Marquee Moon is one of my favourite albums of the ’70s so this should be right in my wheelhouse. And it mostly is. Verlaine is a better songwriter than a lot of his contemporaries (with the notable exception of David Byrne), though he’s hardly an all time great. He has a good sense of melody, …
Tag: Art Punk
Playing With a Different Sex (1981) by Au Pairs
This is an excellent feminist post punk record that has right been compared to Gang of Four, both for its political lyrics and its danceability.
Penis Envy (1981) by Crass
I can be a little skeptical of records from certain genres released past the genre’s “moment.” So I’m often skeptical of “classic” punk records that were released after 1978 just as I’m skeptical of “classic” new wave records released in the ’80s.
The Great Annihilator (1995) by Swans
I am still far from a Swans expert – though I have seen them in concert! – but I feel compelled to echo the comments of others about how this record feels either like “more accessible Swans” or some kind of hybrid of their ’80s sound with a more traditional approach to songwriting (at least …
Wrong (1989) by NoMeansNo
I had no idea what I was getting into with this band, assuming they were just yet another pop punk band. So I was very pleasantly surprised by this record, which really gets in my wheelhouse at times. But I can’t love the record, because, well, I’ve listened to too many of the bands that …
154 (1979) by Wire
Perhaps the shock has warn off. Chairs Missing is so different from Pink Flag – not to mention it helped invent a genre – that one sort of expected a similar leap between Chairs Missing and this record. I’m not trying to say they’re that similar, but they’re certainly more similar than I had been …
Cut (1979) by The Slits
I am having a hard time thinking of this band as something more than “not the Raincoats” or “lesser Raincoats”. And that’s utterly ridiculous. A quick google will demonstrate that this album came out two months before the Raincoats’ debut album. And it’s not either band’s fault that I have listened to multiple Raincoats albums …
Y (1979) by The Pop Group
Ever since I first heard about this band, I had a feeling I would like them, if only because of their name. For some reason (their name starts with a p!) it has taken me years to get around to listening to them.
Public Image First Issue (1978) by Public Image Ltd
Simon Reynolds begins his definitive history of post punk, Rip It Up and Start Again with “Public Image” and this album. He argues that Lydon leaving the Sex Pistols, recording and releasing a song about them and releasing this record mark the point at which punk wasn’t just punk, but evolved into something else. It …
Prehistoric Sounds (1978) by The Saints
Eternally Yours might be the first ever “punk with horns” album, but the band lacked the courage of its convictions and only put them on some tracks. Not so here; instead we have the full embrace of the horn section and the result is, for me, a substantial improvement on the last album.
Real Life (1978) by Magazine
As an album recorded by a band featuring the former lead singer of one of the original British punk bands, but manifestly not playing punk rock, I think there’s a temptation to say this record could be the original post-punk record. (It literally is “post punk” in that sense.) That in itself would make this …
Adventure (1978) by Television
It’s hard when you’ve only ever listened to one album by a band for so long, you think that that album is the band. Worse, it’s the band’s “classic” and the one everyone knows.
Easter (1978) by Patti Smith Group
I struggle with Patti Smith; she’s one of those artists I think I should like, not just because of received opinion but because the things she does are things I supposedly like. But for some reason I have this barrier. I think it comes from how I first heard her.
The Modern Dance (1978) by Pere Ubu
Imagine New Wave at its absolute quirkiest (i.e. Devo) and then add a dose of avant rock from the late 1960s and you get some vague idea of what Pere Ubu sounds like on their debut. All the herky jerky New Wave stuff is here but so are piercing noises, samples of who knows what, …