Junior Delgado was one of the lesser celebrated figures of reggae music – with one of the most prolific and longer-lasting careers.

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French vocal trio Belle Epoque had their biggest (and possibly only) hit single in 1977 with disco classic Black Is Black.

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Back when punk and reggae were rebel bedfellows, I discovered this deep cut – thanks to Johnny Rotten. I still can’t find out much about it.

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Motörhead shook the foundations of the Top of the Pops studio in 1980 when they played a barnstorming cover of an old Motown tune.

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I’d never heard of The Bears until I began reading Richard Norris’s memoir, Strange Things Are Happening, and came across their debut single, On Me.

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A Carry On-style collaboration between John Martyn and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, Big Muff came into being at the breakfast table of Island boss Chris Blackwell.

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One of the great singles from the punk period, Spanish Stroll has nothing much in common with the rest of the CBGBs crowd. But that’s where it came from. And it’s just a classic, with that lazily strummed guitar intro and the spoken word Spanish bit in the middle.

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There was no escaping this song in the summer of ’77, though I was far more interested in the Pistols and the Clash than chart-topping disco tunes.

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The Zeros are another of the long-forgotten punk bands from the Class of ’77. This was on the fairly terrible Streets compilation on Beggars Banquet that year.

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