Don’t Look Back in Anger
Britpop is often dismissed as an embarrassing, retrograde moment in British culture. But at its best, it hinted at what might have happened if the working class had managed to regain its sense of power and pride after the defeats of the 1980s.
One advantage of being a millennial is that we have no real equivalent to the New Left apogee of 1968. As a result, freed from wistful thoughts of political and cultural might-have-been, we tend to look forward rather than back when we dream of a revolutionary moment. Having said that, for many of us — especially (but not only) those of us who grew up in Great Britain — there is one period in recent history that does tend to induce an ambivalent, slightly sheepish reverie.
For those who lived through it, the so-called summer of Britpop, which began in 1994, following the death of Kurt Cobain, and ended with the election of Tony Blair as prime minister in May 1997, will always seem like a cultural high-water mark of some kind. But though most of us would agree that there was something pivotal about the mid-’90s, there is wild disagreement about the historical significance of Britpop. Was it a failed breakthrough for an authentic modern populism, or just another tacky and reactionary example of postmodern “retromania”?
Britpop Sociology
The tackiness was always there in abundance, of course, even when Britpop was at its most exhilarating. This was, at its roots, a musical movement that rejected the pretension and political earnestness of ’80s indie rock in favor of an aesthetic that was gaudy, louche, and — above all — popular.
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