Manchester must dance: A life of music, madness and moving on up

With forewords from Martin Fry, Johnny Marr, Noel Gallagher and Calvin Harris, this gripping memoir tells the story of one of Manchester’s musical pioneers.

‘Already my essential music book of the year.’ – Irvine Welsh
‘Like a musical Zelig, Pickering was there for fucking everything.’ – John Niven
‘Playful, picaresque, impossible-to-put-down.’ – Audrey Golden

Beginning on the night in November 1963 when his mum took him to see the Beatles live at Manchester’s ABC Cinema, Mike Pickering takes the reader through sixty years of clubs, clothes, gigs, record labels, football matches and politics.

Pickering has lived through decades of rapid change in popular music. As an influential DJ he introduced house music into the legendary Haçienda. He signed Happy Mondays and James to Factory Records before working with Kasabian, Gossip and Calvin Harris at Sony. His Mercury Prize-winning, multi-million-selling group M People transformed the music industry's attitude to dance music. As he tells his remarkable story he introduces an array of friends and collaborators, many of whom would become important – and sometimes notorious – figures in music history.

Manchester must dance is a revelatory insider’s account that moves from the cramped back streets of 1950s north Manchester on a journey deep into music, the city and the wider world. It features forewords from some of those Pickering inspired.