The musical 'misfits' who blazed a trail with some of Scotland's most influential bands

Now some of the earliest stars of the nation’s “indie” music scene are back celebrated in a new book recalling their unlikely origins, their biggest hits and near misses, the champions and their escapades on the road.

Postcards From Scotland recalls the emergence and influence of Primal Scream, Teenage Fanclub, The Jesus and Mary Chain, The Vaselines, The Pastels, The Soup Dragons and the Cocteau Twins as the 1980s unfolded.

Grant McPhee’s book recalls the impact made by short-lived bands like Finitribe, The Shop Assistants, Jesse Garon and the Desperadoes, and Rote Kapelle, highlights the indie heritage of towns like Bellshill, East Kilbride, Irvine and Grangemouth, and looks at the figures behind ground-breaking record labels like Creation and 53rd & 3rd.

McPhee has interviewed more than 100 singers, musicians, record labels, venue promoters and journalists for the book, which he says focuses on bands who chose to adopt a “punk rock attitude” to making music.

Focusing largely on the period from 1983-1995, Postcards From Scotland traces the revival of Scotland’s indie scene in the aftermath of the post-punk era, which propelled bands like Orange Juice, Altered Images, The Associates and Simple Minds into the limelight.

Recalling the early days of The Pastels, founder Brian Taylor said: “No one had a bloody clue. All you wanted to do was make some records. It was never particularly serious.

“It was never ‘let’s form a band and have a career in rock’. We formed a band because we were friends and it seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Former Altered Images guitarist Gerard McNulty played in The Wake with Bobby Gillespie, who would go on to play with The Jesus and Mary Chain and is still the frontman of Primal Scream. Gillespie had previously played in punk band The Drains with school friend Alan McGee, who would go on to manage The Jesus and Mary Chain, launch the record label Creation and famously discover Oasis in Glasgow.

Douglas Hart, who played bass in The Jesus and Mary Chain, the outfit formed by brothers Jim and William Reid in their native East Kilbride, recalled: “I probably met Jim when I was 14, I used to write names of bands on my school books, and someone said ‘oh, I know someone that loves all those same bands’.”

A home-made demo found its way to Gillespie, who tracked down the East Kilbride outfit.

Hart recalled: “I came home from school one day and Mum said ‘some guy's called you about the band’.

"My mum asked him if he was famous and he said 'not yet.’ So I thought 'that sounds pretty good'. I phoned him back and we literally were on the phone for two hours talking about everything, not just music, but books and films. He was a real kindred spirit. Because the three of us were out in East Kilbride, we kind of felt like freaks in the wilderness.”

Recalling his first encounter with the band, McGee said: “Douglas Hart came in with biker boots and leathers, looking like James Dean or something. Jim and William looked as if they’d come in dragged via punk via the Bay City Rollers or something, and they were just held together by safety pins.”

Hailed as “the best band in the world” by the NME after releasing just one single, The Jesus and Mary Chain became notorious for their live shows, which often lasted just 20 minutes, were performed before increasingly rowdy crowds and saw the band dubbed “the new Sex Pistols” in the media.

Recalling a gig at North London Poly that ended in a riot, Hart said: “Half of the crowd loved us and half the crowd wanted to kill us.”

McPhee traces the roots of Edinburgh’s emerging 1980s indie scene, including Rote Kapelle, The Fizzbombs, The Shop Assistants and Jesse Garon and the Desperadoes, to the neighbouring villages of Currie and Balerno, as well as the then Napier College.

Recalling his “try out” for Rote Kapelle, guitarist Chris Henman said: “I didn’t really know how to play the guitar or any other instrument then. But I went along with the punk ethos that anyone can play an instrument and join a band.”

Describing their first gig, at Balerno Village Hall, he said: “I was so nervous I had a nosebleed just before we were due to play. There was blood all over the place. I like to think it looked punk rock.”

Margarita Vazquez-Ponte, who was in Rote Kapelle, The Fizzbombs and Jesse Garon, said “I left home to go to Napier College. I’ll be honest, I didn’t care what I went to study. I picked, almost randomly, periodical publishing at Napier.

"I ended up in the same classes as a lot of the people I was going to be in bands with. I think a lot of the scene came from the serendipity of all being in that place at the same time.”

Bellshill was to prove the breeding ground for Teenage Fanclub and the BMX Bandits, both of whom were championed by Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain, along with The Vaselines, who emerged from Glasgow.

Duglas T Stewart, founder and frontman of the BMX Bandits, recalled Bellshill as a “ghost town”, which “didn’t seem to have very much hope” when he was a teenager.

He said: “It was also a sort of town where people who thought differently or dressed differently or liked to express themselves in different ways were kind of few and far between. So people who were a little bit like that tended to be drawn together.”

Teenage Fanclub singer Norman Blake, who was in the BMX Bandits and The Pretty Flowers with Stewart, said: “I have a memory of us one summer being in a park in Bellshill. We thought it was a gig, but it was basically just us, playing to nobody.”