The Barracudas’ only hit is almost perfect: a punk-propelled pastiche of a Sixties surf-pop song, complete with that opening radio ad to set the scene.

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Here’s wishing all my gloomy gothic friends in black all the very best for World Goth Day.. with the help of the patron saints of goth.

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I have loved this song since the day I first heard it, and I still love it just as much today. The only doubt I have ever had is whether I prefer it to Wah! Heat’s first single Better Scream.

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The Moondogs were another of the seemingly endless parade of power pop bands to spring up in Northern Ireland in the late 70s.

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This is one of the odder oddities of the punk era, even by the oddball standards of Stiff Records. Digging it out from my collecton, I have a confession to make – I had mentally filed the band as Joe ‘King’ Carrasco and the CLOWNS.

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I suppose you’d have to call Vic Godard another of the oddballs of punk, alongside the likes of Wreckless Eric, Johnny Moped, Kevin Rowland and Spizz.

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Of all the great female-fronted bands that punk produced – Siouxsie, Slits, Raincoats, Delta 5, Kleenex – the most confrontational were the Au Pairs. They were also my favourites.

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Here’s a Beatles cover by The Feelies, whose 1980 debut album was a landmark in the New Wave that followed punk. (more…)

Terence Wilson, universally known as Astro, was the percussionist and part-time toaster in UB40, the unfairly maligned kings of UK reggae.

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