The annual bash once had flowing booze and fierce feuds. Now it’s like a
music biz circle-jerk at a sales conference
“Ladies and gentlemen, The Four Tops!” “No darlin’, it’s Boy George!” Yep, you might assume the
British Phonographic Industry’s annual backslapping sesh bottomed out with the shambolic 1989 edition hosted by Mick Fleetwood and Samantha Fox. Who could have possibly predicted that an inexperienced model and her haunted ostrich butler couldn’t slickly helm three hours of live telly?
Hold your pop horses, however, because the Brits came back like a boomerang during the pwopah nawty 90s, when booze flowed, toilet cubicles were permanently engaged and anarchy reigned. The KLF fired machine guns over the crowd and dumped a dead sheep outside the afterparty. Jarvis Cocker waggled his bony backside at Wacko Jacko. Geri Halliwell wore “that” Union Jack dress (is there an argument to say
Brexit started here? Probably not but give it a go down the pub some time). A fresh feud seemed to kick off each year: Oasis v Blur, Liam v Robbie, Chumbawamba v John Prescott, Geri (her again) v a massive inflatable birth canal. These were halcyon days, viewers. If only we knew it at the time, we might have pulled up our twisted Levi’s, peered through the Marlboro Lights fug and paid more attention.