Up The Bracket (LP)

Up The Bracket arrived like a raging bull in a tired post-Britpop China shop and introduced the world to The Libertines, a new gang of London bohemians, whose ragged tunes, red military tunics, opiated poetry and 'live now pay never' lifestyle came to define the millennial angst of the early noughties. At the heart of the band is the blood bond bromance between the ramshackle Music Hall Jagger/Richards, Peter Doherty, and Carl Barat, ably assisted by the rock-solid rhythm twins John Hassall and Gary Powell. Any bookie worth his salt would have given you short odds on this quartet surviving more than a month or two, given the teetering on the brink lifestyle they chose to lead, but here we are two decades later and our Byronic heroes, though older and wiser, are still fighting the good fight and making music every bit as vital as their debut. The belief, talent, and fervour that Doherty spoke of in their earliest manifesto has stood them in good stead.

Up The Bracket, which was produced by Mick Jones of The Clash, takes you on a wondrously poetic journey into the band's mythical world and their fevered dreams of Albion, a land of squalid glamour, liberty, equality, fraternity, gin palaces and chip shops. Quite simply Pete, Carl, Gary, and John created a hugely compelling timeless British rock'n'roll classic debut as relevant now as it was upon its release.