Wrote For Luck: Selected Lyrics

by Shaun Ryder

In the mid-1980s the Happy Mondays emerged as the prime mischief makers on the Madchester scene. Chief protagonist was Shaun Ryder, a man whose lyrical street swagger in songs like Kinky Afro, 24 Hour Party People and Performance, would come to define a generation. Here, collected and edited for the first time, in trade and special editions, are his unforgettable lyrics with commentary by the man himself and an introduction by his literary collaborator, Luke Bainbridge.

With characteristic understatement, Tony Wilson once compared Shaun William Ryder's lyrics to the poetry of W. B. Yeats. That is, if W. B. Yeats had been an inveterate drug-taker and occasional dealer, a compatriot of criminals and crazies, an aficionado of low life and high times; if he had painted artful sketches of endless parties and urban blight, of chancers, dead beats, fanatics and, always, an endless stream of pharmaceuticals; if W. B. Yeats had composed fractured, hilarious, grubby and shrewdly observed anthems for the Madchester generation. That W. B. Yeats: Shaun William Ryder.

Genres: Music

192 pages, Hardcover

First published September 11, 2018

Reviews

[🌶 peppersocks 🧦 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reflections and lessons learned:
Had me a lovely old read-along listening party for this one! I first came across the Happy Mondays when I was a 13 year old West Midlands girl, not really knowing anything about Manchester or the emerging scene. Step On then exploded on to MTV and my friend caught me throwing myself around the front room to it, but I was amazed by the rhythmic groove and confidence of the band contrasted against the laid back approach. I genuinely hadn’t thought too much about the lyrics until taking this enjoyable time out, and I love the thought of Bez as the internet of Manchester in its day! Strange to think that I now have a small crossover with them in life... I can’t disagree with the quote about them though in that there are “...people who live life on the edge, but I’ve never seen a group who had no idea where the edge is” What a band and moment in music

[Chris Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most song lyrics work better in their original context than on the page and the work of mister Shaun William Ryder is no exception, I’m afraid. Wrote for Luck is certainly one of the best lyrics of its era, though. This book looks nice and some of the commentary is interesting but I can’t imagine anyone revisiting it very often.

[Tim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shaun Ryder was a great frontman, impish and louche. When he sang with the Happy Mondays, some of his lines were more than memorable, they were unforgettable, immediately permanent.
Probably his best known and best verse is the beginning of their big hit Kinky Afro: "Son, I'm 30, I only went with your mother cos she's dirty; and I don't have a decent bone in me. What you get is just what you see" - but there were others. How about this from Do It Better: "Good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, double double good, double double good." I guess it sounds better than it reads.
This is a quick read. The colours on the cover are nice, duly lurid. Shaun could probably make something of that sentence. I am the target market for this book, so I bought it - signed copy too, woohoo. I must admit, though, I prefer the records.

[Daniel Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great insight into the songs, what they mean and why they were written.