Let England...?
Five years of Albion's Secret History
In the final words of ‘Albion’s Secret History’: Snapshots of England’s Pop Rebels and Outsiders (released five years ago today) I wrote-
‘Can the uneasy truce that the electorate have struck with a Conservative party that they do not trust last long after the Brexit issue has been addressed? Perhaps PJ Harvey put it best when she said ‘let England shake’.’
And shake it has. Do we all feel shaken? I feel shaken. My hope that the country was done with the Tories and would boot them out triumphed over my cynicism. The electorate did something it rarely did and let a cabinet of mainly state educated people run the country. At least for a bit. The Tories are now being pummelled in political terms by a Labour PM who won a stonking majority (AKA the ‘loveless landslide’) who incessantly reminds the electorate of how one of the many placeholder PM’s they appointed hiked their mortgages and rents. ‘Liz Truss! Lettuces lasted longer than you!’ Goes the cry.
How has England shaken since those stifled, surreal, screen-dogged days of the pandemic?
Reform and Zack Polanski and the bloated silhouette of Trump.
In that final chapter (read below) I wrote of of-
‘The perceived failure of Labour to offer a coherent answer to Brexit’
Which remains the ghost at the feast.
The ghouls of the Tory party retired to the private interest money-haemorrhaging GB News or took up residency in Farage’s latest outfit. I wrote also of-
‘Jacob Rees-Mogg, whose entire persona seems to defer to a nineteenth-century aesthetic and Beano-esque schtick [who] when pressed seems ready to overrule any tradition – from the monarchy to the Speaker of the House – if it suits his political aims.’
Since 2019? He’s had a failed reality TV show. That sums a bit of it up.
I think what has continued to be exposed since 2019 is the utter venality of the upper classes entrenched in politics. And by that- in English terms- I mean the insidious professional banker type Nigel Farage embodies- ready though he is to cosplay as a farmer for stunts. Ready as he is to express bafflement when the failures of Brexit are laid at his feet. I talked of, in such politicians, their veneer being-
‘a shield which masks an unbreakable – and very cold – self-belief underneath it.’
And nowhere has this become more apparent in the used lot car salesman turned circus showman Donald Trump. If such men had unchecked narcissism and anti-social behaviour disorders. And, at the time of writing this, the rock bottom popularity of Keir Starmer has been buttressed somewhat by him making a stance against it. And what it stands for. Special relationship? Brexit has left the UK isolated, and a rallying against Trump and his foreign affairs / distractions has led to some coalescence of European strength.
I wrote too-
‘If the left manage a coherent response under a new leader – one which combines the sleek aesthetic of the centre ground with the radical socialism espoused by Corbyn – they might yet harness the enthusiasm of the young whilst offering a credible alternative.’
This has been embodied best in the upstart Zack Polanski, offering the left a coherent, emotive counterpoint to the galling clarity of Farage. My suspicion is that the centre-ish Labours best hope of survival- with the media ranged against them and the country still run by The Mail- is to take on the Brexit scepticism of a rejuvenated Lib Dem party and the youthful invigoration that will come with it if they can bring the Greens on board. Listen to the Greens, I say. Listen to the young.
Michael Bracewell- to whom Albion’s Secret History is much indebted- wrote of the angry youth, distrustful of a modern England which he saw as ‘strangled by consumerism on one hand and political failure on the other’. The artists Albion’s Secret History depicts- and if Joy Division are its spine then Gazelle Twin are its headline- articulate the hollowness and then surrealness, what Mark Fisher might’ve called ‘eeriness’ of late-stage capitalism in its weirdly English iteration. Self-service checkouts and daylight robberies. Tesco Club Cards as discount lifeline. But what really strikes me in the last five years?
How. Impossible. This. Country. Is. For. Anyone. Under. Fifty.
Five years from the release of this book and as I type I await the outcome of a mortgage application in which days have been invested. The real hot-button right now is the state this country is in for the young. It was left to Martin Lewis to highlight how out of control student debt is, taking away for the young the means to save for a deposit. With a lack of rental controls and a vast, older, boomer population who (for all their challenges) got houses at low prices, on a single wage, with no student debt plus its interest for even STEM subjects. Let England Shake?
Let the young of England breathe.
And if we can get to a world cup final this year and not choke, let England cheer.
Guy Mankowski, Lincoln, 26th March 2026.
Looking for Albion
Given the possibility of addressing these concerns, one persistent criticism of the left has been its inability to offer a coherent alternative to the centre-right, which has dominated politics in recent years. The rise of Jeremy Corbyn as a cult figure, who prompted massive chanting to the tune of Seven Nation Army, brought discourse about the left to the fore. In 2019 the criticism remained that Michael Foot’s socialist ideas from the 1970s were merely being rehashed in Corbyn’s vision. With the perceived failure of Labour to offer a coherent answer to Brexit and their perceived failure to deal with the smear of anti-Semitism, Corbyn’s vision for England was buried in the Conservatives 2019 election landslide. But what exactly was Corbyn’s vision? An England with a 4-day week, an allotment dwelling, jam-making England, which looks to South American countries for moral examples? A more compassionate, Socialist England? Or was it as simple as the fact that Corbyn’s scruffiness smacked too much of the scuzzy seventies counterculture for most of the electorate, and Johnson’s scruffiness reminded the electorate of the quintessential naughty school boy – which they could live with? One only has to look at some members of Johnson’s cabinet to wonder if the trust the electorate has with such ‘naughty schoolboys’ is solid. Jacob Rees-Mogg, whose entire persona seems to defer to a nineteenth-century aesthetic and Beano-esque schtick, when pressed seems ready to overrule any tradition – from the monarchy to the Speaker of the House – if it suits his political aims. His genuine lack of respect for the status quo was even apparent in his revealingly controversial statement that victims of Grenfell should have ignored evacuation advice. The point is, the likes of Rees-Mogg and Johnson know how to appear familiar, naughty and establishment-like until their personas are scratched. Is the deference to the norm offered by Johnson’s cabinet in fact more of an appropriation of the norm as protection? As a shield which masks an unbreakable – and very cold – self-belief underneath it?
It may well be the case that Corbyn’s vision was simply too radical. That an electorate pummelled by uncertainty, in a Brexit climate that the Conservatives had fostered out of their own fear of the far right, were not brave enough to plump for Corbyn’s vision. It seems fitting that a volume that began with Just William should end with Boris Johnson, whose bumbling persona seems to tap into an enduring English affection for vague ideas of the ‘scoundrel’. If rumours of Johnson’s private behaviour mark him as in fact something far more sinister, then in uncertain times, for all their tolerance of rebels and outsiders, the English seem to have chosen the devil they know.
This is all the more remarkable given the failure of the Conservative government to offer credible narratives on the future of the NHS, youth housing and student debt. This doubt has led the youth to rally to the left (albeit not in significant enough numbers to permit a left-wing governmental coalition). The right argues that realistically there isn’t the funding to address such issues, that taxes will have to rise. The left retorts that this concern is itself a ploy from the ideological right. In a post-truth age there is a sense that political rhetoric has less substance than ever. In an age where music and books have become more digital there can also be the sense that they too have less substance – but that is wrong. They exist within the privacy of people’s consciousness with more diversity than ever. In an era where Johnson’s perceived untrustworthiness seems to be seen as less of an issue than the appeal of his gung-ho patriotism it appears that deeper affections in the British mentality are enduring. The British electorate, at present, seem to prefer voting into power a party that has been proven to lie to them to taking a risk on an unproven alternative. Jeremy Hunt, when Conservative Party Secretary of State for Health, was widely proven to have misrepresented NHS statistics about the so-called ‘Weekend Effect’ but this was not deemed by the electorate as damning enough to deny his party a majority in 2019.
If the left manage a coherent response under a new leader – one which combines the sleek aesthetic of the centre ground with the radical socialism espoused by Corbyn – they might yet harness the enthusiasm of the young whilst offering a credible alternative. The cynics argue that Johnson’s victory is a death-knell for liberal ideas. Hugh Grant claims that the country is finished, and it is striking to see the actor who played lead roles in so many rose-tinted portrayals of Albion saying that.
But perhaps England is not finished – it just needs to take hold of the future. It no longer needs to rehash seventies counterculture or indulge in colonial nostalgia. Britain can be reinvigorated, and express deeper, more nourishing undercurrents that prevail within it. The sense of interclass cooperation fostered in the Second World War, combined with the individual agency and talent that made Sherlock Holmes such a recognisably English character. The success of artistic collectives like Massive Attack. In this collection I have elucidated the cultural moments in which overlooked demographics through invention, talent and sheer force of ambition have incorporated their worldview into the mass consciousness, benefiting us all as a result. I have looked at how artistic collectives have formed springboards for rich artistic careers, creating rich seams of inspiration for future generations. All these qualities could be expressed in Britain’s shop front window – in its leaders as well as in its artists – making it a country proud of its nature, no longer ashamed of it. Britain’s navel gazing nostalgia could be a thing of the past, along with its tendency to self-sabotage. Michael Bracewell wrote of the angry youth, distrustful of a modern England which he saw as ‘strangled by consumerism on one hand and political failure on the other’. In truth, the fragmentation of urban living will not stop until a generation is prepared to forgo ongoing economic prosperity in favour of the nuances of a better quality of life. Not in material terms, but in human terms. It is quite probable that the Millennial prioritisation of the environment could be the engine for that change, and could lead to a stronger sense of moral leadership in the political class once the next generation are finally in post. No longer will the high street and the village be further atomised in favour of increased commercial possibility. No longer will urban living become increasingly atomised in the way Gazelle Twin described. The risk of environmental catastrophe could lead to a right angle in the path the country takes, with the collective will required inspiring a turn back towards a sense of responsibility within the community. This change could be enriched by insights from component members of a metropolitan, multi-racial, inclusive country, with the wealth of experience they offer the country.
For all that, in early 2020 Corbyn might be deemed a failure on his own terms, he did lead his party to being one with the largest membership of any in Europe. And, lest it be forgotten, for all his public-school education Corbyn is a collective figurehead for the long-lost English counterculture. The fact that he did not achieve high office is perhaps not remarkable. It is not simply that the English cannot tolerate rebels – it is perhaps that they tolerate a kind of sanctioned rebellion that they can be sure will not jeopardise their own patch. But with statistics from the last election showing that the youth are far left in mindset, this sense of nimbyism cannot last for long, unless the youth shift to the right in a manner they are not known to do. Can the uneasy truce that the electorate have struck with a Conservative party that they do not trust last long after the Brexit issue has been addressed? Perhaps PJ Harvey put it best when she said ‘let England shake’.