Entertainment For Lively Minds
Bernie Rhodes knows. Don’t argue!
I’ve just finished reading Jon Savage’s The England’s Dreaming Tapes, his excellent companion to the original England’s Dreaming. The birth of punk in 1976 and 1977 is probably my favourite musical period. I was in my late teens, living in London for the first time and there was this gust of fresh air that blew away the long hair, flared trousers and, what was becoming, very stale music. For me, the interview transcripts that Jon includes highlighted three points:
1) There was an incredible snobbery and bitchiness between punk bands. Examples include the fact that punk was viewed by many of the original participants to have died after the Bill Grundy interview (i.e. when it started to become popular), Siouxsie was not universally loved and nobody had a good word about the Jam (who used flight cases for their equipment, for goodness sake!)
2) There were some excellent writers that emerged through the early punk years that have gone onto bigger and better things (Paul Morley, Julie Birchall, Tony Parsons). But there were others that played a key role in documenting the rise of punk that have been all but forgotten. In particular, Caroline Coon (at the Melody Maker) and Jonh Ingham (at Sounds) did much to raise the profile of punk at this time. And whatever happened to Jane Suck?
3) Whilst The Sex Pistols and The Clash are undoubtedly the two most important bands of this period (with The Damned an outside third candidate) one of the bands that have been overlooked in the support role they played (at least by me) is Subway Sect. I’ve heard very little of their music, but they were there almost from the start, were gigging regularly and were regarded by many of the key players as one of the bands who could have had greater success. And this lack of success seems to have a lot to do with Bernie Rhodes, their manager at the time, not being focussed on marketing them properly
I’m about to address the Subway Sect gap in my musical collection with a download of their singles collection. If you’ve any interest in the rise of punk, this is a thoroughly recommended read.
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Sounds like a good read,
Sounds like a good read, Haven't bought this yet as to be honest the original England's Dreaming seemed pretty exhaustive, not sure how much new stuff you are really getting? But sounds like you got a lot out of it.
Thanks Mr Wonderful
I never read the first so I should do my homework and get both. Anything with Bernie should be good for a laugh. I imagine The Stranglers are as unloved as The Jam. Subway Sect were a miserable bunch though...
Subway Sect, miserable bunch?
A friend of mine interviewed Vic Godard a few years ago and Vic spoke about one his first interviews with the music press in the early days of punk rock. Asked if Subway Sect was his first band, Vic replied that it was, although he had previously played the drums in The Scouts. The journo stroked his chin and wondered how he could have failed to have noticed this clearly seminal proto-punk combo. "The Scouts? What were they like then?" he was forced to ask. "You know," Vic replied, "green shirts, neckerchiefs, formed by Baden Powell." Boom-boom!
I read..
..the original "Englands Dreaming" and that's quite enough.
Bernie Rhodes and Malcy always considered themselves far more important than their actual charges, which probably says more about the spotty herberts in the bands than either of them.
(Although, from the evidence I've seen, how anyone could have seen the pretentious mealy mouthed twat that was (is) Bernie Rhodes as an authority figure is beyond me.)
The Clash
I was 18 in 76 so I ought to have been in the punk demographic but I always thought they were crap musicians making a racket and posing a lot. With the wisdom that comes with age I thought I'd watch a series of documentaries about the Clash which were recently on the Beeb and see what I missed. Guess what - bugger all. They look even more contrived and hilarious with hindsight, with their designer "punk" gear and snotty sneers. How on earth did anyone fall for it? As Johhny Rotten, smarter than the rest by a mile, put it, "have you ever felt like you've been had"?
Wasn't for everyone
Lots of people didn't get it, prefering the "real" music of the old guard who could give them the 20 minute guitar solos that their hearts craved, but for those of us who wanted exitement back in our music it was a force for the change we were so desperate for. Give me snotty sneers over persian carpets any day of the week.
*applauds*
(or should that be *gobs* in support?)
Me too!
Of course there were a fair few bad musicians, that was a lot of what was so exciting and energetic about it - bands forming and learning as they went along.
Give me the guitars of Colin Newman, Bruce Gilbert, Marco Pironni, Captain Sensible, Wilko Johnson and Paul Fox over the yawn-inducing Eric Clapton any day!
Yes, it was always..
"Excitement" over "20 minute guitar solos" wasn't it?
I wouldn't take snotty sneers over anything, never mind bands that could play.
As I said
Each to their own. My dad would also moan about the fact that "they can't play". Some people would no doubt prefer to see Tarkus performed live or Mr.Clapton showing us that he was "god". At a time when music has never been more in need of another revolution I can only pray that something comes along quick.I also hope to God (not clapton) that I don't get it and think that it's just a bloody noise. A stagnant music scene is bad for everyone.
As a wise man once said,here's three chords,now go form a band.
Interesting...
...that the stagnant boring stuff is rediscovered with joy by successive generations whilst the exciting new stuff disappeared within a year. Also, do try harder, there was a lot more going on than Clapton (who never thought he was God anyway, and by 1976 had virtually renounced playing guitar solos in favour of rootsy acoustic based material) and ELP. But hey, it takes all types.
Interesting
I really feel that to say all the new stuff disappeared within a year is ludicrous.The influence of the bands from that time has prooven to be just as lasting as the bands that came before. Without the influence of punk and the indie scene that it spawned would there have been a nirvana or any of the other generational movements that followed.I know we all have our favourite periods that are usually based around when we were in our mid-late teens but to decry anything that comes after our own personal watershed it to become our parents in the most narrow minded of ways. There is room for all in a vibrant music scene,even those you feel can't play their instruments.
I think it was
your spiky haired pals who were denouncing all that came before. And indie is largely a retread of the 60s and 70s, The Beatles, Byrds, the Stones, Nick Drake etc etc. The very people, actually, that the class of 76 disliked so much.
I don't know...
for me Punk led me on a musical journey back through the New York CBGB's scene, the Velvets, Stooges, MC5, Doors, the old Nuggets American garage bands and the Kinks, Troggs and the Who.
The Clash and the Ruts got me interested in Reggae too.
Also, the influence lives on to this day and I would say far more people want to form a band to be like The Clash, Oasis, U2 than they want to be like Emerson Lake & Palmer.
And in most cases
if they've taken a cold, hard listen to themselves playing, that's probably a very wise decision.
Everything
is derivative of something else.Punk was a return to the 3 minute blast of rock'n'roll and the 60's garage scene. There is nothing new under the sun.Do you think that the stones were not a retread? Still,as Elvis and others got up peoples noses it's great to see that the very thought of punk can still get some people seething.
I've got three bricks..
..can I build you a house?
Strange how incompetence is shunned in most human endeavor, but applauded in rock music.(Or it was, for about ten minutes in 1977)
It was hardly a revolution was it? More like yer average ten-yearly changing of the guard.A few inkies tried to turn it into one.
So then
Going by that arguement we should all shun rock music and listen to the most complex classical music we can find. That is just musical snobbery.
Not at all....
..punk apologists seem to believe that their darlings invented simplicity and the do-it-yourself attitude, but didn't the skiffle scene do exactly the same thing, and aren't the great songs of Hank Williams, Bob Dylan,Cyril Tawney etc musically simple?
Don't confuse simplicity with the incompetence that the early punk bands and their acolytes revelled in.
..and how come 20 minute guiar solos were alright when the ghastly Television indulged, eh?..eh?
There's nothing snobbish about listening to music
that is complex (whether in the Western classical tradition or otherwise). It just requires open mindedness and a willingness to work at understanding something a little more complex than three chords. It's not *better*, just *different*.
I'm currently having a new studio & office built...
I've got a great architect, he didn't go to architecture school and is learning as he goes. The building will only last 6 months but, hey, it's *authentic*.
And not just authentic
It's relevant.
Yeah,..look at that wanker..
..Christopher Wren. Too complicated for his own good, all you need are three walls.
As John Peel said, he's a complete waste of talent and concrete.
So much spleen
Vented at a musical genre. Chill out. I can happily listen to all types of music. None would upset me the way punk obviously riles you.You're not Bob Harris by any chance. Mock rock eh?
Nah, they're just kidding...
don't rise to it Doug!
Bob Harris...
..now there's a man!
I've always believed "mock rock" (and I've seen the clip) arose from the fact that The Dolls were just about the first band ever on Whistle Test to play to a backing track.
Now there was a bunch of no-hopers if ever I saw one.
I'd almost prefer Eater.
Miming along to a backing track
(often with live vocals) wasn't uncommon in the early days of the OGWT but the New York Dolls were the first not to bother trying to mime convincingly.
Heresy
If you look carefully Bob Marley and the Wailers are miming to "Stir it up" in their famous clip. The Dolls were a joke though, I agree with Shane.
I seem to remember that, on the OGWT DVDs...
Alice Cooper and The Who were also miming the music.
I'm with Twang
To quote from a letter of mine that was published in the magazine a long time ago 'I did mind the bollocks'.
Whither Jane Suck?
The first issues of Loops magazine includes Jon Savage's outtakes from the England's Dreaming Tapes, including a long interview with Jane Suck.
It includes the following note:
"Jane Jackman, aka Jane Suck, was my friend and colleague at Sounds and, I thought, the most naturally talented writer of all the punk generation. After leaving the music press under the circumstances that she relates below, she got a BA at the University Of East Anglia and resumed writing under the name Jane Solanas. Her current whereabouts are unknown"
The "circumstances", man
Spill the "circumstances"!
I'm sure I read somewhere...
...that she now writes under the handle 'Sian Solanas', and has penned a couple of Pop Idol-related books, including 'Gareth Gates: Right From The Start'. We've all got to eat.
Hmm
I would love to think that this is her but I suspect it isn't.
She certainly wrote under the name Jane Solanas (presumably a reference to Valerie, of SCUM fame) and possibly under her real name, Jane Jackman.
She was a genuine talent - I much preferred her writing to that of her now more famous contemporaries. I can think of few things that would gladden my heart more than to see her byline in The Word.
Alas...
Sian Solanas appears to be someone else entirely. A bit of digging suggests that she is Sian Pattenden, AKA Mrs Luke Haines : http://sianpattenden.co.uk/biography/
Amusing choice of pseudonym though.
This here blog...
...is the most up to date thing I've ever been able to find on her. Somewhat ominous, however it might help avoid interested folk wading through the search results arising from 'jane suck'...
http://littleredbookthoughts.blogspot.com/2006/09/if-it-aint-stiff.html
I wasn't sure if I wanted this or not
as I've read England's Dreaming and wasn't sure that the new one would be a worthwhile addition, but your post has meant I'm going to have to visit the bookshop again at lunchtime!
Unsung heroes: Not only Subway Sect but the UK Subs played the Roxy, they were there at the start! Along with Wire, The Stranglers, they always get airbrushed out of the "cool" retrospective's
Two Aussie bands..
..The Saints and Radio Birdman who were at least as awful as The Pistols, were shunned because their hair was too long.
How unutterably pathetic.
True, both great bands
but I (probably like a lot of people in the UK) only found out about them much later due to CD re-issues and suchlike.
I picked up a great compilation of Australian Punk "Do The Pop!" a few years back and it is excellent but I don't think any of the bands would have got any coverage.
That was the down side of the UK Punk scene for me - the complete and utter snobbery of it all, not just against the prog-rockers and rock star lifestyles (fair enough!) and not just against bands from other countries - I mean how can the Pistols camp keep denying that they ripped off everything from Richard Hell!? And Steve Jones copied every Johnny Thunders move under the sun!
Actually the worse bit was the snobbery amongst their contemporaries. UK Subs had a singer who was old, Stranglers were old hippies, Ian Dury was a Pub Rocker, Wire were too arty, Damned were just big kids out for a laugh, thing is they made some of the best music for me!
Quite right
Quite right too.F#ckin' hippies.
I *heart* Vic
Vic Godard is great, and dangerously close to deserving National Treasure status. Ambition, Parallel Lines, Stool Pigeon - what a magnificent hat-trick. He's a true outsider who's been ploughing his own furrow for the last 30-plus years, and he's still a hugely charismatic and engaging performer, well worth seeing live.
Skiffle......the real DIY music explosion
Always hated the Clash and, frankly, punk.
Rather than a kick in the eye for the music industry it always struck me that the industry split and therefore sold more records.
The Beatles and the Stones had been far more of a jolt to Decca and EMI.
Punk is also always compared to the tat of the mid-70's which it 'replaced' (the musical equivalent of preferring to step in a cow pat rather than a dog turd) but compare it to the music scene of the mid-60's.....and it is garbage.
The true DIY music which involved the WHOLE nation with groups down EVERY street and performances in EVERY living room was.........Skiffle.
Although rarely spoken of other than as a footnote, for every punk band I'd estimate there were at least a hundred, maybe even a thousand, skiffle groups.
where's me washboard?
Tea chest?
it's all tea bags these days...
Can I once again recommend Pete Frame's
*excellent* book, 'The Restless Generation: How Rock Music Changed The Face of 1950s Britain'.
Covers the journey from trad jazz -> skiffle -> British rock n roll through the eyes of those who were there.
"...and what a strange journey it is, leading the reader from riverside pubs in Middlesex circa 1949 to sweaty Soho clubs in the Fifties via countless variety shows and talent contests, protest marches, package tours and even a Louisiana jail. The young Cliff is there, of course, along with Messrs Fury, Faith and Wilde, but the true pioneer, according to the author's meticulous researches and fund of rich anecdotes, was the late, unsung jazz fiend Ken Colyer, who paved the way for the skiffle of Lonnie Donegan et al and later the Old Kent Road-caveman rock of Tommy Steele."
It's an awesome work of research, up there with Revolution In The Head as an essential work of reference.