early demos

Although the Charlatans would later become popularly associated with the Madchester scene, the band’s early demos recorded in 1988 in Birmingham and Dudley already showcased the sound that would later define their music, characterised by Collins’s Hammond organ , underpinned by the driving rhythm section of Blunt’s powerful bass and Brookes’s drumming. With their sound – a fusion of 1960s soul , R&B and garage rock – inherited from Blunt’s earlier 1982 band Makin’ Time , the band saw themselves as part of the West Midlands tradition of hard-edged soul and R&B, which included Birmingham bands the Spencer Davis Group and early Dexys Midnight Runners . Blunt has characterised the band’s early influences as including the Stranglers , Stax Records , Joy Division and the Doors , but has also credited the band’s formation during the explosive growth of the acid house scene as contributing to their sound, explaining that they “suddenly sounded like the Spencer Davis Group on E”.