Why Alisha's Attic?

When I got into rave in the mid-90s I stopped having favourite bands because that's not what rave is about. Then one day in 1999 after a year or so of opening myself up to music that wasn't rave I declared my favourite band was Alisha's Attic.

At that point in time my collection simply consisted of their 2 albums to that point. First I bought their 2nd album "Illumina". It had an excellent lead single "The Incidentals", a far inferior 2nd single "Wish I Were You" but it was easily the 2nd best track on the album and the final single from the album was "Barbarella" which I've never really been able to decide I like it or not. The rest of the album is very much album filler.

Then I acquired their much better debut album "Alisha Rules The World". The title track plus their debut single "I Am I Feel" are excellent. 3rd single "Indestructible" is pretty average and 4th single "Air We Breathe" had little impact though the album version is better than all their singles.

The album had 6 more tracks that were actual songs. "Intense" was one I never liked, "White Room" is pretty average if I'm honest, "Stone In My Shoe" is one I have to be in the right mood for and "I Won't Miss You" has some very welcome breakbeats in parts but overall is nothing special.

However it's the final 3 tracks that really make the album. "Just The Way You Like It" was my initial favourite, then we have the already mentioned album version of "Air We Breathe" and we finish with "Adore U" which became my favourite and indeed it was whilst listening to that track that I declared them my favourite band. 

In the 18 months or so that followed I really did go over the top. I bought all their singles, promo singles and any other rarities I could find in their discography. I joined the fan club and made a website called "Adore Alisha's Attic" named after my favourite song of theirs.

Back to that point in time, we're talking about a band with just 6 songs where I could say I really like this. Taking my favourite "Adore U" as an example, could I really say that's better than my favourite rave records? I would say no. In-fact even at the time I could name non-rave records that I preferred.

So back to the original question, why Alisha's Attic?

Well one thing I've never given any thought to before but something I've realised recently is that they were the first all female music act I bought anything by. I might of had the odd DJ Rap tape in a rave tapepack but the fact I can't even remember if I did have a DJ Rap tape tells you I never bought a tapepack because of DJ Rap.

Basically they were the first music act where I could say I both like their music and find them attractive. The latter placed less importance on the music in a way. I never liked their final single "Pretender Got My Heart" but I went out and bought it anyway. 

Once their 3rd album flopped and they got dropped from their label and called it a day I was seeing the error of my way, sort of. I say sort of because Alisha's Attic stopped being my favourite band but taking their place was the Honeyz, the 2nd all female music act I bought music by.

Much like Alisha's Attic, the Honeyz glory days were already behind them when I properly got into them. Unlike Alisha's Attic though, their 2nd album is pretty good.