Stone Roses at Spike Island: Recording of legendary gig revealed

It has gone down in history as one of the legendary gigs in British music history. But the Stone Roses’ full performance at Spike Island in 1990 wasn’t thought to have been captured on film.

However, a video recording of the entire concert, which took place in front of 28,000 fans in Cheshire, has now come to light – shot by a crew member who then stored the tape in a box for years.

Martin Cornell’s three hours of footage – which also includes the preparations and soundcheck – is set to be used in a documentary showing the event in all its glory for the first time.

It should also settle a long-running debate about whether the gig really was the sublime high point of a heady musical era, or was in fact a disappointing night with dodgy sound.

The outdoor show, which took place on the site of a disused chemical plant, was supposed to have been filmed professionally – but that fell through at the last minute in a dispute over fees.

Mr Cornell was part of the crew who built the stage and wasn’t working on the day of the gig, so decided to go along with his video camera.

His boss let him film from the scaffolding tower in the middle of the crowd. There had been health and safety concerns from local authorities, and his boss thought the footage could be useful to prove there were no problems.

“I didn’t know that they’d pulled their cameras. I didn’t know that they weren’t videoing it,” Mr Cornell told BBC News.

“I was just there as an independent, working for my boss, basically, on a health and safety tip on my day off, and I had a camera. Nobody else did.”

He captured the seminal Manchester band in their heyday – albeit slightly out of focus at times.

“I watch it occasionally and go, ‘Yeah, it’s good’,” Mr Cornell added. “I’m not proud of the focusing on several occasions. But it can be cleaned up, probably, quite nicely.

“It all sounds good. Everybody says the sound was bad. But if you look at the footage I’ve got, it sounds pretty good to me.”

After the gig, he packed the tape away and forgot about it.

“I tucked it away with all my home videos and stuff like that. It went into a box. It got put away – not for future reference, it just got put away, as you do.

“I came across it again probably 10 years later and thought, oh that’s quite interesting, I’ll see if I can take this somewhere.”

He mentioned the footage on Stone Roses message boards, but says he got dismissed by fans who didn’t believe him.

“I was totally derided by the community. And that’s when I kind of lost interest.”

However, his brother David then gave fans the first taste of the footage when he put some short clips on YouTube about 15 years ago. The pair also offered it to the band, but says the group weren’t interested in releasing it.

“We weren’t in it for monetisation or to make a buck,” Martin Cornell said. “We were doing it because it’s there. Let it out and let people see it. We couldn’t do it ourselves.”

Film-maker Shane Meadows included 10 minutes as a DVD extra with his 2013 documentary about the band, billing that as “the only remaining footage” of the gig.

However, there is much more.

Freelance journalist Matt Mead, who runs a social media account dedicated to Stone Roses drummer Reni, got in touch with Mr Cornell and is now helping to plan the documentary, which will use the footage alongside other material such as interviews, 300 unseen photos, and unheard audio of the band’s pre-show press conference.

He couldn’t get a ticket to the gig, and said he has spent the subsequent 34 years “trying to desperately relive that moment, even though it’s gone and it will never happen again”.

“I think with this footage, something incredible can happen and I think it will help people to relive that momentous day,” he said.

“There was no band like them out there. They were one of a kind. That’s what people want to experience again – they want to experience that incredible year of 1990 and the amazing band that the Stone Roses were.”

Director and producer Paul Crompton is also on board. He did have a ticket for the gig.

“Everyone was talking about it before it happened, as well as everyone talking about it after it happened,” he recalled.

“So everyone just felt like they had to be there. It was a really hot day and there was a big sea of people with Reni hats on. And there were so many people clambering over the fence.

“It was just a really good day. It sort of cemented the whole Manchester music thing. It was very symbolic, I think, in that respect.”

No indie band had staged a gig on that scale, and the organisation didn’t all go smoothly.

“I like the fact that it captured the spirit of Manchester more than just the spirit of the Stone Roses,” Mr Crompton said.

“It captured the spirit of the whole Manchester period, you know? An element of chaos and being shambolic, but we’re going to have a good time.”

The documentary project is still unfunded and at an early stage, but Mr Crompton hopes to use new technology, like that used for recent Beatles series Get Back, to enhance the original footage.

“It’s not professional 30mm film. It’s not HD. Again, it captures the spirit of it.

“But he’s filmed all the key events – the whole gig, the soundcheck, the stage construction, the fans, all the queues and all that. He’s done a really good job of filming everything that you need to capture an event.

“There are things you can do now with AI and the latest tech that improve things in a really fascinating way. So that’s what I want to do as soon as I can.”

He also hopes to get the band on board, and has put out feelers.

A spokesperson for the band declined to comment to BBC News.

Meanwhile, the photos of the day will be published by Mr Mead and Dave Hewitson of 80s Casuals in a book titled Spike Island Unseen.