What's the story?

Britpop godfather Alan McGee on being a Rangers fan, hanging out with Graeme Le Saux and having a soft spot for Chelsea.

You were a big Rangers fan growing up in Glasgow, was that a family thing? Religious? My dad was never that bothered but you know the score in Scotland. You're either Rangers or Celtic, that's just the way it is. I went to a Protestant school, yeah. I'm not in anyway bigoted. I moved to London when I was 19 and for me, people are people. I'm not racist, homophobic, sectarian. I just support Glasgow Rangers - is that allowed? Can you remember the first game you went to? Bizarrely the first game I went to, when I was about seven, was a Celtic game. I went to see the local football team Queens Park at Hampden and it just so happens they were playing Celtic. Celtic had just won the European Cup in '67 so it was a really good time to see them, even if I was a Rangers fan. Did you have many Celtic fans as friends back then? A lot of my friends are Celtic fans, I'm not into all the nonsense. Most of the people in the music industry are Celtic fans. Bobby Gillespie is a Celtic fan. Do you still take trips back up to Ibrox now? I haven't seen Rangers for ages. I live in Wales now and I hadn't been up in Scotland for about two years before January. I've been up five times in the past few months though, DJing in Edinburgh. I'm still very tight with my dad so go to see him regularly. The only reason I was up in Glasgow over the past couple of years was to see Glasvegas play. James, the singer, is also a Celtic fan. How often did you used to go to the game when you lived in Glasgow? I used to go regularly in the seventies, I would have been 11 or 12. They were mad times, I remember being chased through the streets, up the Copland Road, by the Celtic fans. It was just what you did as kids, go to watch the football. Who were your favourite players at the time? At the time it was Derek Johnstone, Colin Stein, John Greig - people like that. I liked Jimmy Johnstone too, even though he was at Celtic. That's a fair old list. Why do you think Scotland are no longer producing players of a similar calibre? That's true for everyone though to be fair, although in Scotland it's particularly bad. I think in the seventies people played football because it was a way out, for the working classes. Nowadays a lot of working class kids are sedated, on drugs. A lot of good young footballers, I guess, end up losing it before they're 15. Did you play yourself? Any good? I was average. I wasn't good but I wasn't terrible. I could play without embarrassing myself that's about how far my talent stretched. When your music career started to take off is it fair to say your interest in football started to wane? Completely to be fair, although it was resurrected in 1994 when I came off drugs. I've been clean ever since and it did come back into my life after the best part of 20 years. I loved it when I was around nine to 19 or 20 and then I lost interest entirely. When I cleaned up I got into watching Chelsea and maybe had ten years of going there regularly. Then I had a little girl, who's ten now, so to continue going it would have been ridiculous given I'm living in Wales. You really got into going to Chelsea though, didn't you? I heard you had a season ticket. I had a box, I've got a good Ken Bates story if you want it? Do tell... At the height of Britpop I went to see Chelsea and they were playing Middlesbrough, or some other garbage team. It was a good