Acid House Hacks: the legends George Michael thought didn’t change the world
Music has, and always will have, the capacity to change lives for the better. As perhaps the most universal and culturally impactful medium, virtually everyone on the planet will have been affected by music at some point in their life. You could argue that the first stars to have ever changed lives with their music are the likes of Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley or even Bill Haley and his Comets, but there’s also a fair argument to be made that some obscure 16th-century lute player will have had a profound effect on at least a handful of people at the time.
The 1960s saw the popularity of musical acts go stratospheric, and the impact that the likes of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones made not just on the history of popular music but on wider society was undeniable. However, despite the world falling head over heels for these acts and many more, how could one possibly say that they were a one-off phenomenon or that they were the last of their kind?
For example, the 1980s saw the birth of solo pop megastars, with the likes of Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, and Prince all being among the biggest names coming out of the US. Back in the UK, one of the biggest cultural exports was George Michael. While he enjoyed a fair amount of success alongside Andrew Ridgeley in Wham!, it was arguably his solo efforts that saw him join the lofty ranks of the superstars.
However, Michael wasn’t sure that anything from this period was able to create the same impact that those in the decades prior had done on a cultural level, and he argued that the ways in which the music business had shifted to focus more on record sales rather than becoming part of the zeitgeist meant that no matter how big an artist became through domination of the charts, they couldn’t possibly have the same leverage when altering the minds of the youth.
Speaking to Q Magazine in 1990, the singer made a puzzling point of how poor marketing was the only thing that prevented the Beatles and the Stones from being even bigger than they were. “They were a huge cultural phenomenon,” he began, “But people just didn’t know how to sell them properly.” He would then go on to further argue that some of his peers don’t have the same cultural pull, arguing: “It’s different now. Madonna isn’t a cultural phenomenon, and neither am I, and neither is Jackson. We’re sales phenomenons.”
As baffling as it is to consider the idea that neither Michael Jackson nor Madonna were cultural phenomena, Michael further argued that the landscape had changed and that modern music at the time of the interview wasn’t able to change people’s lives. Picking up on a couple of rising trends and acts from the turn of the decade, he argued that “something like the acid house movement became a big part of culture but generally individuals don’t change things any more.” He’d then go on to pose one final question, asking: “Music-wise in this country, what is there now? The Stone Roses? I don’t think they’ve significantly changed anyone’s life.”
Of course, The Stone Roses did change lives and were at the helm of a scene that caused a cultural ripple that is still being felt today. If anyone’s music is being heard and having any sort of profound effect on the listener, then a case can be made that that artist is capable of significantly changing someone’s life, and George Michael, of all people, should have been able to recognise his own importance to his audience.
