Stone Roses / Stone Roses (1LP)

The Stone Roses is the sound of four Manchester lads deciding that the 1960s never ended, the 1980s could go fuck themselves, and the summer of 1989 would last forever. Recorded over 14 months in battered studios in Manchester and Wales with John Leckie (who�d just done XTC�s Oranges & Lemons), the album is 49 minutes of pure liquid sunshine: Ian Brown�s half-sung, half-talked vocals dripping with swagger, John Squire�s liquid-lead guitars that soundtracking a thousand Ibiza sunrises, Mani�s basslines that walk like they own the street, and Reni�s drums that swing like Motown on ecstasy.