A brilliant account of the last great indie label is republished.

By Tom Doyle.

Strings attached: Creation Records’ in-house genius/ nemesis Kevin Shields, 1990.

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The Creation Records

Story: My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry For The Prize

★★★★★

David Cavanagh

FABER. £20

IN THE chaotic tale of Creation Records, among many myths and legends, the making of My Bloody Valentine’s 1991 opus Loveless is one of the standout yarns: multiple blown deadlines, mounting bills (to the rumoured final tally of £270,000), the obsessively perfectionist Kevin Shields slowly driving himself around the bend to nail what turned out to be a masterpiece. It’s a story that’s often been told, but never as vividly or with such wry wit as here, by the late MOJO writer David Cavanagh. “Loveless,” he notes, “was – like one or two of the invoices Creation had received during its protracted gestation – outstanding.”

The same can be said of Cavanagh’s 700-plus-page definitive study, originally published by Virgin in 2000 and now reissued by Faber nearly a quarter of a century on. While initially written with the co-operation of Alan McGee, the Creation boss quickly distanced himself from the final book (even after having read and approved it), dismissing it as “the accountant’s tale” and “objectionable”. Given that McGee’s subsequent 2013 autobiography was heavy on self-mythology, it’s perhaps easy to see why. But it’s a pity, since Cavanagh’s forensic account is clearly the objective version of events and, as such, far closer to the truth.

McGee likely recoiled at Glasgow guitarist James King’s memory of the former’s performance as bassist in the band Newspeak (“A ginger-headed cunt [who’d] bounce up and down while he was playing”), but elsewhere the future label boss is affectionately depicted as a perma-enthusiastic individual who succeeds through sheer force of personality. But this is, at the same time, a detailed history of British independent labels from punk onwards – it’s nigh on 100 pages before the first Creation single is released, the ranty 73 In 83 by The Legend! (“About a minute after it starts, it stops,” Cavanagh noted. “Nobody ever wants to hear it again.”)

From here, it’s a white knuckle ride through the stories of The Jesus And Mary Chain (in which McGee mimics the maverick approaches of his hero Malcolm McLaren), the overlooked Pete Astorfronted Loft (the ambivalently ambitious lyric of whose 1985 single Up The Hill And Down The Slope lends the book its subtitle) and the gnarly tales of Primal Scream, Felt, Momus and the short-lived Baby Amphetamine (a manufactured trio of three shop assistants randomly approached by McGee as they worked in London’s Virgin Megastore).