Man – Four Day Louise

23rd October 2021 · 1970s, 1974, Music

The first gig I ever saw was by a Welsh rock group called Man, in May 1974.

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There were a couple of bands in the mid-Seventies sending up the sort of rock’n’roll excess that spawned punk – while simultaneously revelling in exactly the sort of sounds they satirised through a proto-punk prism.

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I never got to see The 101ers, even though they were playing regularly at the Elgin in Ladbroke Grove when I was living not far away off the Gloucester Road.
 

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I’ve never really bought into the idea of the “guilty pleasure” so I feel no shame about liking and posting this song.

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OK, this song is awful. But it’s a bit of pop history because even though it wasn’t Lou Reed’s first recording it was the catalyst for the creation of The Velvet Underground.

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I’m not sure The Runaways were ever really a punk group, but they made their mark at the right time to be part of our world and they were punky enough to play CBGBs alongside Blondie and Television and The Ramones.

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The Modern Lovers’ only album is, for me, one of the greatest albums ever. Roadrunner is pretty much a standard now. It’s astonishing that this song, which most of us only heard years later, was recorded back in 1972. (more…)

 I had never heard of The Velvet Underground while they were still going. Of course I hadn’t – I was 12 when Lou Reed left the band, and only eight years old when they recorded their landmark debut album.
 

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RIP Paddy Moloney (1938-2021)

14th October 2021 · 2021, Music

I only had the one encounter with Paddy Moloney, the late leader of The Chieftains. It was in Japan. (more…)

Not one but eight snippets of songs from the earliest days of punk, shot at CBGBs in New York over the course of (I’m guessing) 1974 and 1975. (more…)