The indie/dance crossover sound from the late 80s and early 90s might well have had its home in Manchester, but these London boys gave them more than a run for their money.
It’s On was the first single from Camden-based Flowered Up, being released in 1990 on (then new) Heavenly Records. The music press was raving about them to a crazy degree, and they couldn’t possibly live up to the hype. Then they actually released a record and the “hype” turned out to be bang on. Having said that, I don’t think they came up with anything as good as this again until the epic Weekender (more on that later on this blog, for sure).
Critics would dismiss them as a southern copy of Happy Mondays. Although that seemed unfair, the presence of the Bez-like Barry Mooncult in their live setup certainly contributed to that popular view.
The video for this is great, just a band miming to their track about scoring and dealing drugs and that, while cute kids and dogs dance around. It didn’t get aired much at the time but it remains one of my favourite pop videos.
Sadly, their openness to drugs brought about their demise. Literally. Singer Liam Maher, and his guitarist brother Joe were to die young from heroin overdoses.
Don’t do drugs kids.
