LITMIR.BIZ

Copyright

      Fourth Estate

      An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

      1 London Bridge Street

      London SE1 9GF

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      Originally published in paperback 1994

      Copyright in introduction, compilation and editorial matter

      Copyright © Chris Roberts 1994

      Chris Roberts asserts the moral right to be identified as the editor of this work

      ‘You Gotta Have Lost a Couple o’ Fights’ © Bono 1994

      ‘Sparing the Rod’ © Nick Hornby 1994

      ‘Led Zeppelin and the Pixies’ © Martin Millar 1994

      ‘Vedder as Merton: 2001’ © Stephen J. Malkmus 1994

      ‘Suede or How I Stopped Worrying and Learnt to Love the Hype’ © Caitlin Moran 1994

      ‘In the Mind of the Bourgeois Reader’ © Thurston Moore 1994

      (All songs © Sonic Tooth adm. by Zomba Songs inc BMI)

      ‘Stations of the Crass’ © Robert Newman 1994

      ‘Walking Around Being a Woman’ © Kristin Hersh 1994

      ‘Tonight, Your Hair Is Beautiful’ © Chris Roberts 1994

      ‘Musical Influence in Great Britain on Big-Head Here’ © Mark E. Smith 1994

      ‘Banana Republic: Memories of a Suburban Irish Childhood’ © Joseph O’Connor 1994

      A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

      All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

      HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.

      Source ISBN: 9780006382669

      Ebook Edition © JUNE 2016 ISBN: 9780008191641

      Version: 2016-05-23

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

‘You Gotta Have Lost a Couple o’ Fights’ Bono

‘Sparing the Rod’ Nick Hornby

‘Led Zeppelin and the Pixies’ Martin Millar

       ‘Vedder as Merton: 2001’ Stephen J. Malkmus

       ‘Suede or How I Stopped Worrying and Learnt to Love the Hype’ Caitlin Moran

       ‘In the Mind of the Bourgeois Reader’ Thurston Moore

       ‘Stations of the Crass’ Robert Newman

       ‘Walking Around Being a Woman’ Kristin Hersh

       ‘Tonight, Your Hair Is Beautiful’ Chris Roberts

       ‘Musical Influence in Great Britain on Big-Head Here’ Mark E. Smith

       ‘Banana Republic: Memories of a Suburban Irish Childhood’ Joseph O’Connor

       About the Author

       About the Publisher

Introduction

      SO I’VE JUST GOT UP THE STAIRS with my piping hot fish and chips and the phone’s ringing. I put my fish and chips on top of the stove, which hasn’t worked for eighteen months, and think: this better be quick. ‘Yeah?’ I snarl with all the hostility I can muster.

      ‘Hello, Chris?’

      ‘Yeah.’ (A sort of three-quarters snarl, jockeying for position.)

      ‘Hi, it’s Bono here.’

      I don’t say: Bono Who?? Neither do I ask him to ring back after I’ve had my chips. I switch into what I consider to be sweetness-and-light mode and thank him for phoning, and we talk about Frank Sinatra. ‘Have you got five minutes? I’ll read it out to you,’ he says. Oh, I think so. The chips can go hang. Because no matter how jaded you are by working around the music industry, or for that matter how jaded you are by Life Itself (big themes! already! yeah!), when one of the world’s most famous rock stars phones you up it is still, frankly, quite exciting. It is more exciting than chips, say.

      The absurdity of the situation does not escape me; neither does the thought that he’d be perfectly within his rights to have a moan about one or two of my U2 reviews over the years. Yet he seems to want to talk about his enthusiasm for Frank, and stress the point that however many fans you’re perceived to have acquired yourself, you don’t stop being one, it doesn’t go away, you can still be starstruck.

      While some of the contributors to Idle Worship remain rather gloriously starstruck, others remember when they were, with affection or disbelief. Some admit to hideous embarrassment, while others eulogise the inspiration and motivation drawn from leading pop lights. Others go off on berserk ‘irrelevant’ tangents, which

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