Glasgow Anorak Filth

From Sounds, 11 August 1990:

‘Long renowned as the "mad fucker" mate of archetypal Glasgow band man Stephen Pastel, Norman [Blake] once played in the original BMX Bandits with Sean Dickson and the brilliantly eccentric Duglas (who occasionally supports TFC by miming to backing tapes). Blake went onto The Boy Hairdressers with current Teen axeman Raymond McGinley, a fresh faced 26-year-old from North West Glasgow — a cultural gap bridged by some tasteful six string. The Boy Hairdressers were, however, a dead duck. "We got labeled with the post-anorak tag," notes Raymond. "The so-called dirty movement, when everybody got into the ‘sex thing’...Like it was amateur sex and I’m not into that." "The whole thing was a reaction against people calling it anorak music," adds Norman. "Which was a joke anyway, it was only people in places like Bristol that took it seriously."

The much maligned ‘Anorak’ era, which eventually became the stereotype of indie music, all started because of Stephen Pastel’s tongue-in-cheek 'rak. The piss-taking cynics on the Glasgow scene quickly picked up the garment and the joke soon got out of hand. The subsequent "dirty" movement, hosted by The Vaselines' tongue-in-cheek pop sleaze, was a reaction against the 7-inch versus 12-inch crap that most of the airheaded fanzines of the time were involved in.’ - John Robb