Levellers

During an era of post-grunge, the Levellers were derided as obsolete crusties, but one of their biggest hits was influenced by classic 70s rock.

- Rob Hughes

A free-spirited gang of underdogs who championed social causes and aligned themselves to the travelling community, Levellers were a fast-rising force come the mid-90s. The band's heady brand of anarcho folk-punk hit its commercial peak with 1995's Zeitgeist, their fourth album, due in no small part to the inclusion of openhearted street anthems like Hope Street.

Released as a lead-off single that July, Hope Street is a song for the dispossessed and the forgotten, for all those struggling in the slipstream of economic progress. It’s peopled by outcasts, addicts, vagrants and gamblers.

“I was living in Hove and travelling into Brighton every day to record Zeitgeist,” says lyricist and bass player Jeremy Cunningham. “And Hope Street was a kind of heightened version of what I saw walking down the street. It’s actually based on Western Road, which runs the length of Brighton into Hove. But the song is called Hope Street because there’s a Hope Street in almost every town or city”

“I’m a mad Smiths fan,” he continues, “and I really wanted to write some words that were a bit more observational, like Morrissey did. So it’s me having a go at telling that story. At that point, the council was trying to lift homeless people off the streets and then ship them off to the edge of town. The idea being that it would take them about a day to walk back in again. But at least they were off the streets for that short time. Then they’d lift them again when they finally made it in. So that’s kind of a big part of the song: ‘No old faces out today/ Someone took them all away.’”