Decades tend to crest halfway through, and 1995 was the year of the Nineties: peak Britpop (Oasis v Blur), peak YBA (Tracey Emin''s tent), peak New Lad (when Nick Hornby published High Fidelity, when James Brown''s Loaded detonated the publishing industry, and when pubs were finally allowed to stay open on a Sunday). It was the year of The Bends, the year Danny Boyle started filming Trainspotting, the year Richey Edwards went missing, the year Alex Garland wrote The Beach, the year Blair changed Clause IV after a controversial vote at the Labour Conference.
Not only was the mid-Nineties perhaps the last time that rock stars, music journalists and pop consumers held onto a belief in rock''s mystical power, it was a period of huge cultural upheaval - in art, literature, publishing and drugs. And it was a period of almost unparalleled hedonism, a time when many people thought they deserved to live the rock and roll lifestyle, when a gen
