leading lights of the whole early 90s Madchester scene.

Artist, album and year: The Charlatans, Some Friendly, 1990.

Why is it a classic? : In an era where the sound of Manchester was the big thing everywhere coming hot on the heels of the acid house movement, this tune stood out and became something of an era-defining anthem.

The Stone Roses were the unofficial standard bearers for the scene and you also had the Happy Mondays, Inspiral Carpets, James and to a lesser extent, The Mock Turtles.

The Charlatans burst onto the scene with this absolutely brilliant bass driven number. This was the song which filled dancefloors in every indie disco in the land and still does today.

With lyrics directly lifted from The Byrds’ 1967 song “Everybody’s Been Burned” they didn’t try to hide their influences. Tim Burgess, the front man gives a stirring performance on vocals, but it’s the rasping bassline from Martin Blunt and the swirling Hammond keyboard sound of Rob Collins which defined their sound and is huge on this track.

Did you know? : From the original incarnation of the band back in 1989, only Tim Burgess remains in the band today

The lyrical hook: ‘Everyone has been burned before, everybody knows the pain….’