Punk doesn’t get much punkier than Lookalikes, the anti-conformist anthem that opens Temptations Of A White Collar Worker, the debut EP by Manchester band The Drones.
Its chorus – “We don’t wanna conform / And I don’t wanna be you / And you don’t wanna be me” – captures the essence of the spirit that fired punk into life.
Before long it would soon sound ironic as a generation of suburban punks rushed out to get mohicans and motorcycle jackets like the ‘punks’ they had seen in the tabloids and on TV.
I love the plangent one-note wail of lead guitar that punctuatesin what is otherwise a fairly standard slice of what one critic called “dole queue punk.” As is the anti-monarchy jubilee song that followed it – Corgi Crap.
Recorded back in April 1977, it was the first release by The Drones, a pub rock group (fka Rockslide) who had released a solitary single, Roller Coaster before reinventing themselves as a punk band.
Helped by a high-profile manager in NME writer Paul Morley, a fellow Manc, they moved to London and became regulars at the Roxy before scoring a support slot on a Stranglers tour.
They released a second single, Bone Idol, and recorded a Peel session, before their debut album Further Confessions, came out in December that year.
It would be another 22 years before they reunited to record a follow-up arrived and toured America for the first time.
Despite the deaths of singer MJ Drone (aka Michael Howells) in 2013 and drummer Pete Purrfect (aka Peter Howells) in 2019, the band soldiered on with new recruits joining guitarist Gus Gangrene – now retired due to ill health – and bass player Steve ‘Wispa’ Cundall.
He now remains the only original in the latest version of The Drones, alongside drummer Brian Grantham (ex-Slaughter & The Dogs) and guitarist Al Crosby (of Ed Banger & The Nosebleeds).
Their last release in 2018 was an EP called Who Will Stand In Front Of The Bullets (featuring a reworking of Hard On Me from the debut EP).
It sold out, prompting a second pressing, suggesting that what it says on those studded leather jackets may well be true – “Punks Not Dead.”