kelvin mackenzie

OBSCURE SIXTIES GARAGE ROCK TRACK REFERENCED IN TABLOID NEWS HEADLINE SHOCKER!

A front page article in the Guardian today, concerning lingering resentment on Merseyside over The Sun’s coverage of the Hillsborough tragedy, hardly told us much we didn’t already know. Briefly, sensational tabloid news reports aren’t always true and, despite their protestations to the contrary, Liverpudlians really do have a tendency to wallow in victimhood. (Comparing a slanderous twenty year old newspaper article to the holocaust? Really?)

What did grab my attention though was The Sun’s Hillsborough tribute headline this week. As any garage rock aficionado will tell you, ’96 Tears’ was the title of a 1966 hit single by ? & the Mysterians. (In 2006, it was voted no. 120 on Pitchfork’s 200 Greatest Songs of the Sixties list.) A random Scouser contacted by Tripping Along the Ledge for comment fumed “This is a slap in the face to the people of Liverpool… It’s no different to what Pol Pot did to the Cambodians… etc. etc. etc.”