Second Coming is an album released on December 5, 1994 in the UK and early 1995 in the US by The Stone Roses. The album was released on Geffen Records. It went platinum in the UK and sold 1 million copies worldwide. The album was dedicated to Philip Hall, the band's publicist, who died of cancer in 1993. It was recorded at Forge Studios in Oswestry, Shropshire and Rockfield Studios near Monmouth in Wales between 1992 and 1994.
The second album by the influential Manchester four-piece, it suffered greatly at the time from the sheer weight of expectation generated by both the 5½ year gap between it and the band's eponymous debut, and the band's withdrawal from the live arena for 4½ of those years. In addition, The Stone Roses made their return in a changed musical environment, with the UK newly-ensconced in Britpop with Blur and Oasis as the premier rock bands of the day.
Second Coming features tribal rhythms, 1970s-style extended guitar riffs, funky rock/blues numbers with jazz elements and campfire style songs such as "Your Star Will Shine" and "Tightrope" that hint at the bands rural surroundings at the time (the band moved to Wales to make the album). As the line-up began to crumble, three singles ("Love Spreads", "Ten Storey Love Song", and "Begging You") from the album were released in the UK.
Reference in Popular Culture
In the 2004 film Shaun of the Dead, one scene makes a reference to the album. In this scene a girl is seen in the back garden by Shaun's flatmate Ed, at first he thinks she is drunk, but then begins acting like a zombie until an older man joins her and acts in the same way. After impailing the girl, she recovers with a hole in her stomach, before Shaun and Ed begin to throw various objects at them but all miss. Ed finds a vinyl in the back yard and throws this at the male zombie, with the vinyl smashing and bits of it sticking in his head. With this event Ed brings out Shaun's vinyl collection and begins to throw one at the zombies but misses, Shaun, unhappy with one of his records being thrown, influences Ed to call out the names of the records with Shaun replying "Throw it!", or "No!". At one point in the scene Ed comes across a vinyl copy of Second Coming, which isn't seen to the viewer, and calls out "Stone Roses?!" with Shaun replying "No!", with Ed then mentioning the name of the album to make Shaun change his mind, only to reply "I like it!".
Track listing
All songs were written by John Squire, except where noted.
