The BBC’s economic expert Paul Mason describes the importance of Northern Soul:
I might be the only person who’s experienced both Wigan and, say the Taksim Square occupation in Istanbul this year, so this is hard to verify: but I think these very different atmospheres shared something in common. There was something overtly rebellious and subconsciously political about Wigan. Like with a riot, or an occupation, you could tell immediately, through eye contact, who was feeling the buzz.
What we were doing, back then, was rewriting the rules of being white and working class. We knew exactly what it meant to dance to black music in the era of the National Front and the racist standup comedian. Ours was a rebellion against pub culture, shit music and leery sexist nightclubs. Our weapon was obscure vinyl, made by black kids nobody had ever heard of.
The article accompanies a documentary on Northern Soul Mason did for the BBC’s Culture Show:
Paul Mason used to be a regular at the Wigan Casino in the seventies; the reason he’s gotten back into Northern Soul is a new Elaine Constantine feature film about the scene, which features lots of lovingly shot dance scenes:
As I said in the previous post, Sandra used to go to the Wigan Casino and other Northern Soul discos too in the seventies and remained in love with the music for the rest of her life. What with the second “anniversary” of her death being, well, today, this music is much on my mind. It’s maudlin and upbeat at the same time.
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