23 August 1962 - Shaun William George Ryder is born.
Notes: Born 12lbs, Connison Avenue, Hulton, Worsley, Lancashire which is now classed as Greater Manchester. He was born into a Catholic family. The home consisted of older brother Paul, mother Linda Ryder and father Derek Ryder. Derek would later become chief roadie for the band. Shaun and Paul's cousins Matt and Pat would form Central Station Designs, and they would be responsible for most of the bands sleeve art.
From theguardian, Fri 11 Jan 2013 17.49 GMT, Nick McGrath: Interview: Shaun Ryder: My family values. The Happy Mondays singer talks about becoming a better father - and how he used to be the dad of the band.
I'm from a close-knit Catholic family. All me mam and dad's brothers and sisters had nine, 10 or 11 kids and they thought that was all just too chaotic, so it's just me and me brother, Paul, in our family. All the cousins were close and we were in and out of each other's houses all the time growing up. We still go round to each other's houses. We're still quite close. Me mam's coming round this afternoon. She comes for a swim in my pool.

1964 - Paul Anthony Ryder is born

1968 - The Ryder family live on Cemetery Road, Salford
Notes: Paul & Shaun shared a bunk bed. Shaun was forced to write with his weaker right hand, as writing left handed was seen as 'The Devil' in Catholic schools. Shaun struggled in school with dyslexica and in 2019 he was, finally, diagnoised with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

1969 - Ryder family watch the Moon landing.
From What Planet Am I On? by Shaun Ryder Book:
But the biggest thing that really got everyone thinking about space travel when I was a kid was man landing on the moon. That happened in 1969, when I was seven years old, and I remember it quite clearly. It was a huge deal at the time, and I remember my dad went out and got us our first colour telly for it. It was a big old thing, a rented television with a meter on the back where you had to put 10p in. Then the rental guy would come round and empty the meter every now and then. Imagine that now? Having to stick 10p in the back of your telly if you want to watch Coronation Street.
From theguardian, Fri 11 Jan 2013 17.49 GMT, Nick McGrath: Interview: Me mam and dad understood the difference between the entertainment industry and the bullshit. All this sort of cartoon character that came out while we were making it and trying to grab headlines and stuff – that was just part of the game, part of the business. He did the clubs. He was a stand-up comedian. He did the folk scene. He did the Irish clubs. Me old bloke had a go at it from the late 60s up until the early 80s, then when we first started he would drive us to gigs, and later on he was one of the techs and, like with Paul, working together wasn't great for our relationship. Me and me dad sort of grunted at each other for years. Now it's brilliant, just how it should be but there were definitely problems.

197x - Bez in school
07 November 2022 - The Big Issue Bez Interview: I actually enjoyed school, the social aspect and girls and all that, but academically it never worked out well for me. I was never an academic unfortunately, and I used to be quite unruly in the classroom as well. Of course, I could have done much better if I’d put my mind to it and under different circumstances. I don’t regret not learning in school though, because I’ve self-educated myself since. Everything I’ve learned in later life I’ve got from life experiences.
Like most people I started drinking cider when I was about 11. There was a 24-hour place which stored cider and Schweppes and we all went to rob it for all our booze for parties. I don’t know why they didn’t ever improve the security because they must have known that every kid in the area invaded the place before parties. I remember when I was 15, I had speed for the first time. I think it was a kind of slimming tablet. We got three for a pound. I used to love it for dancing, socialising – we had some amazing times.

1976 - Shaun aged 13 was apparently at the Sex Pistols show at The Free Trade Hall in Manchester
Notes: Shaun left school aged 13 to work on a building site and at dinner time they would go to the pub. Shaun's first record he bought was David Bowie's Pin Ups.

1977 - Shaun was arrested and placed in custody for theft.
Notes: Shaun also spent some time in prison, repeated offender.
From What Planet Am I On? by Shaun Ryder Book:
There were also a few huge sci-fi movies that came out in the late seventies when I was a teenager, especially Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Star Wars. At the time I thought Close Encounters was a great movie, but I thought Star Wars was just fantasy nonsense; it’s like a comedy Wild West movie set in space. Ridiculous. I was fifteen when it came out in 1977 and I just didn’t enjoy all that saving-the-Princess routine and battling-for-the-Federation bollocks. It was just not for me. Garbage. I thought Close Encounters was a much better movie at the time, and I still do. To me it was more real than Star Wars.
From theguardian, Fri 11 Jan 2013 17.49 GMT, Nick McGrath: Interview: The values me mam and dad tried to drum into us were no stealing, go to church, go to school – all of which we ignored. We'd fight, we stole, we cheated and we didn't go to school. But we did still go to church. They were relaxed on some things and strict on others, but let's just say I got away with murder unless I got the police brought round to the house. Then I got a good beating off me dad.

1977 - Shaun Ryder works for The Post Office
Notes: Shaun is sacked for 'stealing parcels' after working for them for three years. Although Shaun claims "cos' when you get to 18 you have to become a proper postman, working mad hours for £100 a week and that's garbage."

1977 - Paul Ryder starts learning the bass
Notes: Inspired by punk rock.

21 July 1978 - Shaun sees a UFO at The Height, Irlam o' th' Height, Salford
From What Planet Am I On? by Shaun Ryder Book:
So I was always interested in space and the possibility of life on other planets, but then in the late seventies I had two personal encounters with UFOs that changed my life and changed my thinking on it.
The first one happened at th’ Height – Irlams o’ th’ Height – which is a place near us when we were growing up. I was stood at a bus stop at th’ Height at about 9 p.m. at night. It was late summer so it was just going dark. I’d been out with a couple of pals of mine from school who lived at th’ Height and I was waiting to get a bus back up to Little Hulton, where I lived.
I looked up and just saw hundreds of lights across the sky, hundreds of them. My first thought was, ‘Fuck me, are we being invaded?!’ It was amazing. I’d never seen anything like it in my life. There were hundreds of these lights moving across the sky and they looked like craft. It scared me a little bit at first, but then I actually found it quite calming. I think if an adult saw something like that for the first time, they might be quite scared, but because I was a kid I wasn’t as frightened. As a kid you’re more innocent and naive, aren’t you? But as an adult you might sense the danger a bit more.
Quite a few other people saw it and it was reported in the Salford Journal or Reporter. Some spokesperson for the authorities, the head of police or Salford Council or something, blamed it on the floodlights of Salford Rugby Club going haywire, going bonkers, which was absolute bullshit. I remember reading the paper at the time, thinking, ‘You what? Bullshit! Who you trying to kid?’ I knew what the lights at Salford rugby ground looked like, because I’d grown up there and I used to go and watch the rugby sometimes with my granddad and Our Paul. What I saw that night looked fuck-all like Salford’s floodlights. The lights I saw were different colours for a start and were slow-moving objects, and there were what looked like hundreds of them moving slowly across the sky.
04 November 2021 - Shaun appears in Fortean Times Issue number 412
Notes: Rise and shine with Shaun and Jenny...
Back then, I lived in the area too (I was in Irlam, and Shaun in Irlams o’ th’ Height). It was mid-1978, around 7am; it was just getting light and Shaun was at the bus stop heading into town where he worked as a messenger boy. A local schoolboy caught the same bus daily; they knew each other by sight and both witnessed what happened. (That by now 50-something has never spoken of what he saw; if you are reading this, then please do!) Shaun says an object appeared and zig-zagged across the sky. It had lots of lights and Shaun’s mind considered the possibility of an alien invasion. “I had never seen anything like it,” he says. He did not go public as he was just a kid. It moved so fast that he knew right away: “It wasn’t ours.”
The media ‘solved’ one UFO case around that time as a Rugby stadium on the blink – an odd explanation (though Shaun calls it something else). Our UFO group was pragmatic, as lots of people saw that incident at the same time, and, contrary to intuition, UFO researchers regard mass sightings like this as almost always caused by an Identified Flying Object. Close encounter UFO experiences tend to be focused as to people and place (if UFOs were something real and extraordinary and yet so overt that they showed themselves to cities full of people, then the debate would long have been over)...It was 21 July 1978 in a house between Irlam (where I lived) and the other Irlam (where Shaun caught his bus) and right beside Salford Quays (now host to the new ITV studios). There were two witnesses, who by chance had seen me being interviewed on Granada TV (possibly by Tony Wilson). They had contacted ‘UFO expert’ Patrick Moore, who told them they’d seen a meteorite. That is obviously absurd, but he talked them out of any thought of it being a UFO until they saw me on TV, solving a case but admitting that some sightings remained puzzling. One midsummer evening this recently retired couple were admiring the lovely sky when a strange object appeared. It resembled a child’s drawing of the Sun – a dark, flat disc in the centre, with rays shooting out all around that were at least 10 times the diameter of the central object. They estimated there were 30 or 40 of these ‘antennæ’ and they observed the object for about 90 seconds (the husband had time to fetch binoculars, so this was not an overestimate). The object moved slowly and silently in an arc of 45 degrees across the sky, heading southwest. But there was no change in perspective as it moved – this was particularly noticeable to the wife, a gifted artist who immediately saw the anomaly. This UFO disappeared in an odd way too. The rays ‘extinguished’, as if made up of a slew of lights going out one after the other in sequence as the object moved away. Remarkably, despite the nature of this event above an urban area on a lovely evening, nobody else saw this event. Half of the city should have. So why was it just this couple? As I said earlier, sometimes the more interesting cases appear to be more in the nature of a personal display than an event that anyone in the right place at the right time can witness. UFO encounters are strange. Which is why we love them I guess.

1979 - Shaun is living in Little Hulton

1980 - Bez in borstal
07 November 2022 - The Big Issue Bez Interview: At 16 I was probably at my wildest, totally unruly. I was homeless at the time. Then I was in Borstal, then in and out of prison [he was jailed for three years when he was 17]. Totally out of control. All I cared about was partying and having a good time. Life at home just didn’t work for me anymore. I was off on a particular course of life. I preferred living that way to being under the restriction of a home life. And my parents couldn’t cope with someone who wasn’t conforming to any kind of normality as it was deemed at the time....The years I was homeless I was sofa-surfing, travelling, living in sheds or the bushes, sleeping rough. I’ve gone through a whole different array of homelessness, I did it in my own style. It took me ages to get my shit together and get my own place, because I was kicked out of the house when I was 16 and I really didn’t have any idea how to organise my life. But I had lots of friends and a lot of my mates’ mams looked after me as well, doing my washing and feeding me. Even Shaun’s ma [Happy Mondays bandmate Shaun Ryder] used to make me corned beef and tomato butties.

1980 - Paul and Shaun form a band.
Notes: Mark Day joins the band. Mark would continue to work at the Post Office up until the band were paid for the Bummed LP royalties.
From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Interview: Paul: "None of us like meeting new people. When we first met Mark, we never used to speak to him for three hours...

Paul Ryder - Bass
Shaun Ryder - Vocals
Mark Day - Guitar.
Korg Mini Pops Drum Machine

Something in the Attic / Avant-Garde - 1981 - Mark Day's Attic Rehearsal, Home Recording, Swinton, Manchester
What's Your Name? (Depeche Mode cover) (Demo #1) / Unknown (Demo #2)
Notes: The maxwell c-30 cassette had 'Ringo And The Boys' written on the tape in pen. Assuming the band did not have a name back then, Ringo And The Boys could have been a working band title. The session is often noted as 'Rehearsal In Attic'. The three piece used Derek's (Paul and Shaun's dads) Korg Mini Pops Drum Machine.
From Simon Spence’s Happy Mondays site ‘Recorded on a cassette player in the attic at Mark Day's parents home in Swinton and transferred to a digital format and cleaned up in a professional studio. The band were called either Something in the Attic or Avant-Garde at the time and the line-up would have been: Paul Ryder on bass, Shaun Ryder on vocal and Mark Day on guitar. This is before drummer Gary Whelan joined the band in early 1982 (keyboardist Paul Davis joined the following year) and the three Mondays are still playing with a drum machine - Derek Ryder's Korg Mini Pops. Here now is a segment (the only surviving evidence) of the band's fabled cover version of Depeche Mode's What's Your Name? an ultra-pop and camp track written by Vince Clarke from the Basildon band's debut 1981 album Speak & Spell. The other track has no title. Cheers to Bigg T’
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

1982 - Gary Whelan joins the band.
Notes: Gaz Whelan.
From 27 September 1986 - Sounds Magazine "Dream, Drink Or Die" article: Gary 'Gaz' Whelan's football career hit the rocks ("I used to get fed up and wander off in the middle of a game, it seemed like an OK thing to do")

Shaun Ryder - Vocals
Paul Ryder aka Horse - Bass
Mark Day aka Moose and/or Cowhead - Guitar
Gary Whelan - Drums

1983 - The Bungalow Sessions, Swinton, Manchester
Delightful / Hold Back The Night / The Happy Side of You / New Day / These Words Of Mine (Part) / The Egg
Notes: Recorded at Shaun and Paul Ryder's Grandma's Bungalow. The orange insert on the tape had the band name 'Happy Mondays' and the songs titled written in pen. Side 2 was blank and 'EGG' had been additionally added and written on in biro pen. First demo noted as 'Happy Mondays'. The band have stated that the band name is a take on the title of New Order's song, "Blue Monday".
From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Interview: Shaun: "Well we don't like the name, do we? None of us likes the name, awful." Horse: "It's like Labrador, or Walrus." Shaun builds himself up for an epic rant: "Happy Mondays is a dreadful name, man. I hate it. Even bands that I hate have got a better name than us. Our name's awful, it puts you off from the start. I mean, it does, dunnit? not like LL Cool J or Grandmaster Flash. It's a bad name, we've gotta face it. I suppose you could get famous and then say, oh f*ck it, we're changing our name .. ." "We could be The G-Men, or The Squirrels," ponders Horse. Shaun: "But we'd probably still be called another bad name, because we can't make up names for bands! It's not funny! I mean, I wish I'd thought of Joy Division, New Order, Rolling Stones, man. Our name's just really bad, innt' "Perhaps, we aren't known by our name," hopes Cowhead. They're still not known to many people at all.
Bootleg: The Bungalow Tape () Delightful / Hold Back The Night / The Happy Side of You / New Day / These Words Of Mine / The Egg
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

1983 - Paul Davis joins the band.
Notes: Apparently Paul wanted to play guitar. He had to learn keys from scratch and used the method of writing the notes on the keyboard.

1983 - Primary School Rehearals, Swinton, Manchester
From 31 March 1990 - Melody Maker magazine: Mondays used to rehearse two nights a week in a primary school classroom in the Swinton district of Manchester. They'd slip the caretaker a couple of quid and apprently spend a few unprofitable hoursarguing, smoking a occasionally colliding to produce one almighty racket.

1984
Shaun Ryder - Vocals
Paul Ryder aka Horse - Bass
Mark Day aka Moose and/or Cowhead - Guitar
Paul Davis aka P.D - Keyboards & Programs
Gary Whelan - Drums

1983/84 Demo Session,
See The Sorrow / Happy Side Of You
Notes:
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 1 (CD-R) - See The Sorrow (1983/84 demo recording) / Freaky Dancin' Jam (pre Squirrel album rehearsal/jam) - Guitar Solo Jam (pre Squirrel album rehearsal/jam) / Fat Lady Wrestler (Blistred Rabbi Demo Tape 1988) / Do It Better E2 Mix (version 1) / WFL LSD Mix 2 / Holiday (Pills LP LA Sessions, Capitol records, 1990) / Mad Cyril Rehearsal (unknown session) / Unknown Instrumental (Pills LP LA Sessions, Capitol records, 1990) / Step On (live at Pinkpop Festival 1991) / Stinkin Thinkin (alternate version, Barbados Sessions) / Total Ringo (alternate version, Barbados Sessions) / Bass & Drum Idea 2 (1993 final session)
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

15 March 1984 - The Gallery, Manchester
From 27 September 1986 - Sounds Magazine "Dream, Drink Or Die" article: "We sat around in forests and discussed how we were going to be" Shaun remembers. "It was chaos, someone wanted to Alex Chilton, someone Funkadelic, Bez wanted to do this cross between Tibetan fold and heavy metal. In the end, we thought, sod it, throw it all together and see what happens. Let's be original and famous."

1984 -
From 1987 NME Magazine "Everything else is foreign, innit?" article: Ok, I exaggerate, yet they did start out supporting the Salford Jets!

1984 - Shaun apparently gets married
Notes: The marriage lasts two years.

1984 - Happy Mondays go to Glastonbury
Notes: Apparently the band went to the festival but arrived two weeks too early. 'We just stayed there waitin' for it to happen,' recalls Bez.

1984 - Happy Mondays meet Ian Brown & John Squire (The Stone Roses) at Corbieres Wine Cavern, Manchester
Notes: 23 May 2006 09:41 - The Daily Mail article with Ian Brown Interview, written by Piers Hernu: It was during the next few formative months, when Brown was finding his feet as a singer, that he and Squire would frequent Corbieres Wine Cavern in Manchester, taking turns to play their favourite tracks on its jukebox. 'We always used to buy each other a box of Maltesers at Christmas...' "Corbieres was famous for having the best jukebox in town and I believe it still has. We'd hang out there with other new Manchester bands like The Happy Mondays and listen to classic songs. Ever since then I've always fancied owning one, but it's one of those things I haven't got round to buying... yet!"
1998 - Record Collector, December 1997 - Hotel, Park Lane, John Reed Interview/article: RC: I heard the Happy Mondays used to kick your scooter over! Ian Brown: We used to go to the beehive in Eccles and the scooter boys used to fight with the lads from that area – where the Mondays were from, Swinton. So yeah, we used to fight them every week. Years later, we laughed about it.

1985
1985 - Session, Manchester
The Weekend Starts Here / The Egg / Delightful
Notes: This Three Track Demo Tape was sent into the local radio stations by Paul Ryder to promote the band.
From Louder Than War, 13 May 2012 Carl Stanley interview with life-long fan Phil Grunshaw: ''...3 track demo? Again, this is off T and I believe this was being given in to radio stations by Horse in the early days of the band (84/85). It consists of The Weekend Starts Here, The Egg and Delightful.''
Official / Bootleg: 3 Track Demo Tape ()

27 January 1985 - Tiffany's, Leeds * Supporting: New Order *

1985
17 March 1985 - Spirit Studio Sessions, Manchester
24 March 1985 - Spirit Studio Sessions, Manchester
Comfort & Joy / The Weekend Starts Here / Oasis / This Feeling / You & I Indiffer / Anyone With A Battle / Delightful
Notes: The tracks were recorded over the two dates at Spirit Studios.
Regarding You & I Indiffer, fan said: ''This is a demo from the Spirit Studio Sessions 17-24/03/1985. Never released demo track that was given to me by Phil Saxe (Happy Mondays manager). I have transported this from cassette onto my computer. I hope the sound quality is ok. As an avid factory records collector I feel this track should be shared with all fans around the world. I'm honored to be the kid who was here...''
From Louder Than War, 13 May 2012 Carl Stanley interview with life-long fan Phil Grunshaw: ''...I told him of the early recordings I had of the band and further down the line I finally converted them from cassette to digital format and sent them over to Horse in L.A. Soon after this he put me in touch with a serious collector of all things Happy Mondays, called T, he had loads of rare stuff and live bootlegs but none of the early gigs myself or my friends had recorded, I’d not really shared them much, they`d been quietly collecting dust with my New Order bootleg tapes, or more specifically, the NO bootlegs that had survived, cos I’d recorded over many of the inferior ones, making house mix tapes in 88/89/90. T was helping Horse out with his Green card Application, cos he had extensive press clippings charting the bands career, so he put me and T in touch and we started swapping Mondays stuff including the Spirit Studio Sessions from the 17th and 24th March 1985, which had 3 tracks I’d never heard before. The full recording consists of; 1 Comfort & Joy, 2 The Weekend Starts Here, 3 Oasis, 4 You And I Differ, 5 This Feeling, 6 Anyone With A Battle, 7 Delightful.''
Bootleg: 17 & 24 March 1985 - Spirit Studio Session - CD-R
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

1985 - Manchester
On Your Own 4:20 / You And I Indiffer
Notes: Bootleg notes suggested 'circa 1986 Demo'. You And I Indiffer is the same as the Spirit Studio Sessions though (see 17 March 1985 / 24 March 1985)
06 August 2019 - Happy Mondays - Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 6 / 8 / 2019:
Other tracks that have surfaced on YouTube that were never formerly released include excellent, fully formed demo ‘On Your Own' and the curiously titled ‘You And I Indiffer’, (“God, I dunno about that one, fuck me!” Shaun remarks).

19 April 1985 - Leisure Centre, Stoke On Trent * Supporting: New Order *

1985 - Battle Of The Bands, FAC 51 The Hacienda, 11-13 Whitworth Street West, Manchester
Notes: The band came last but Hacienda co-owner and Factory Records boss signed them anyway. I've read conflicting dates, even one dating back to 1983?.

1985 - FAC 51 The Hacienda, 11-13 Whitworth Street West, Manchester * Supporting: Colourfield
Notes: Terry Hall, former Specials and Fun Boy Three, lived in Manchester and formed Colourfield. Happy Mondays were first on and were followed by Frank Sidebottom.

September 1985 - Forty-Five E.P. U.K. Release Date
FAC 129 Forty Five
Produced by Mike Pickering
12inch
Delightful
This Feeling
Oasis (E.P. Version)
Notes: Mike Pickering, M-People lead memeber, would go on to be the head of A&R for Factory and sign them in 1986.

1985 Demo Session,
Freaky Dancin' / Untitled (Jam) / Uknown (Guitar Solo Jam)
Notes: Very early instrumental version of Freaky Dancin'.
From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Interview: ..."A lot o' what we do is accidental. We came in here the other day and thought we wouldn't get any new song together, and then we had three songs together in about fifteen minutes. We get spasms of ideas for ages then we can't think of nothing to do for about three months, come up with nothing." "Sometimes, to stop us getting bored," adds Bez, "we can work on three songs at one time. We do 10 minutes on this, stop over 28 minutes on the other, an hour on the other, and back to 15 minutes on the other... " At this point his words become lost in cries of uproar from the band, who don't seem able to recognise this way of working. Shaun, who has a great line in shocked disgust, explodes in disbelief: "F*ing hell! Sounds like a F*ing mechanised, uh, professor, that does!" "You know there's something there when you know there's something there, but when there's not something there, you know it," persists Bez...
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 1 (CD-R) - See The Sorrow (1983/84 demo recording) / Freaky Dancin' Jam (pre Squirrel album rehearsal/jam) - Guitar Solo Jam (pre Squirrel album rehearsal/jam) / Fat Lady Wrestler (Blistred Rabbi Demo Tape 1988) / Do It Better E2 Mix (version 1) / WFL LSD Mix 2 / Holiday (Pills LP LA Sessions, Capitol records, 1990) / Mad Cyril Rehearsal (unknown session) / Unknown Instrumental (Pills LP LA Sessions, Capitol records, 1990) / Step On (live at Pinkpop Festival 1991) / Stinkin Thinkin (alternate version, Barbados Sessions) / Total Ringo (alternate version, Barbados Sessions) / Bass & Drum Idea 2 (1993 final session)

03 November 1985 Sunday - In An Autumn Of Discontent Factory Records Night, Claredon Hotel Ballroom, Hammersmith Broadway, London * Doors Open: 20:00 * Ticket Price: £3.50 * Supporting: Section 25, The Stockholm Monsters
Notes: Apparently, Happy Mondays did not play the support slot despite being advertised on the line up.

03 December 1985 - FAC 51 The Hacienda, 11-13 Whitworth Street West, Manchester * Supporting: New Order *
Notes: Firs time Bez appears on stage with the band.
From 1987 NME Magazine "Everything else is foreign, innit?" article: "Others on the label go on about money and all that, but we can't slag Factory off 'cos they've been good to us. No one else would encourage us. They got us on vinyl before we even had an inkling what that meant." "The first proper gigs we did were with them," bellows Shaun, vocalist and one half of the brotherhood. "We're not trailing around in the shadow of New Order 'cos when we go out with them, we get f***ing food, booze and treated right." "To those on the outside maybe we are," someone ripostes.
07 November 2022 - The Big Issue Bez Interview: Becoming the dancer in Happy Mondays – that is something you can never plan for. It just happened. Me and my mates were in a pretty altered state of mind, we’d been taking acid all day. I was going to see Happy Mondays supporting New Order that night. I was excited because New Order were a massive Manchester band, and my mates were supporting them at The Haçienda. So I went along as a spectator. Then backstage Shaun said, we need your support onstage. I said fuck off, I’m not going onstage. So there was a bit of to-ing and fro-ing and I ended up going on. It was just the right place at the right time in the right circumstances. It was a proper life changing moment for me, but it wasn’t something you could actually ever plan to do. I think that was in 1984 and I’ve never looked back since. After that Manchester gig we did actually get to support New Order on some really good tours. That exposed us to some of New Order’s fans, and we picked up a big fanbase of our own. It was a dream come true, to sign to Factory Records and be part of that whole Manchester scene. It was an incredible moment in time, and we were all inside this great part of music history. Tony Wilson was a big part of that. A lot of people didn’t like him, but I’ve only ever got good things to say about him. He was an amazing man and he did a lot of good for this city...

15 December 1985 - The Boardwalk Christmas Party, The Boardwalk, Little Peter Street, Manchester, M15 4PS * Doors Open: 15:00 * Ticket Price: £2.00 (Advance), £2.50 (On the door) * Supporting: James, The Railway Children, DJ The Taxman
Notes: The venue was run by A Certain Ratio & The Railway Children manager Colin Sinclair. Unconfirmed if the band played, they were not mentioned on the gig posters. The band would have been on first either way. Party invites (tickets) were available from Geese Clothing & Piccadilly Records for £2.00, some tickets were available on the door for £2.50 too. The black and white hand written and drawn James posters advertised 'Free Vegan Food + Soft Drinks. Strictly no alcohol. The red doors on Little Peter Street Manchester (no callers). Personal invitation. 3pm onwards. Sunday 15th Dec with D.J. The Taxman. Delicious non-alcoholic cocktails.'
A fan said: Mondays were always around The Boardwalk, remember them at the top of the stairs when James played a Sunday afternoon there and a few of us from Leeds came, thought ‘here we go’ but it was cool.
Chris Goodwin remembers memories from The Boardwalk circa 86': “There would be about 40 lads in there. It was a football-y type thing, but all into music. There’d be like Shaun, Bez, the rest of the Mondays, Noel, some of us, The Charlatans. It was way before they were all in bands. It was good as you could go and watch, say, Spacemen 3 on a Sunday night and you’d recognise people and this scene started. It was just before the main Hacienda thing.”

1986
Shaun Ryder - Vocals
Paul Ryder aka Horse - Bass
Mark Day aka Moose and/or Cowhead - Guitar
Paul Davis aka P.D - Keyboards & Programs
Gary Whelan - Drums
Mark Berry aka Bez - Percussion

198? - Phil Saxe manages the band

February 1986 - Mike Pickering signed Happy Mondays to Factory
Factory Communications Limited, Palatine Road, Manchester M20
Notes: Happy Mondays Forty Five E.P producer signed the band to Factory Records. Head of A&R Mike also signed The Railway Children too. Mike Pickering started DJ-ing 'Nude' night on Fridays at The Hacienda in Manchester. He started spinning local bands like The Stone Roses, Happy Mondays, New Order and was the first DJ to play imported house music from the U.S. too. Date and information taken from 1989 - FAC229! Booklet.

01 April 1986 - John Peel Session, BBC Radio 1, BBC Studios, London
Kuff Dam / Freaky Dancin' / Olive Oil / Cob 20
Notes: Transmitted: 09 April 1986.
Official: December 1991 - The Original Peel Session 1986 CD
Official: December 1991 - The Peel Sessions E.P. CD

10 March 1986 - Blackburn

July 1986 - Festival Of The 10th Summer, Fagins, Manchester
Kuff Dam
Notes: Kuff Dam footage is available on the official 13 November 1989 - Madchester Rave On VHS, FACT 262, sometimes the date was noted as 20 November 1989, a week later than the scedhuled one, maybe there was a delay?.
Official: Madchester Rave On - VHS

26 July 1986 - Hammersmith Clarendon Ballroom, Hammersmith, London * Supporting: The Weather Prophets & The Servants *
Freaky Dancin'
Notes: Happy Mondays are the first on stage.
John Wilde review for the show 'I Do Like Mondays' 09 August 1986, it included a photo taken by Steve Double: NAGGINGLY ADDICTIVE, it's a wonder Factory misfits manage to make something so massively bright when their imaginations clearly hover on the lunatic fringe. Therefore, it might be reasonable to assume that the barmy elements make them the most flushed pop to emerge this year. Already, the jittery judder of 'Freaky Dancing' is making a convincing claim as this year's finest of topsy-turvy dance: tonight, this motley array of fruitcakes and fanatics turn it into a laughing chorus, one giant panic flight.
Their image may be gloomy but this noise tickles the erogenous zones and hurls caution to the incinerator. When Happy Mondays rub their beards and brood, they do so with a shoplifter's concern for detail. All the flares flapping about on stage are probably the most honest thing to happon to pop music since PJ Proby split his rompers way back when.
Happy Mondays are beautifully oblivious, see. All their dance delirium born so blatantly of wedlock. By this time next year, Happy Mondays will be smugly patronisod, will be huge big, massive, will wear the same vacant look that only true genius encourages.
They carve the best song titles ('Were Those People Throwing Rocks At The Seagulls Or Feeding Them LSD?' being particularly memorable) and their noise is an abnormal delight. Happy Mondays dance the polka while their rusty hinges creak like crazy. Love them, love them.

August 1986 - Freaky Dancin' / The Egg U.K. Release Date
Produced by Bernard Sumner. Photos by Kevin Cummins. Artwork by Central Station Design.
FAC 142 Freaky Dancin' / The Egg
7inch
Freaky Dancin' (7inch Mix)
The Egg (7inch Mix)
12inch
Freaky Dancin' (Live)
The Egg (Mix)
Freaky Dancin'
Notes: Some release dates note 'June 1986'. Produced by New Order's Bernard Sumner. Happy Mondays and New Order would go on to play several gigs together over the next twenty years. Apparently Matt and Pat of Central Station Design are cousins of Shaun Ryder.
From 27 September 1986 - Sounds Magazine "Dream, Drink Or Die" article, the band said: "Er...fantastic, weird, wacky, real, deluded, bewitched, sort of dizzy, unbalanced, most of all frantic,"
From 05 September 1992 - Melody Maker - Bob Stanley, St. Etienne: 'The new singles's not very good. And their attitude these days is fairly appalling. But you can't deny 'Freaky Dancin' (second ever Mondays single) is a complete work of genius, one of the most important British records of the late-Eighties in terms of its influence. It had no precedent. Beyond Bummed though they sort of lost the plot. Even they admit it's just a career now...'
From Happy Mondays Top 10 from Shiiine On Blog, Gaz Whelan said: 9. The Egg - This was our name for Paul Ryder yellow Ford Escort. None of us could drive except ‘Horse’ so this was our only conveyance… We lived in it…I loved this tune and didn’t realise we had recorded it… I thought it was just a demo, then Paul Ryder reminded me it was a B-side on an early single… I had no idea!
06 August 2019 - Happy Mondays - Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 6 / 8 / 2019, Shaun said:
“It was a car of our kid’s and a bright yellow Mark II fucking Ford Escort,” Shaun recalls. “We had no ignition in it. It was just the wires and it ran on fucking water. I don't know how we got about because we never put petrol in it! It went though, you know what I mean? It fucking went anywhere. How we never got nicked right, like six of us, crammed in that, all smoking bongs, skinning up driving at twenty miles an hour because we’re all laughing our bollocks off. We just never got pulled! This was before we’d even started really doing any shows, this”.

12 September 1986 - King George's Hall, Blackburn * Supporting: The Railway Children *
Kuff Dam / Olive Oil / Russell / Freaky Dancin' / Oasis / Little Matchstick Owen / Desmond
Notes: Audience members kicked off in the middle of the set, the band carried on depsite the unsettled crowd.

27 September 1986 - Happy Mondays appear in Sounds Magazine
Notes: Includes an interesting tale from Bez regarding the formation of the Happy Mondays. Also includes the claim the band picked up Bez after wathcing him 'dance' on stage at a Gary Glitter gig. The article was penned by John Wilde, who attends a show and catches the band pre-show in a tour van. The article also includes an early photo of Shaun & Bez in front of some railings.

02 October 1986 Thursday - Tower Ballroom, Reservior Road, Edgbaston, Birmingham * Doors Open: 20:00 * Ticket Price: £5.00 * Supporting: New Order *
Notes: The Wonderstuff came on first, Happy Mondays were second to headliners New Order. The bright orange tickets included the friendly notice 'No cans, bottles, cameras or tape recorders'.

03 October 1986 Friday - Malvern Winter Gardens, Cheltenham * Ticket Price: £5.00 * Supporting: New Order *

09 October 1986 Thursday - Bay 63, 12 Acklam Road, Ladbroke Grove, London, W10 * Doors Open: 20:00-12:00 * Ticket Price: £2.50 (Advance) £3.00 (On The Door) * Supporting: Blurt (and The Poet Milton)
Notes: Happy Mondays were second to headliners, The Young Gods were the first band on.

October 1986 - Tart Tart Video Shoot, London
Notes: Notes from Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches Collector's Edition 2007 Booklet "Tart Tart - Video Directed by Michael Atavar and Donald Guy, October 1986 - London"
Official: Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches Collector's Edition 2007 CD & DVD
Official: 13 November 1989 - Madchester Rave On - VHS

31 October 1986 - King George's Hall, Blackburn * Supporting: A Certain Ratio *
Notes: Happy Mondays were on first followed by Railway Children (another Fatory Records signed band). A Certain Ratio cancelled at the last minute, the support bands played though. Apparently ACR's singer was ill and could not play. A fight broke out during the Mondays' set as a member of the audience got on stage and made Nazi salutes. Bez punched the fan leading to an audience stage invasion and security had to break up the fight. The show carried on with the Railway Children though and a disco after.
Dave Noonan said: “was cancelled due to Jez (I think) having a tooth knocked out(?)or at least so we heard... so the Happy Mondays played with the Railway Children as support & the whole place went up – they were fighting in lumps after Bez slapped a Blackburn casual who was 'sig heiling' on stage...”)
Booleg: Audience Recording (CD-R/Tape)

December 1986 - Fire House Studios, London
Kuff Dam /
Notes: John Cale recording sessions for their debut album. Rehearsals included rooms set up in Camden, London.
Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 25 September 2015: "A couple of years before we’d been dropped off in London in Camden (to record 1987 debut LP ‘Squirrel and G-Man Twenty Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carnt Smile (White Out)') with seventy quid in our pockets to last us four weeks or something. It lasted us five minutes!" he laughs. "You just sort of roll with it. You don’t really take anything in. You’re on the hamster tread wheel. You’re just doing it and you get on with it. You rarely appreciate anything as well cos you’re just getting on with it and doing it. Years later you sort of go ‘Wow...'."

1987
Shaun Ryder - Vocals
Paul Ryder aka Horse - Bass
Mark Day aka Moose and/or Cowhead - Guitar
Paul Davis aka P.D - Keyboards
Gary Whelan - Drums
Mark Berry aka Bez - Percussion, Bezness, Freaky Dancing

1987 - Phil Saxe manages the band

09 January 1987 - Dingwalls, Chalk Farm, Lock, Camden, London, NW1 * Ticket Price: £5 (General) £4 (Members)
Notes: I found this date on a poster, along with 11 January - The Shamen, A Guy Called Gerald, 11 January - The Chesterfields etc. So I presume this is 1987.

31 January 1987 - Saturday Club, The Boardwalk, Little Peter Street, Manchester, M15 4PS * Doors Open: 19:30, Happy Mondays on stage 21:30, Bar curfew: 01:00 * Ticket Price: £2.00, £1.50 (Student Discount) * Support Act(s): Inspiral Carpets *
Inspiral Carpets Support Set: Garage Full Of Flowers / Give Me Less Time - Beautiful Face / Love Can Never Lose Its Own / Now You're Gone /
Thinking Of You / You're Gonna Miss Me / Moon Over Waste Drive / Slow Suicide / Some Kind Of Respect / Commercial Rain / Head For The Sun
Notes: A bootleg recording exsists for Inspiral Carpets set. The Boardwalk venue and rehearsal rooms opened in 1984, Little Peter Street. The rehearsal rooms were based in the cellar. The venue was a converted school house, which was next door to where Joy Division used to rehearse in the city centre. The rooms were occupied by mostly Factory Records signings including Happy Mondays, A Certain Ratio and even James. The venue was run by A Certain Ratio & The Railway Children manager Colin Sinclair. The Boardwalk (Music Venue, Little Peter St., Manchester) ticket holders could get a £1 discount off The Hacienda club night entry on Fridays and Saturdays.

M - 14 February 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 7, 55p
Notes: Morrissey on the cover, photo by Patrick Quigly. Happy Mondays feature.

March 1987 - Tart Tart U.K. Release Date
Produced by John Cale.
12inch
Tart Tart
Little Matchstick Owen's Rap
Notes: The Tart Tart label has a painting of George Best doing what he did best.
From 09 May 1987 NME 1987 Article The Monday Club Shaun said: "We just knew this girl" explains Shaun, "who was a really good friend of ours, and she died, and we called that song 'Tart Tart' after her. One verse fits, but the rest of it's probably nothing to do with her." How did she die? "Um...brain haemorrhage. Fell down the stairs. But she might've been murdered." he adds dramatically. "No, she weren't murdered," mutters Bez darkly, doubling the effect...
From Happy Mondays Top 10 from Shiiine On Blog, Gaz Whelan said: 10. Tart Tart - Was the nickname of a woman in Chorlton in South Manchester from whom we would get our hash from. She was very bohemian and a kind of ex-hippie. Think she had been a lecturer at Manchester University at some point. She took a shine to us and when we were skint and T.T. would ‘Lay it on’…Then one day we went round to pay our debts and she had tragically died from a brain haemorrhage which really hit us hard…

21 March 1987 - Melody Maker 'Tart Tart' Review by John Wilde
Notes: Sounds Magazine & NME Magazine also featured a review too.

07 April 1987 - Clerkenwell Photo Shoot
Notes: Includes full band photo shoot, usually printed in black and white.
1987 - Trafford Bridge, Old Trafford, Manchester Photo Shoot by Ian Tilton
Notes: One of the bands earliest posters included a photo from the Trafford Bridge photo shoot. There are a few photos from this session, some are colour whilst most printed in the media were black and white.
1987 - Photo Shoot by Chris Clunn
Notes: Photo inside a factory window, features in "Everything else is foreign, innit?" article.

11 April 1987 - Record Mirror feature a 'Tart Tart' review by Nancy 'Factory Groupie' Culp
Notes: Nancy, for the Record Mirror, also reviewed the 'LP' a week later (18 April 1987)

12 April 1987 - The Observer featre a 'LP' review by John Savage

April 1987 - Squirrel And G-Man Twenty-Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carn't Smile (White Out) U.K. Release Date
Recorded: December 1986 - Firehouse Studios, London
Produced by John Cale.
Engineered by Dave Young, Assisted by Zuni and Andy Kelly.
Artwork by Central Station Design
FAC 170
Vinyl
Cassette
Kuff Dam / Tart Tart / Enery / Russell / Olive Oil / Weekend S / Little Matchstick Owen / Oasis / Desmond / Cob 20
Notes: Re-released in September 1987, dropping Desmond due to legal rights. The song was owned by Michael Jackson, after he won the rights to part of The Beatles catalogue. Jackon's legal team demanded royalties and a payout which Factory could not afford. The pressings were halted and the track was replaced, by their October single. Demond was dropped from future setlists too. All subsequent pressings would drop Demond in favour of the 24 Hour Party People single.
The original Factory press release noted: Squirrel & G-Man, Twenty-Four, Party People, Plastic Face, Can't Smile (White Out) Side One - Kuff Dam / Tart Tart / 'Enery / Russell / Olive Oil - Side Two - The Weekend Starts Here / Little Matchstick Owen / Oasis / Desmond / Cob 20
Shaun, 2005, said: Squirrel was the nickname of the Happy Mondays' keyboard player's mum and And G-Man was the nickname for his dad, who was a bizzy (a police officer).
From MOJO Issue 152. Featured a piece on the top 101 Beatles tracks of all time. Leading it all off at #101, Shaun Ryder explains the enduring fascination and inspiration behind 'Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da': "I was born in 1962, and when you're a six, seven year old and you've got a Lieutenant Pigeon piano and you're running about with your spliff and your massive mushrooms it sounded brilliant. It sounded like Pendlebury Market in Salford - the vibe, everything. And Molly Jones is outside the pub door at 10 past 10 waiting for them to open at half past, just watching the men. I thought the lyric was 'Desmond takes a trolley to the Durex store' till I was about 12. It's so descriptive. You can have the imagination of a brick and still see pictures in your head. You can smell the streets! People go on about Sgt. Pepper, and it's brilliant and everything, but it's all on the same train on the same track on the same railway line. The White Album us off on tramlines, fuckin' buses and bicycles, and planes and saddling up sheepdogs and pigs, it's incredible. I mean, they probably had to put a big chain round the studio so they couldn't get out! Did I rip this off for Desmond [track on Happy Mondays' debut album, withdrawn after complaints from Apple]? Well, we gave the game away calling it Desmond. On Lazyitis [Bummed album track strongly reminiscent of Ticket To Ride] we eventually had to give the credits to David Essex, Sly Stone, Lennon & McCartney, and the fuckin' Wombles, I think!"
From 1987 NME Magazine "Everything else is foreign, innit?" article: What does 'Kuff Dam' mean, Shaun? "It came from picking up some porno book years ago, and there was 'Mad F***': Film Story', so we spelt it backwards." "You didn't know what it meant till A. started visting a maternity clinic, didya?" argues Paul Ryder, bassist and brother. Strangely enough, their dad monitors the onstage monitors...
"Well there's Manchester, and there's South Manchester. Moss Side is more congeial than Little Arndale 'cos you've got clubs open for 24 hours. It's hard to adjust at times to visiting the central side of town, especially when you hate thinking, hate worrying and hate it all."
06 August 2019 - Happy Mondays - Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 6 / 8 / 2019:
With people’s names a common feature amongst the band’s song titles, ‘Enery’, ‘Olive Oil’, ‘Little Matchstick Owen’, ‘Donovan’, ‘Cowboy Dave’, ‘Russell’ from ‘Squirrel and G-Man’ has one of the best backstories.
Is it true that the words were inspired by a Russell Grant astrology book? “Oh yeah, yeah”, Shaun replies, reciting the lyrics, “Hold onto your hats/This is the book/That you've been waiting for/One Hand tells you everything/You need to know/To help you understand/Oh the one you love/But yourself too’. It’s the full blurb off the back of Russell Grant’s ‘Your Star Signs’. I see Russell now quite a bit, I worked with him on a TV show not long ago (ITVs Celebrity Detox-style prog ‘10 Years Younger in 21 Days’ last year). I told him and I said ‘You’re not coming after me for royalties, are you? I didn’t even buy the book and all, I robbed it from WH Smiths”. Did you tell him that bit of the story? “Yeah, heh heh!”...the original version of the alum featured a seldom-heard track titled ‘Desmond’. Huge Beatles’ fans the song made reference to ‘Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da’, much like how later single ‘Lazyitis’ featured a melody line from ‘Ticket to Ride’. With Michael Jackson having recently acquired the rights to the Beatles’ Northern Songs catalogue, ‘Desmond’ fell foul of nervous record company lawyers, a situation that revived following the landmark legal case against the makers of 2013 mega hit ‘Blurred Lines’. “That went to the Beatles, their publishing,” Shaun recalls. “It’s not even a music sample or anything. It’s just a vocal lick, words sung in a similar tune to that. I think it was at the time sampling was a free for all, you know like in the rap game at first? It was around the time that sampling was getting sorted out. Whoever was looking after us ended up giving away all sorts of shit”.

18 April 1987 - Sounds Magazine feature a 'LP' review by Ron Rom

18 April 1987 - Top Hat Club, Blackburn * Supporting: The Bodines / Pink Noise *
Notes: Happy Mondays were the second band on, after Pink Noise but before headliners The Bodines. Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List but had a pen strike through the date.

20 April 1987 - International 2 Club, 210 Plymouth Grove, Longsight, Manchester M13 * Supporting: The Fall
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List but had a pen strike through the date.
The Bodines were second to headliners, Happy Mondays were on stage first. A review, penned by John Robb, appeared in Sounds Magazine 02 May 1987.

23 April 1987 - Rock Garden, London
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List but had a pen strike through the date.
24 April 1987 - Merseyside Trade Union + Employment Centre, Liverpool
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List but had a pen strike through the date.
26 April 1987 - Marquee, London
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List but had a pen strike through the date.

03 May 1987 - The Black Horse, Camden Town, London
Tart Tart / Kuff Dam / Russell / Desmond / Olive Oil / Enery' / Weekend S / 24 Hour Party People
encore: Little Matchstick Owen
or
Tart Tart / Kuff Dam / Russell / Desmond / Olive Oil / Enery' / Little Matchstick Owen / 24 Hour Party People
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
From 1987 NME Magazine "Everything else is foreign, innit?" article: You lose out on all the century's finest energies when even London seems as remote as Lusaka, eh, Paul? "But anywhere else is foreign, innit?" Anonymous voice: "He means the words, Paul" "We're talking music" "Words!" All (chorus): "Music, Music, Music, Music". Forty seconds later "Music's got no language, has it?" Shaun offers, from his position atop the pub table. Quick to the resuce, their wise manager pipes up in the background: "Tell him about Morocco and Africa" "Well you know what Arabs are like, anyway" says Paul, resisting everyone else's attempts to extract the foot from his mouth. "The most dishonest people you can meet unless you befriend 'em. In Algeria, I got mugged and left on the outer reaches of the Sahara Desert with just a sleeping bag. More than anyone else they're always out on the blag, out for cash"...
Bootleg: Audience Recording () Black Horse Pub - Cassette - Tart Tart / Kuff Dam / Russell / Desmond / Olive Oil / Enery' / Weekend S / 24 Hour Party People / Little Matchstick Owen
Bootleg: Audience Recording () Untitled - CD-R - Tart Tart / Kuff Dam / Love Child (Russell) / Desmond / Olive Oil / Enery' / Little Matchstick Owen / 24 Hour Party People - 27 October 1988 Thursday - Astoria - Do It Better / Bring A Friend / Moving In With / Mad Cyril / Fat Lady Wrestlers / Performance / Wrote For Luck

M - 09 May 1987 - Happy Mondays appear on the cover of Melody Maker 50p
Notes: 'Nuts In May'
M - 09 May 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 19, 55p
Notes: Happy Mondays feature.

16 May 1987 - Polytechnic, Cardiff, Wales
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
17 May 1987 - Humphries, Cheltenham
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.

19 May 1987 - The Bierkeller, Bristol
Soundcheck: Yahoo / Tart Tart
Show: Russell / Desmond / Yahoo / Little Matchstick Owen / 24 Hour Party People
Notes: The entire show was filmed by a friend of the band, the soundcheck was also filmed too. Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
From Louder Than War, 13 May 2012 Carl Stanley interview with life-long fan Phil Grunshaw: ''I bet the technology was a bit different then wasn’t it? Just a bit, yes, the analogue years, I couldn’t afford a Sony Professional Recording Walkman, they were over £200 even back then I think, when gigs were as little as £2 for the Mondays so I made do with what I had, and I stopped doing it pretty quickly when I realised you had to stand still, be quiet etc, i.e. not much fun!''
Video Bootleg: Amateur Audience Video Recording - Soundcheck & Show Amateur (VHS Video / DVD-r)
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

? - Scrumpies, Leeds * Supporting: Yeah Jazz

Adam and Eve's, Leeds * Support Act(s): Bridewell Taxis
Fan said: Leeds, think it was called Adam and Eve's, some dingey basement bar but went to see their support act Bridewell Taxis as they were from Leeds, hooked on them from that night.

20 May 1987 - The Warehouse, Leeds * Supporting: Weather Prophets *
Notes: Additional date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List. Written on in biro pen.
21 May 1987 - Astoria, London
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
A Fan said 'Bez showed up with a busted up hand, crowd mostly football types, they kept their cool and put on a good gig.'
22 May 1987 - Polytechnic, Wolverhampton
Notes: Additional date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List. Written on in biro pen.
23 May 1987 - University, Hull
Notes: Additional date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List. Written on in biro pen.

28 May 1987 - FAC 51 The Hacienda, 11-13 Whitworth Street West, Manchester * Doors Open: 19:00, On Stage: 21:30 * Ticket Price: £2.00 *
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
From Happy Mondays Top 10 from Shiiine On Blog, Gaz Whelan said: 7. WFL - Personally not my favourite. It has a Pavlov’s dog affect on me, it makes me feel hungover. This came out of a jam session. After Hacienda at about 6am Sunday morning in our rehearsal room. Our room was across from the Hac so instead of going home sometimes we would crash in the tiny room. Myself, Paul Ryder and Paul Davis were jamming 2 songs… ‘Two Tribes’ Frankie Goes To Hollywood (listen close very apparent) and Kate Bush’s ‘Running Up That Hill’. Most of the track came from Paul Davis’ keyboards as he was kind of leading the jam. He never gets any credit PD, he deserves much, much more.

29 May 1987 - Civic Hall, Middleton
Wah Wah (Think Tank) / Kuff Dam / Tart Tart / Desmond / Yahoo / Little Matchstick Owens Rap / Russell / Weekend
Notes: Date taken from official Factory Records 1987 Tour Date List.
Bootleg: Audience Recording / Soundboard ()

May 1987 - Happy Mondays feature on various artists compilation 'FACTUS 17 Young, Popular and Sexy'
FACTUS 17 Young, Popular and Sexy
Vinyl FACTUS 17
Cassette FACTUS 17C
Notes: Kuff Dam features on the various artists compilation. A Factory New York Release. Distributed in the UK through Pinnacle and Rough Trade. A press release noted 'Factory Records of New York releases a record. A compilation album of ten songs. These ten songs represent ten Factory artists. Young Popular & Sexy. New Order is not on this record. There is a point to be made....Happy Mondays - Kuff Dam. Seemingly, the only concern in all their work is fucking, drugs and occasionally sleeping. Beneath these obsessions there is tremendous complexity. Available on their debut LP (Fact 170), produced by John Cale.'

06 June 1987 Saturday - Finsbury Park, Factory Records Supertent, London, N4 * Doors Open: 17:00 * Ticket Price: £7.00 * Supporting: New Order, A Certain Ratio, The Railway Children & DJ MP2 *
Wah Wah (Think Tank) / Kuff Dam / Tart Tart / Desmond / Yahoo / Little Matchstick Owens Rap / Russell (attempt) / Russell / Freaky Dancin'
Notes: Unconfirmed if Railway Children were the first band on and followed by the Happy Mondays. The ticket stub states Happy Mondays were first on stage. The show was organised by Factory Records & Phil McIntyre. You can hear the Manchester fans throughout the show, especially during Russell. A fan recalls ''That Finsbury Park gig, they stole the show. Bez chanting Mexico and give a shout out to my mates from Leeds when we were stood among a 100 or so Mancs!!!! Good times, good band, good tunes.''
Bootleg: Audience Recording - (CDr / Tape) - Tune up - Wah Wah (think tank) / Kuffdam / Tart Tart / Desmond / Yahoo / Little Matchstick Owens Rap / False Start Russell - Manchester chanting / Russell / Freaky Dancin'

03 July 1987 Friday or Monday - The Buzz Club, The West End Centre, Aldershot, Wolverhampton * Doors Open: 20:00 * Ticket Price: £3.50* Support Act(s): The Waltones, The Poison!, The Stigmata Club, The Caretaker*
Taken from handsigned setlist: Wha Wha (New one) / Kuff Dam / Russell / Tart Tart / Desmond (Sued by Michael Jackson) / Ya Hoo / Little Matchstick Owens / F.D. / 24 Hour Paty People
Set: Wah Wah () / Kuff Dam / Russell / Tart Tart / Desmond / Yahoo / Little Matchstick Owen / Freaky Dancin' / 24 Hour Party People
Notes: The original promo posted noted 'The Buzz Club sunsplash + factory records present The Happy Mondays...'
Weekend S aka Wah Wah (Think Tank)
Notes: Weekend S would later become Wah Wah (Think Tank), 24 Hour Party People B-Side. The band were three hours late. Approx 30 people attended the show.

20 July 1987 Monday - The Panic Station, Dingwalls, Chalk Farm Road, Camden, London * Doors Open: 20:00-02:00 * Ticket Price: £3 / £2 (Club members, with flyer/newspaper advert) * Support Act(s): North Of Conrnwallis, The Corndollies
Introduction / Moving In / Kuff Dam / Russell / Yahoo / Desmond / Olive Oil / Tart Tart / 24 Hour Party People / Freaky Dancin
Notes: Recorded by The Modern Structure, probably funded by Factory, the VHS is introduced by 'Structure Moderne Presente'.
Bootleg: The Modern Structure Video (VHS / DVD-r) Amateur Audience Recording
Bootleg: CD-R Audio lifted from DVD-R

05 August 1987 - Portlands, London
Notes: Unconfirmed, see 05 October 1987 for recording.

13 August 1987 - The Boardwalk, Rehearsal Rooms, Little Peter Street, Manchester, M15 4PS
Yahoo / Moving In With
Notes: Unconfirmed but probably The Boardwalk. Sometimes noted as the 15 August 1987 too. Recorded by the band themselves, tempted to say Tony H Wilson was filming the band but he cannot be seen or heard in the videos. At the time other Factory Records artists were using the Boardwalk Rehearsal rooms, including A Certain Ratio, The Railway Children, Jazz Defektors, James and even Swing Out Sister.
Bootleg: Amateur Video (includes a bonus unconfirmed London video recording of Freaky Dancin' too)

August 1987 - Session
24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) /
Bootleg: T Archive Volume 2 (CD-R) - 1981 Demo #1 (attic rehearsal) / 1981 Demo #2 (attic rehearsal) / Happy Side Of You (1983/84 demo recording) / Delightful (1983 Bungalow Tape) / Comfort & Joy (Spirit Studios Sessions 1985) / 24 Hour Party People (Vocal Demo) / Desmond / Yahoo (Bristol Bierkeller, Soundcheck 1987) / Do It Better (Driffield Sessions 1988) / Clap Your Hands (Hillsborough Benefit Gig 1989) / Rare Interview (includes conversation regarding the debut album and the bummed album, including talk of song titles and recording) / Wrote For Luck (Rehearsal) / Tart Tart - Step On (Amsterdam Paradiso 1990) / Monkey In The Family (Barbados Session 1992) / Opportunity Knows (Final ever session 1993)

August 1987 - Session
24 Hour Party People / Moving In With / Yahoo / Wah Wah (Think Tank)
Notes: Produced and Engineered by Dave Young. All would appear on 24 Hour Party People single (see October 1987) apart from Moving In With. This would appear on the various artists Sounds 7inch, which was given away with the magazine.
Official: October 1987 - 24 Hour Party People
Official: 1987 - Various Artists - Sonic Sounds 3 7inch Vinyl - Moving In With (Produced by Dave Young)
06 August 2019 - Happy Mondays - Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 6 / 8 / 2019: The publication of ‘Wrote For Luck: Selected Lyrics’ earlier this year set in print definitive versions of the words to Mondays’ songs, showcasing their inspired wordplay. The volume goes some way to clarifying some of their most off the wall lines such as ‘Moving In With’: "He's got two bent pigs in the crack downstairs below /Stewing at the door I said, 'Why you so slow?'/Got a schizophrenic acquaintance patient no place to go/Stuck with his dick to my window." In transpires the verse details two impatient coppers who came round to score drugs from the group along with “a couple of people from out of the local looney bin” Shaun explains.

August 1987 - Platt Fields, Manchester

September 1987 - Squirrel And G-Man Twenty-Four Hour Party People Plastic Face Carn't Smile (White Out) U.K. Re-Release
Vinyl
Cassette - FACT 170c Issued in an Orange Box.
Artwork by Central Station Design
Kuff Dam / Tart Tart / Enery / Russell / Olive Oil / Weekend S / Little Matchstick Owen / Oasis / 24 Hr Party People / Cob 20
Notes: Re-released without Desmond with adding the recent single and albums namesake. The album wouldn't see a CD release until March 1990. Revised credit 'All songs written, arranged and played by Happy Mondays'. The release, later, saw a Japanese CD release POCD-1850 Made In Japan CD.
From 09 May 1987 NME 1987 Article The Monday Club Shaun said: "You know the album title," announces Shaun.

1987 - Leicester
Notes: From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Magazine Interview: ...Paul: "Like, we played in Manchester a few weeks ago, and the crowd was all storming on stage, jumping about and everything, great, but the night before that we played in Leicester and there was only about 60 people there." Horse: "That was Newcastle." Paul: "Both of them, Leicester and Newcastle." Horse: "I don't remember Leicester...
1987 - Hull
Notes: Horse:.. But I hate it when there's daft lights and you've just gotta stand there, and I hate plaing anywhere north of here. Hull, Newcastle, Scotland, it's just all so glum. And I don't like playing south."
1987 - Newcastle
Notes: From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Magazine Interview: ...Paul: "...the night before that we played in Leicester and there was only about 60 people there." Horse: "That was Newcastle." Paul: "Both of them, Leicester and Newcastle."...
1987 - Manchester
Notes: From 28 November 1987 - Melody Maker Magazine Interview: ...Paul: "Like, we played in Manchester a few weeks ago, and the crowd was all storming on stage, jumping about and everything, great...''

October 1987 - 24 Hour Party People U.K. Release Date
Produced & Engineered by Dave Young
Artwork by Central Station Design
FAC 192
7inch White Label Promo
24 Hour Party People (Radio Edit) 3:27
Notes: Edit is the same as the promo video version, also featured on The Best Of - Indie Volume Top 20 CD compilation
12inch
24 Hour Party People
Yahoo
Wah Wah (Think Tank)
Notes:
06 August 2019 - Happy Mondays - Interview with Shaun Ryder by Richard Lewis from pennyblackmusic.co.uk published: 6 / 8 / 2019 Shaun said: “Wah Wah’ was named after the guitar pedal. The former stands out for its vaguely menacing lyrics that seem to involve dodging a cab fare. “A lot of them I had working titles for and they got changed and so I don’t even fucking remember them until I either hear them or read it and then I’ll call it by the working title,”...Elsewhere, from the 12” of ’24 Hour Party People’, ‘Yahoo’ which recounts the tale of a character called Anxious Bill points the way forwards to the band’s next LP, genre-melding indie rock/Acid House hybrid ‘Bummed’ (1988).
From 09 May 1987 NME 1987 Article The Monday Club Shaun said: "You know the album title," announces Shaun. "We've got a song called that, now. I'd say that's influenced by Little Hulton (a Manchester suburb). The song's like, walking round the Civic, when I was about 12, in the Northern room, seeing all the older c**ts there, about 19 or 20, with big fu**ing works stickin' out"
From Happy Mondays Top 10 from Shiiine On Blog, Gaz Whelan said: 8. 24hr Party People - Paul Ryder and I started out playing a Motown beat and bass line but Julian Copes ‘World Shut Your Mouth’ was impregnating the airwaves and I got caught up in the harder driven groove. I always thought the line “How old are you, are you old enough?, should you be in here watching that’” must have come from the 4 screen cinemas in Walkden (Worsley). When I was at school we would travel to watch latest films at ‘Unit 4’ Cinemas. We would pay to watch a Disney film or something and then sneak in to watch and ‘X’ rated film showing in the next cinema unit. Whenever we would get caught this is what they would ask. I don’t think I ever went with the band, this was earlier but seems we all had same experience. I am just guessing as I have no clue where the lyric came from… But hope its from this?

1987 - Happy Mondays appear on the various artists Sonic Sounds 3 7inch Vinyl given away with Sounds Magazine
Sonic Sounds 3 - All Tracks Exclusive To Sounds. SONIC 3 Side A Track 2. 1987
Moving In With (Produced by Dave Young)
Notes: 7inch was given away with Sonic Sounds Magazine Issue . Includes a unique to vinyl version of Moving In With. An outtake from the 24 Hour Party People single session. The track would eventually be re-recorded and released on Bummed a year later.
Official: 1987 - Various Artists - Sonic Sounds 3 7inch Vinyl - Moving In With (Produced by Dave Young)

05 October 1987 Monday - Portlands, London
Freaky Dancin'
Notes: Only known footage is an audience recording of Freaky Dancin'.
Video Bootleg: Amateur Video (Bonus footage to 15 August 1987 - Rehearsals) Freaky Dancin'

07 October 1987 Wednesday - The Princess Charlotte, Leicester
24 Hour Party People
Notes:
Fan said: Less than 50 people in the audience. Paul Ryder said “that`s the one were the roof was leaking and the stage was wet”.

16 October 1987 Friday - Solem Bar, University Of Manchester * Doors Open: 20:00 * Ticket Prices: £2 (Advance) £2.50 (On The Door)
Notes: Harry Enfield was doing stand up, the night after. The Bodines were playing the week after (23 October).

1987 - Shaun goes to Amsterdam and brings back Ecstasy to Manchester.

M - 21 November 1987 - Record Mirror Magazine, Volume 34 - Number 47, 65p
Notes: Cover By Joe Shutter. Happy Mondays feature.

28 November 1987 - Happy Mondays appear in Melody Maker Magazine
Notes: Ian Gittins Interview with the band included:
"A lot o' what we do is accidental. We came in here the other day and thought we wouldn't get any new song together, and then we had three songs together in about fifteen minutes. We get spasms of ideas for ages then we can't think of nothing to do for about three months, come up with nothing."
"Sometimes, to stop us getting bored," adds Bez, "we can work on three songs at one time. We do 10 minutes on this, stop over 28 minutes on the other, an hour on the other, and back to 15 minutes on the other... " At this point his words become lost in cries of uproar from the band, who don't seem able to recognise this way of working. Shaun, who has a great line in shocked disgust, explodes in disbelief: "F*ing hell! Sounds like a F*ing mechanised, uh, professor, that does!"
"You know there's something there when you know there's something there, but when there's not something there, you know it," persists Bez
Happy Mondays shout and laugh at each other a lot, moved by a looming sense ofthe absurd which roams free through their leery, tumbledown music. The words that are scattered over upbeat patterns are random, chance glitches of meaning on a graph bearing little correlation to logic or narrative.
How do they come about? Shaun: 'Words don't get wrote down, we just record them and they sound alright. It's what makes us laugh. There are some words that make you start cracking up when they come out, and that's okay. They're not dead important but they've got to be okay. There's a lot of sarky humour, y'know; really, Was just lucky if they ever mean anything." To me, your approach resembles that of The Fall. Meaning isn't laid out, clarified, but crumpled, hinted at, touched on, in a process of oblique suggestion, a tease.
"Some people have come up with really good meanings to our words," says Paul. "Yeah, but they don't mean all that, do they'' Shaun breaks in. "Some people trip out on them, over underestimate them."
"It's just a record, innit?" Horse decides. "It's nothing spectacular, just a record. You like it or you don't." It would be misleading to devote much space to analysis of Happy Mondays' lyrics, which lie in the lap of the gods. Much more interesting is their unique brand offunk which is awkward, entangled, and avoids the snagfree polish we expect from dance rhythms. An approach more traditionally applied to left-field rock.
"It's not even funk, ifs just that there's no name for it yet," says Paul.
"There will be in 1O years time. But one of the main things with these interviews we've done is that no-one can ever put us in a bag, or pigeon-hole us.'' Tempting, given the angles of your sound, to see you as a mix of influences, a collision of people driven by different musics and defiant not to give way. There could be a rocker, a funker
"No, Let's face it," declares Shaun, burying my theory, "we all listen to the same stuff. Rappers, hardware, Rolling Stones, Beatles, Northem Soul, Top 20. You listen to whatever's in the charts, or whatever some elder brother or cousin's into. It's passed down, your music taste. But two years ago, I'd never heard a Fall record or an ACR track, till we started coming up here."
Paul: "You're saying two years ago, you hadn't heard The Fall. Well, I had. Shaun: "I couldn't give a shit." Paul: "No, that's what I'm saying, right. We've got our personal tastes, but once we get in here, it's just us lot, using it all. When we first met Cow he was a real Led Zep freak— Queen and 'A Day At The Races', all that stuff. We even got into that."
'We're just geniuses," beams Cow. Radiantly. THE Happy Mondays live experience is something else again. On stage, the distortions and tensions of their spastic funk are blown up, exaggerated by their gawky appearance. Where most dance music gains from fluidity, Happy Mondays seem to aim at dislocation, jagged edges. Are they best when tight, slick, or loose and falling apart?
Bez: "Tight." Shaun: Noh, loose, loose. At ease." His voice rises to a shout. 'When you lot start trying to play something off a sheet of music, you go f*in' stupid! It's dead tight, dead fast, dead controlled, all wrong. When you're just easy, you're confident." Bez: "I like it when we're easy and tight at the same time."
Cowhead: "That's natural, but when everyone's trying to be too relaxed, man .. ." Shaun: "Too pissed! Off us heads!"
Paul: "Like, we played in Manchester a few weeks ago, and the crowd was all storming on stage, jumping about and everything, great, but the night before that we played in Leicester and there was only about 60 people there." Horse: "That was Newcastle." Paul: "Both of them, Leicester and Newcastle." Horse: "I don't remember Leicester. But I hate it when there's daft lights and you've iust gotta stand there, and I hate plaing anywhere north of here. Hull, Newcastle, Scotland, it's just all so glum. And I don't like playing south."
...plans for the future?
Shaun: 'Well, thing is when you start you leave school and think there's else to do, you don't want to do this or that, so you start up playing, with your big ideas. You watch 'Top Of The Pops' and think, wow, I wouldn't mind being up there."
"But if someone told us now we were going on 'Top Of The Pops' we'd get so stupid we probably wouldn't be able to stand up," warns Paul. Shaun: "Yeah, I'd be getting there and I'd have to sit on a camp bed. I wouldn't be able to do anything!" Horse: 'We'd all be laid down." Paul: "Gary Dwyer, from The Colourfield, was telling us about Teardrops. They went down there all tripping and bought about £l00 worth of Marathons, didn't they, and built this chocolate city in the dressing room, and it all melted. They all got banned, couldn't go again."
If you did get there, squeeze into that space, what would be the difference between you and George Michael?
"No, I respect George, man," shouts Shaun. "I know The Bodines, right, and they're sound, and they've met George Michael and reckon he's alright. They came round and said they'd met him, and he's smaller than you think and all that but he's a good geezer." Horse: "I'd rather not meet him, know what I mean?"
"Anyway," Shaun continues, "we wouldn't all go up to him and start slappin' him round the head. It wouldn't be 'How do, George! Whack!' I could put a Wham! tape on and listen to it, and he still gets pissed at the end of the day same as us." "But we'll never get to that stage, so don't worry about it," Cow says.
Horse develops a sudden strategy. 'We've gotta get known first, calm down and then do a programme. We still won't get anywhere, underground bands never do, but we've got to calm down." Shaun is annoyed at this attempted sell-out. "What? You'd change how you sound, just to get on there?" "No," defends Horse, but Shaun's still not satisfied. 'Well, that's what you just said. Anyway, even the way we are we'd get there if we got played on the radio. Anything that gets played on the radio nine times a day will get in the charts." HAPPY Mondays are a mass of contradictions. They're a white, northern English indie band moved by funk shifts more than the Velvets' aloof jangle. They stand apart from all trends. They're idealists who don't even know what day it is. The're friendly, charming, They're contrary and smiled on, from their name outwards.
Shaun: "Well we don't like the name, do we? None of us likes the name, awful." Horse: "It's like Labrador, or Walrus." Shaun builds himself up for an epic rant: "Happy Mondays is a dreadful name, man. I hate it. Even bands that I hate have got a better name than us. Our name's awful, it puts you off from the start. I mean, it does, dunnit? not like LL Cool J or Grandmaster Flash. It's a bad name, we've gotta face it. I suppose you could get famous and then say, oh f*ck it, we're changing our name .. ." "We could be The G-Men, or The Squirrels," ponders Horse. Shaun: "But we'd probably still be called another bad name, because we can't make up names for bands! It's not funny! I mean, I wish I'd thought of Joy Division, New Order, Rolling Stones, man. Our name's just really bad, innt' "Perhaps, we aren't known by our name," hopes Cowhead. They're still not known to many people at all.
Paul: "None of us like meeting new people. When we first met Mark, we never used to speak to him for three hours. But when you go out, right, in a gang of 10 lads and go to a different place, and you see another few lads, why do they always start fighting? Probably they've all got things in common, they could talk, but they end up having a fight and not a conversation. If you're out of the country, it's great, the English like each other, but if a Scouser and a Manc met here they'd be killing each other. "I just think that I've seen millions of gigs since I was about 13, and if someone asked me what would I think if I walked into a club and saw this band, Happy Mondays, I'd say they sounded pretty good." ...

11 December 1987 Friday - Anti-Apartheid Benefit Show, The International 2, 210 Plymouth Grove, Manchester, M13 * Ticket Price: £3 * Supporting: Zila
Notes: Zila headlined the benefit gig, Happy Mondays second on and The Poors Of Reign opened the show. Info taken from leaflet.

December 1987 - 24 Hour Party People Video Shoot
24 Hour Party People
Notes from Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches Collector's Edition 2007 Booklet "24 Hour Party People - Video Produced and Directed by The Bailey Brothers, December 1987". This was the first of many promo video shoots collaborations with The Bailey Brothers.
Official: Pills 'N' Thrills And Bellyaches Collector's Edition 2007 CD & DVD
Official: 13 November 1989 - Madchester Rave On - VHS