This just in from My Bloody Valentine leader, Kevin Shields:

Kevin Shields has raised the notion that Britpop was part of a
government conspiracy. Speaking to the Guardian in an exclusive
interview, to be published online later today and in the G2
Film&Music section tomorrow, the My Bloody Valentine leader reacted angrily to a mention of the Cool Britannia phenomenon.

“Britpop
was massively pushed by the government,” he said. “Someday it would be
interesting to read all the MI5 files on Britpop. The wool was pulled
right over everyone’s eyes there.”

In the early years of Tony
Blair’s premiership, Britpop luminaries such as Noel Gallagher and Damon
Albarn were vocal supporters of the Labour government, and visited 10
Downing Street. Shields said he would only have attended “on condition
we could play a song”.

There is, of course, a chance that Shields was being funny but if it’s not a prank, it’s seriously goofy and sounds like sour grapes to me. As angry as I’ve been with Tony Blair since he lodged his head permanently up Dubya’s ass, I think his musical taste-like mine-run to jangly power pop like, well, Oasis and Blur. I have a hunch that MI5’s files don’t have a lot to say about rock music of any stripe unless there are some files on the anti-Thatcher/Tory views of the mast majority of British musicians.

My advice to Shields, chillax and listen to this song. Uh oh, I said chillax, which is one of David Cameron’s favorite words, which may make me a conspirator. I also watched the recent Foyle’s War series wherein the taciturn copper works for MI5. Holy crap, I’m implicated up the wazoo. Back to the fightin’ Gallagher brothers: