Through the 'Looking Glass': The Story of The La's

The story of The La’s is one of British guitar music's great unfinished stories: brilliant songwriting, creative obsession, constant personnel changes and a recording process that stretched across years, studios and producers, all for the sake of one album. Led creatively by Lee Mavers, the Liverpool band would eventually create 'There She Goes', one of the most enduring British guitar songs of its generation.

Emerging from Liverpool with a sound that seemed to belong simultaneously to the city's past and its future, The La’s appeared capable of becoming one of the defining British bands of their generation. Their songs carried traces of skiffle, Merseybeat, The Beatles, The Who, The Kinks and The Rolling Stones, but there was nothing nostalgic about the best of them. 'Way Out', 'Timeless Melody', 'There She Goes' and 'Looking Glass' sounded immediate, melodic and strangely timeless.

At the centre of everything was Lee Mavers, a songwriter whose standards would eventually become inseparable from the band's story. Mavers was not simply searching for a good recording. He wanted to capture the feeling of people playing together in a room, the warmth and spontaneity he heard on older records and the indefinable quality already present on The La’s earliest demos.=

The closer the band came to completing their debut album, the harder that quality became to reproduce. By the time 'The La’s' finally appeared in 1990, critics and listeners heard one of the finest British guitar records of its era. Mavers heard a compromise.

Contradiction has followed The La’s ever since. They created a record that influenced generations of bands, containing one of the most enduring British songs ever written, yet its creator has spent decades insisting that the definitive version of The La’s was never properly captured.

Formation & Early Days: 1983 to 1986

The La’s were formed in Liverpool in 1983 by Mike Badger. Badger later said the name came to him in a dream, drawing on the familiar Scouse use of "la" as shorthand for "lad". The earliest version of the group was loose and experimental, closer to an art-school skiffle collective than the tightly focused guitar band that would eventually emerge.

Lee Mavers joined in 1984, initially as a rhythm guitarist. His songwriting quickly began to reshape the group, while bassist John Power arrived in 1986 after meeting Badger on a council-run musicianship course. As Mavers developed into the band's most prolific songwriter, the balance of power began to shift.

By late 1986, that tension had become impossible to ignore. Badger later recalled Mavers bluntly telling him that his time in the group was almost over. Badger walked away, taking his songs with him, while Mavers assumed creative control of The La’s.

On Power's recommendation, guitarist Paul Hemmings joined the new line-up. The band began rehearsing in an outbuilding belonging to Hemmings' family, and it was there, away from record companies and professional studios, that The La’s entered the most fertile songwriting period of their career.

Hemmings later remembered that Badger's departure forced Mavers to produce new material quickly. Instead of the endless deliberation that would characterise the band's later recording sessions, songs were simply written and completed.

The results were extraordinary. 'Way Out', 'Timeless Melody' and 'There She Goes' all emerged from this period, forming the backbone of the only studio album The La’s would ever release.

One particular recording became especially important. The band captured 'Over' on a basic cassette recorder during a hot summer afternoon in the stable. Technically, there was little remarkable about the equipment, but Hemmings remembered the performance simply flowing.

For Mavers, that rough recording became a benchmark. The band had captured something naturally on cheap equipment that would later prove almost impossible to reproduce in expensive studios. That pursuit of the Stable sound would haunt the next several years of The La’s career. The better the technology became, the further Mavers often felt the band moved away from the sound he actually wanted.

By the end of 1986, demo tapes were circulating around Liverpool and beginning to attract industry attention. One eventually reached Andy MacDonald at Go! Discs. Despite interest from larger labels, The La’s chose Go! Discs, beginning a relationship that would produce some extraordinary music and almost constant frustration.

Go! Discs, 'Way Out and 'There She Goes' 1987 & 1988

The first signs suggested things might move quickly. The La’s released their debut single, 'Way Out', in October 1987 after signing with Go! Discs.

Instead, the single established the pattern that would define almost everything that followed. Listeners and critics heard an exciting new band. Lee Mavers heard everything that was wrong with the recording.

'Way Out' was eventually recorded with Gavin MacKillop at Townhouse Studios after an earlier attempt with John Porter failed to satisfy the band. Even at this stage, Mavers' approach stood against much of the dominant production of the 1980s. He disliked overly polished recording and wanted something warmer, rougher and more organic.

The sounds he admired came from older mono records by bands such as The Who and The Rolling Stones. He wanted to hear the room, the instruments and even some of the imperfections that modern studio technology was increasingly designed to remove. The difficulty was translating those instincts into technical instructions.

Then came 'There She Goes'.

Written during the fertile period around the Hemmings family stable, the song is built around remarkably simple ingredients: a cycling guitar figure, an irresistible melody and lyrics describing an almost overwhelming attraction. Hemmings added another guitar line, while the title inevitably recalled The Velvet Underground's 'There She Goes Again'.

The result lasts barely two and a half minutes, yet almost nothing in it feels unnecessary.

A long-running interpretation claims the song is about heroin, largely because of references such as something "pulsing through my vein". Those close to the band have repeatedly disputed that reading. Hemmings later recalled Mavers explicitly denying it, while Mavers himself generally described songwriting in less literal terms, as something closer to instinct or the subconscious.

Perhaps that ambiguity is part of why 'There She Goes' has endured. The listener does not need to know exactly who or what "she" represents. Like many of Mavers' best songs, there is enough space for somebody else to place themselves inside it.

Capturing the song in the studio proved considerably harder than writing it. Sessions stretched across different producers and studios, with Mavers becoming increasingly frustrated by the inability of professional recording to reproduce the feeling he associated with the band's rougher recordings.

John Leckie, who would soon work on The Stone Roses' debut, was among those asked to interpret Mavers' increasingly unusual descriptions of sound. Stories from the period include arguments over equipment, requests for unconventional microphone placement, and Mavers reportedly judging cables and instruments according to criteria that could leave engineers completely baffled.

As money disappeared and recordings continued to be rejected, the pressure began affecting the band itself. Drummer John "Timmo" Timson left, while Paul Hemmings also departed before the final single recording was completed. Chris Sharrock eventually joined on drums, and John "Boo" Byrne took over guitar duties.

The version of 'There She Goes' eventually released was recorded in July 1988 with Bob Andrews at Woodcray Studios. By then, Mavers' reputation for unusual recording methods was already growing, including the famous story that he tuned his guitar against the low-frequency hum of a nearby refrigerator.

The single finally appeared in November 1988, a year after 'Way Out'. 

It did not reach the UK Top 50. One of the most enduring British guitar songs of the following decades had arrived, but the wider public had not caught up with it yet.

Recording the Debut: 1989-1990

By 1989, The La’s had an unusual problem for a band with songs this strong: they still could not make an album that Lee Mavers was prepared to accept.
Attempts at Liverpool's Attic studio and the Pink Museum were abandoned. From those sessions, Go! Discs salvaged another of the band's defining songs, 'Timeless Melody'.

Its title feels almost prophetic now. The song deals partly with music itself, the idea of something created in one moment travelling beyond its original circumstances. Few bands would eventually demonstrate that process more clearly than The La’s.

Melody Maker named it Single of the Week, but Mavers remained unhappy with the recording and the planned release was withdrawn. Years were passing, producers were changing, and the band still had remarkably little officially released music to show for it.

The growing mythology around Mavers made matters worse. He was increasingly being described as a songwriting genius, yet every unsuccessful session raised expectations for whatever The La’s eventually produced.

Go! Discs turned next to Mike Hedges. His work with The Cure and Siouxsie and the Banshees did not make him an obvious match for Mavers' obsession with older recording techniques, but he possessed something that immediately appealed to the band: a vintage Abbey Road mixing desk associated with records by John Lennon and Pink Floyd.

For a short period, it seemed they had finally found a solution.

The band, now including Mavers, Power, guitarist Barry Sutton and drummer Chris Sharrock, recorded in Devon. John Power later remembered everybody being happy with the results, including Mavers.

Then the sessions collapsed.

Power and Sharrock went on holiday while work continued. Mavers viewed their departure as evidence of a lack of commitment and scrapped the recordings. From this period came one of the most famous stories in La’s mythology: the idea that even vintage Abbey Road equipment could not satisfy Mavers because it no longer carried the authentic dust of the period he was trying to recreate.

Whether every detail should be taken literally is almost less important than what the story represents. Mavers was searching for something no piece of equipment could guarantee. The pressure on the musicians around him increased. Barry Sutton later recalled being asked to repeat guitar parts in minute variations until he became increasingly unsure of his own playing. What had begun as a search for spontaneity was becoming extraordinarily methodical.

The contradiction was impossible to escape. Mavers wanted the sound of musicians playing instinctively together, but the more intensely he tried to reproduce that spontaneity, the less spontaneous the process became. Sutton and Sharrock eventually departed. Peter "Cammy" Cammell arrived on guitar, while Mavers' brother Neil took over the drums.

In December 1989, six years after The La’s had first formed, the band entered Eden Studios in London with Steve Lillywhite for another attempt.

Lillywhite immediately recognised the quality of the songs. The problem remained getting performances onto tape that Mavers would accept. A session could produce several excellent recordings, only for one perceived flaw to convince him that the entire process needed to begin again.

Their disagreement was partly philosophical. Lillywhite was comfortable using modern recording techniques to build the strongest possible finished track. Mavers wanted the band captured naturally, preferably playing together and reaching something that could not be manufactured afterwards.

Eventually the sessions broke down.

Go! Discs had run out of patience and money. Lillywhite was brought back to assemble an album from what already existed, using recordings and guide vocals from the abandoned sessions.

In October 1990, 'The La’s' was finally released.

The band had little control over the final title, artwork or running order. Mavers regarded the finished record as a compromised version of what The La’s should have been.

Almost everybody else heard something remarkable. The album moves with an ease completely at odds with the torturous process behind it. 'I.O.U.' carries the momentum of Merseybeat, 'Feelin'' barely needs two minutes to make its point and 'Freedom Song' reaches into older British music without sounding trapped by it. 'Son of a Gun' seems almost to mirror Mavers himself, restless and unable to settle.

'There She Goes' sits naturally among them rather than overwhelming the record, but the album's most revealing moment arrives at the end. 'Looking Glass' stretches beyond seven minutes, considerably longer than the concise pop songs surrounding it. Its atmosphere is dreamlike and reflective, allowing Mavers to move away from the directness that defines much of the record.

The title became increasingly appropriate as The La’s story developed. A looking glass offers something recognisable but altered. That was Mavers' relationship with the album eventually carrying his band's name: the rest of the world heard one of the great British guitar records of its period, while he heard an imperfect reflection of what it should have been.

Its final words, "the change is cast", would soon take on another meaning.

The album entered the UK chart at number 30 and received strong reviews, but Mavers spent much of the promotional period attacking it. He complained that guide vocals and early backing tracks had been used and argued that the finished record bore little resemblance to the sound he had intended.

At almost exactly the same time, the world finally discovered 'There She Goes'. Reissued in October 1990, the song reached the UK Top 20 and began its transformation from cult single into something far larger.

The La’s had finally arrived, and yet the band that made the record was already beginning to come apart.

All Change 1991- Today

By 1991, The La’s had momentum, critical acclaim and an album full of songs that were beginning to travel far beyond Liverpool. Behind the scenes, however, the relationship between Lee Mavers and John Power was deteriorating.

Power had remained beside Mavers through changing line-ups and repeated failed recording sessions, but he was also developing into a songwriter himself. The La’s live set had remained built around much the same material for years, and Power increasingly wanted his own songs heard.

The situation echoed the earlier conflict between Mavers and Mike Badger. Mavers had once taken creative control of a band started by somebody else; now Power was struggling to find creative space inside Mavers' version of The La’s.

The tension eventually erupted during a soundcheck at London's Town & Country Club when Mavers refused to sing harmonies on Power's 'Follow Me Down'. Power later recalled the confrontation becoming an argument over whether either man would sing on the other's songs.

By December 1991, Power had had enough. He left The La’s and eventually formed Cast with Pete Wilkinson of Shack.

Even the name carried a final connection to the band he had left behind. 'Looking Glass', the last song on 'The La’s', ends with the phrase "the change is cast".

Power took the final word and started again.

While Mavers gradually withdrew from the music industry, Power moved quickly. Cast secured high-profile support slots with Elvis Costello and Oasis, and during the Oasis dates, Polydor A&R head Paul Adam was surprised to discover that the band remained unsigned.

Cast signed to Polydor on December 13, 1994, three years to the day after Power had left The La’s.

Their debut album, 'All Change', followed in 1995 with John Leckie producing. The same producer who had struggled to capture Mavers' vision years earlier helped Power create one of the defining guitar records of the Britpop period.

'Finetime', 'Sandstorm', 'Walkaway' and 'Alright' turned Cast into one of Britain's most successful new guitar bands. 'Alright' even had roots stretching back towards Power's final period in The La’s.

Most significantly, Cast managed something The La’s never did.

They made another album.

'Mother Nature Calls' followed in 1997.

As Cast moved forwards, The La’s increasingly became surrounded by mystery. There were occasional performances and changing line-ups, but no second record. The longer Mavers remained silent, the more exaggerated his reputation became.

By the early 2000s he had become one of British music's great reclusive figures, a songwriter discussed almost as much for what he had not released as for the record he had.

MW Macefield attempted to separate some of that mythology from reality while researching 'In Search of The La’s: A Secret Liverpool'. After years spent tracking down former members and associates, he eventually met Mavers himself.

The reality was far more ordinary than the mythology suggested. Mavers was living quietly in Liverpool with his family, still interested in music and still writing. The obsession had not disappeared, however. He continued playing unreleased material while maintaining that 'The La’s' did not represent the record he had wanted to make.

That may be the most revealing thing about the entire story. Mavers had not moved beyond The La’s because, in his mind, The La’s had never been properly finished.

A brief renaissance arrived in 2005 when Mavers and Power reunited for a series of shows, including Glastonbury. Unreleased songs such as 'Gimme the Blues' and 'Sorry' appeared in the set, raising hopes that new material might finally follow.

It never did.

There were later performances, collaborations and rumours of further sessions, but the second La’s album remained somewhere between possibility and mythology.

More than three decades after 'The La’s', that follow-up remains one of British music's great hypothetical records. Bootlegs, radio sessions and archival releases contain further songs including 'Fishing Net' and 'I Am the Key', suggesting that Mavers did not simply stop writing.

That makes the absence of a second album even more fascinating.
The songs existed. The recording he was willing to release apparently did not.

The La’s Influence on, Britpop & British Guitar Music

If The La’s had simply disappeared after 1990, their story would still be remarkable. What happened to the music afterwards is what makes them genuinely important.

'There She Goes' became one of those songs that gradually separated itself from the circumstances in which it was created. Each generation could encounter it without needing to know anything about abandoned recording sessions, changing producers or the Mavers' dissatisfaction.

That creates the central irony of The La’s story. Lee Mavers spent years trying to capture something timeless and remained convinced he had failed. Everybody else kept hearing timeless songs.

Their influence is particularly obvious in the British guitar music that followed. Noel Gallagher has repeatedly spoken about his admiration for The La’s, and only weeks after Oasis released 'Supersonic', he famously declared that Oasis wanted to finish what The La’s had started.

That sentence says a great deal about where The La’s sit in the story of British music between the 1980s and Britpop. They connected older traditions of British and American songwriting with a new generation who wanted guitar music to feel direct and alive again.

The connection to Oasis did not end there. 'The Importance of Being Idle' later opened with a musical idea closely associated with The La’s 'Clean Prophet', which itself belonged to the same lineage as The Kinks' 'Sunny Afternoon'.

But reducing The La’s influence to Oasis would miss much of the story. Their melodic directness, impatience with excessive production and belief in classic songwriting can be heard throughout the British guitar music that followed. Blur, Pulp, Suede and The Verve emerged into a landscape The La’s had helped reshape, while later generations found their own connections.

The Libertines shared something of their preference for looseness and immediacy over studio perfection. Arctic Monkeys again demonstrated how songwriting rooted intensely in a particular place could travel far beyond it, while Jake Bugg openly carried some of the acoustic and folk traditions that had also shaped Mavers.

Even where the musical resemblance becomes less direct, the idea remains important. The La’s showed that older forms of British guitar music did not need to be treated as museum pieces. Merseybeat, skiffle, folk, garage rock and classic pop songwriting could be recombined into something contemporary.

That mattered particularly in Liverpool.

The La’s arrived from a city that could never escape its own musical history. Every Liverpool guitar band inevitably existed somewhere in the enormous shadow of The Beatles, whether they wanted to or not. Mavers found a way of acknowledging that history without simply recreating it. The La’s sounded unmistakably connected to Liverpool, but they did not sound trapped by the past. That helped open a route followed by later generations of musicians across the city.

While researching their story, one anecdote stayed with me more than most. Joe Maddocks of Liverpool band RATS recalled leaving the Cavern Pub after an open mic performance and finding Lee Mavers outside. Maddocks asked him how to play 'There She Goes', and Mavers showed him.

There is something beautifully ordinary about that image.

Forget the producers, the abandoned albums, the recording bills and decades of mythology for a moment. What remains is one Liverpool songwriter standing on Mathew Street showing a younger Liverpool musician how to play a song written decades earlier.

More than 35 years after their only album appeared, 'There She Goes' still seems weightless, 'Timeless Melody' continues to live up to its name and 'Looking Glass' remains perhaps the most appropriate image for The La’s themselves.

Lee Mavers looked into the record everybody else considered a masterpiece and saw something distorted. Perhaps The La’s story is usually described too easily as one of wasted potential. There was certainly more music that could have been made, but one album was enough to alter the direction of British guitar music and leave songs that have survived almost everything surrounding them.

The tragedy is that Lee Mavers never heard the album the way everybody else did. The achievement is that everybody else still can.

For Liverpool: a city of timeless melodies, for all those who sail from there, and for anybody who has ever looked through its looking glass.

Jack x