Rap-Jones

24 Hour Party People is a popumentary that chronicles, mostly, the Factory records scene in Manchester, England between 1976 and 1992.

Like most of the world's brief pockets of rock and roll revolution, England gets to call this one it's own. Whether or not you've ever heard of The Happy Mondays or New Order, you've definitely heard their singles at some point in your life without realizing how influencial they were.

Let this act as a quasi-document of some of the most important musical outfits of the last twenty years, ultimately done in by the excesses that fuelled the entire "Madchester" scene as it would come to be known.

Steve Coogan, recognizable to brits as Alan Patrige, plays Tony Williams... the hub and driving force behind Factory, the Hacienda night club and all things Manchester (also a heavy player in the early rave scene). 24HPP tells his story, a hallucinatory rampage through 16 years of brit-pop beginning with The Sex Pistols, ending with a heroin addled Happy Mondays. It's boisterous and colorful, with Coogan constantly breaking the 4th wall to play narrator. It's surreal, extremely funny and dark at times (before the half way mark, Ian Curtis is dead).

Those familiar with names like Joy Division, New Order and Happy Mondays will immediately fall in love with it. Those unfamiliar may either miss the point and become confused after the first twenty minutes or discover a sub genre of music that has fallen by the wayside in the wake of one-man wonders like Paul Oakenfold (a contributor to the Monday's Success).

I fall into the first category and was thrilled to find that finally, a nod was given to a much more recent breed of British rock instead of retreading over the Beatles and Bowie (not that there's anything wrong with them). So smoke a couple of bowls and put this movie on. It's fast talking, it's bizarre and it'll probably leave you hungry for your own local pop revolution.

Oddly, there is little mention of The Smiths, Stone Roses and Inspiral Carpets, all as important as the other mentioned in the movie.

And on a pure opinion level... this should have happened in America too. At the height of the Madchester scene, Nirvana was happening here. Madchester was a million times more interesting than poorly dressed northwesterners whining about life.

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My name is Tim and I'm a criminal. In the eyes of society I need to be in jail for the choice of herbs I inhale. This ain't no wholesale operation, just a few 8's and a playstation's my vocation, I pose a threat to the nation and down the station, the police hold no patience.