Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
To think of the young, the next generation, finding that life has already reached the pinnacle of their desires because they believe that the world is not ready for them, is one that can leave two different flavours in the mouth. The first being sorrow, that we as those that have gone before have allowed this group of creative people whose hopes and dreams perhaps matched our own in the past to bathe in the shallow end whilst we have neglected the opportunity to stand aside and let them tackle the issues of the day. The second is that with any luck, it has taught them anger, that the positive of such actions will lead them to understand that theirs in not to be Faded Days after all.
The Racket, four bright young things from Widnes, have identified this in their single Faded Days, the illusion sold of doing well at school, of being part of a society that cares about the future of the young, and yet the opportunities are growing scarce, the world is as unsafe and precariously poised as it was for those growing up under the banner of Generation X and the daily worry of nuclear Armageddon. Add to this the thought of dead end jobs and those who have no hope beyond the next Saturday night out and the chance to escape their lives for a brief hour or two, it is no wonder that the youth of today are frustrated and growing more alert to their aspirations, even if it is with a punk value and wrestling a grim reality.
Fifty years ago they gave us the Summer of Love and that turned quickly sour, the mid-seventies and mid-eighties were contrasting polar opposites and in a way we are still reeling from decisions marked out in that ten year era, Faded Days, we perhaps all feel them but it takes the introspection of someone more in tune with the state of the world than you to show that emotion properly. The Racket deal out the cards and with 21st Century fury, refuse to give in to those who have consigned such a hopeful and positive to that of resentment and suspicion.
Faded Days is the muscle that dares speak its name, the world is not meant to be this insane, it is only those who suggest that those who are under a certain age have no say in their future that have let down and turned the world beige for those to whom hope has turned sour.
Ian D. Hall