The indie4me long read
In May 1982 an eighteen-year-old guitarist talked his way into a stranger's bedroom in Stretford and asked him to start a band. Five years later British music had a new grammar. How The Smiths were built — and what they left behind.
Michele Harding · 19 Sept 2026
Origins
In Britain, The Doors were a minor act who never had a hit while Jim Morrison was alive. Their highest UK chart placing came twenty years after he died. This is the story of a band the British took seriously only once they were safely historical — and then built half of post-punk out of.
Pre-1977 · Los Angeles
Origins
He had the Velvet Underground before Britain could buy them, mixed the Stooges, produced Lou Reed and saved Mott the Hoople from breaking up — all in about eighteen months. What British indie took from David Bowie was never the costumes.
Pre-1977 · London
Origins
Everyone repeats the line about the first Velvet Underground album: nobody bought it, and everyone who did started a band. The truth is more interesting — and the story runs through a Welsh mining village, a London acetate, and almost everything British indie did afterwards.
Pre-1977 · New York
The indie4me long read
Pulp recorded a John Peel session in 1981 and did not have a hit until 1994. The story of the longest apprenticeship in British pop — and of a band who got famous for being patient.
1990-1995 · Sheffield
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