Hang the DJ

Now you got me onto the subject of the north of England, I digress to the Smiths. There's one thing about the North and that is that all the great bands come from there.

I saw the Smiths at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1986. "Ask" just came in at number 2 in the national charts and they opened with this song. People were dancing in the aisles at the time and I recall the euphoria, as well as the sneaking feeling in my stomach that they were about to become total sell-outs. This they did. The next morning we found out that we hadn't witnessed that last date on that national tour, but that they'd played a private set at the Millionairre's Club in the centre of town right after we'd gone home. Morrisey never went back to his roots after that. Too commercial. I still love listening to those classic tracks though.

North-South Divide

In the 90s a beer company started to advertise its warm, horrible tasting brew with anti-northern slogans. "We put cream on our strawberries, not in our beer" was the incredibly smart strapline that accompanied the sight of a pint of brown sludge. Of course, stupid as marketers are, these southern fairies forgot to consider that most of the population of West London was actually northern, Irish or Polish so it was all a bit self-defeating to be attacking anyone in advertising messages for a constricting market.

This North-South emnity goes wayback and is still alive today. I was talking recently with a crowd from the Manchester areawho reckon that 2012 London Olympics are just for London. Not like the 2002 Commonwealth Games which Londoners are still most grateful for and talk about almost daily.

It's the national news that gets to Northerners. They reckon there's a sort of "Londoncentricism" at work which means they don't get to hear about tax changes on the Wyrral, or the fact that Londoners like to leave the skin on their fish at the chippie, or that they don't all like to have gravy on their chips.

So for all you northen people that enjoy the Gonzo Lecture so much, I wanted to share with you a fine northern greeting I heard once:

"You spawny-eyed, parrot-faced, wassack!"

Feel better now?