’89 is a key year for Liverpool … After Hillsborough so many people and so many things changed … And then this drug popped up; a small tablet that created happiness. Liverpool Narcos II: Ecstasy, Emile Coleman, Sky Documentaries 2021
Best buzz you’ll ever get. It’s a love drug. ibid. user
In a sense there was something evangelical about selling ecstasy. You were doing a good thing for people … Demand outstripped supply in terms of quality. ibid. counsellor
This is the story of a radical nightclub. Bankrolled by an iconic band. The Hacienda: The Club that Shook Britain, BBC 2022
House Music: ‘And then all fucking hell broke loose.’ ibid. Noel Gallagher
The club transformed an entire generation. ibid. caption
How the Hacienda happened: the success of Joy Division 1976-80. ibid.
‘I heard during the day that Ian Curtis of Joy Division has died … ibid. John Peel
‘He said it was necessary to build a cathedral to popular culture in Manchester.’ ibid. dude
The culture of Manchester had that electronic music background, from New Order. House Music is just a baseline, a drumbeat, you know, that is so radical. Bang. Something is happening here. ibid.
‘And then around 88/89, the ecstasy pill was then married to our house music and the rave scene was born.’ ibid.
‘Nobody would settle for going home at two o’clock in the morning any more.’ ibid. Shaun Ryder
Brink’s-Mat money: … had come back and it had funded the importation of ecstasy in this country. The Gold: The Inside Story, rozzer, BBC 2023
Pop culture has met the microchip and a strange new creature has emerged. At the heart of this techno trip is a drug called Ecstasy. But the pleasures of Rave have their price. Ecstasy can kill. But despite dangers known and unknown, this heady mixture of music, drugs and technology has created a brand new experience. Equinox: Rave New World, Channel 4 1994
Midsummer in Kent: an airport hangar is being turned into a beach. A quarter of a million pounds’ worth of lights will sear eyeballs with lazers and strobes. A hundred thousand watts of sound will hammer ear drums. ibid.
It all began in 1988, the so-called second summer of love. ibid.
The new dance music arrived at the same time as a new drug called ecstasy. ibid.