The Nineties: When Surface was Depth Book

You might be forgiven for thinking that Michael Bracewell's The Nineties: When Surface was Depth is a cultural commentary on the nineties and in part it is—-but only in part. This is a book of interviews, music and art reviews, snatches of Bracewell's literary writing, a retrospective of the last four decades of art, literature and music as well as a cultural commentary on the nineties. In the nineties, everything was being touted in quick succession as "the new rock and roll". Everything, that is, from football (the great surge of public fervour for England's chances in Italia 90), to Opera, (Pavarotti brought to the high street) to comedy, (Vic and Bob, Harry Enfield, Frank Skinner, Newman and Baddiel selling out Wembley Arena). Then came the pronouncement that contemporary art was the new rock and roll before the emergence and international success of Oasis reminded us all that "rock and roll, actually, was the new rock and roll and always had been." Bracewell knows the music scene and he tells the story of Britpop with the authority and assurance of someone who has spent a lifetime collecting records, going to concerts and writing reviews for the music papers. He also appears to be equally at home with the Britart phenomenon as well as the literary scene past and present. Some of the material used in the book has appeared elsewhere and consequently The Nineties is something of a patchwork—but none the worse for that. A good portion of the book is comprised of a series of fascinating interviews with and/or commentary upon more or less iconic figures from the 60s, 70s and 80s as well as the 90s; from The Pet Shop Boys to Patti Smith, from Alexander McQueen to Yoko Ono. The interviews and evaluations are truly first rate and alone they justify the price of the book. But this also works as cultural analysis and right from the get-go Bracewell identifies the key ideas that were to emerge from the culture during the nineties, such Irony and Authenticity with the explosion in popular factual programme-making the defining spirit of the nineties. Books such as this are potential banana skins but Bracewell pulls it off with aplomb. Splendidly written, hugely entertaining and intellectually engaging without being too pretentious.--Larry BrownRead More