I Believe in Anarchy: Anarcho-Punk, Crust Punk, D-Beat, and the UK82 Movement

D-beat and crossover pioneers Discharge playing an early gig in Los Angeles

Punk rock was not inherently political at its outset.  Particularly in New York, the music that came to be called punk was much more about art and freedom of expression.  And with the obvious exception of the MC5, even protopunk wasn’t particularly political; while making noisy music a la the Stooges or dressing up in drag like the New York Dolls sends a message (political and otherwise), it isn’t affiliated with any particular political ideology.  Even the MC5 quickly distanced themselves after the arrest of their manager and political Svengali John Sinclair. 

At the start there was nothing inherently political about English punk either.  The Pistols flirted with anarchy on their first single and artists like Sid Vicious and Siouxsie Sioux adopted swastikas and fascist iconography, but in both cases there was no real commitment to either ideology and they were used predominantly for their shock value.  Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren had famously dressed the Dolls up in communist imagery in his brief stint as their manager before their dissolution in 1975, so the Pistols’ “Anarchy in the U.K.” was nothing more than an attempt to rile up conservative England.

Of all the English punk bands, only the Clash hewed to a stronger political stance, mostly an anti-racism, anti-war, pro-left stance.  Songs like “White Riot”, “What Man in Hammersmith Palais”, “Clampdown”, “Police on my Back” and their cover of Bobby Fuller’s “I Fought the Law” had no firm ideological connection to any established political party but nevertheless espoused more completely than other punk bands these stances. 

Within a very short time, however, other bands arose that DID take their politics seriously, very seriously.   Starting as early as 1977, several bands arose that would eventually go on to spearhead what was called the anarcho-punk movement.  Musically these bands often had little in common but thematically much if not all of their lyrical content and other published literature espoused a true anarchist or at the very least an anti-establishment stance.  In this regard they were very much the metaphorical (and occasionally literal) children of the hippie and yippie movements of the 60’s.  Other common causes of these bands include pro-squatting, feminism, anti-racism, anti-war, pro-equality, and environmentalism.

The grandfather (and grandmother) of all anarcho-punk bands is the Essex musical collective Crass.  They formed out of Dial House, a squat housing members of two avant garde performance groups by singer Steve Ignorant and drummer Penny Rimbaud, along with other members such as Joy De Vivre and Eve Libertine.  Their first performance was a live gig at a squatted festival (the plug was reportedly pulled after just 3 songs) and they quickly evolved from shambolic beginnings to a more musically, lyrically, and politically focused unit.

Crass became leaders in this nascent musical/political sphere,  protesting everything from skinhead racism and other forms of fascism, hard right Thatcherite English governmental policies, and the Falklands war and other forms of military and cultural imperialism. 

Crass released five amazing albums in the late 70’s and early 80’s: 1978’s The Feeding of the 5000, 1979’s Stations of the Crass, 1980’s Penis Envy,  1982’s Christ, The Album, and 1983’s Yes Sir, I Will.  On each of these they produced songs that were short, loud, sloppy, angry blasts against hypocrisy, violence, greed, discrimination, and materialism.  Standout tracks include “Do They Owe Us a Living?”, “Punk Is Dead”, and “Asylum” off Feeding;  “Mother Earth” and “White Punks on Hope” off Stations; “Bata Motel” and “Where Next Columbus” off Penis Envy; “Mother Love” and “Have a Nice Day” from Christ; and “Track 3” “Track 4” from Yes Sir.

Scotland’s The Exploited, while never fully affiliated with anarcho-punk, were not too far away, being at the forefront of heavily politicized hardcore.  I was a big fan of the Exploited by about ’85 or ’86, and “I Believe in Anarchy”, “Punks Not Dead” (an answer song to “Punk is Dead” by Crass), “Let’s Start a War”, and my all-time favorite “God Saved the Queen” from their 1983 album Let’s Start a War.

The Subhumans were another anarcho-punk first wave band.  Formed in 1980, their early work hewed closely to the sound and form of Crass and other such bands.  The vocals of singer Dick Lucas are snotty and very Johnny Rotten influenced.  iTunes has several of their albums, including 1982’s The Day the Country Died, 1983’s From the Cradle To the Grave and  1986’s EP-LP.  The best songs are traditional punk anthems like “Animal” and “Society”.  I only recently downloaded some Subhumans from these albums; my favorites are “All Gone Dead”, “Minority” (which thematically edges very close to “White Minority” by Black Flag) and the catchy guitar chug and rumbling bass of “Killing” from Day and “Reality is Waiting for a Bus” and “Waste of Breath” from Cradle, both of which highlight the musical growth of the band from their fast, sloppy beginnings into a band with considerable musical complexity.  The almost twangy guitar on “Waste of Breath” is particularly catchy.

Another early pioneer of the anarcho-punk sound and lyrical bent that was never officially a part of the movement proper was Discharge.  Discharge were, however, true pioneers in punk music; their late 70’s singles were the first glimmers of what would become hardcore, and later they were one of the first to infuse metal sounds and stylings into hardcore punk.  Their early songs had a bludgeoning, sound in which centered on rumbling bass and the heavily distorted guitar sound of guitarist Tony Bones.  “The End” is triphammer fast, and is likely one of the songs that gave rise to D-beat (see below).  “Protest and Survive” and my favorite song by Discharge, “Free Speech for the Dumb” both also off their 1982 album Hear Nothing See Nothing Say Nothing are absolute classics; the latter consists of a rumbling wall of guitar and bass with Cal Morris shouting the song title over and over again, and was covered quite capably by Metallica on their 1999 covers album Garage, Inc.  The noodling guitar on “Free Speech” is one of the first metal flourishes to grace any punk song that I know of.  I also like “A Look At Tomorrow”, “Society’s Victim”, “Fight Back”, and “Does This System Work” from their debut album Why?  Even on this early album Discharge was starting to move their lyrics away from rebellion and rage and toward much darker and violent subject matter, particularly on songs like “Massacre of Innocents” and “Maimed and Slaughtered”.

Discharge’s music represented a branch point for English hardcore in general and anarcho-punk in particular.  Their evolution towards a more metallic sound was pioneering; former guitarist Tony Bones eventually went on to form the hardcore/metal group Broken Bones with his brother Tezz on bass after Discharge broke up in 1983; Broken Bones’ music veered even closer to heavy metal, particularly speed metal, and has been cited as a key influence on the development of crossover/thrash.  I can still remember buying the Broken Bones album Bonecrusher in 1986 shortly after it came out; I bought it at some small record store on Hollywood Blvd. and listening to it at this time, when I was just starting to get into metallic hardcore and crossover/thrash (it was around this time that I bought Metallica’s Ride the Lightning too) it was almost too much for my innocent punk ears.  The leadoff song, “Seeing Thru My Eyes” starts with a rumbling bass that sounds like a Panzer tank rolling by before breaking into the sourest, most awful and despairing metal guitar/feedback wail of all time, then launching into a speed-of-light hardcore assault.  “Decapitated, Pt. 2” is similarly hyperkinetic, starting with a chugging guitar riff before blasting into a tachycardic drum beat.  Broken Bones still occasionally had song titles and lyrics that reflected their former members’ glory days in Discharge (“Wealth Rules” from 1984’s Dem Bones and “Program Control” from Bonecrusher) but they also started flirting with themes that would find full fruition in the death metal and grindcore movement, as demonstrated by songs like “Point of Agony”, “Liquidated Brains”, “Death Is imminent” and “Decapitated”.   The English Dogs took this even further, evolving from a hardcore band to a full-blown metal band in the vein of Iron Maiden, with pure metal riffage and solos and songs obsessed with the mystical such as “The Eye of Shamahn”, “A Tomb of Travellers Past” and “He Who is Bound Shall Be Freed” on their album Where Legend Began, which sounds like a missing Metallica album between Kill ‘Em All and Ride the Lightning.

Other English bands were also evolving toward a hardcore/metal fusion at this time, including one of my all-time favorites, G.B.H. (sometimes also called Charged GBH or GBH).  G.B.H. (the initials stand for grievous bodily harm, a legal term for assault in the U.K.).  G.B.H. started in 1978 and by the early 80’s was a major standard bearer for traditional hardcore, most notable on songs like “Slut”, “Sick Boy”, and “City Baby Attacked by Rats” (all off the album of this last name).  Their look was succinctly encapsulated  by the title of their first EP, 1981’s Leather, Bristles, Studs, and Acne:  G.B.H. were leather and studs clad, Mohawked young punks and their iconic look became massively influential in American hardcore circles during the early 80’s. 

My first G.B.H. album was 1986’s Midnight Madness and Beyond, which I bought shortly after it came out and which showcased their evolution towards crossover/thrash.  G.B.H. was never quite as metallic as some of their compatriots but this sound was definitely an evolution away from their more straightforward hardcore past.  Songs like “Limpwristed” (which sneers at how weak punk has gotten since their 1983 album City Baby’s Revenge), “Future Fugitives”, “Iroquois”, and the title track were amazing punk metal anthems.  “Limpwristed” was my favorite, building up majestically with a stirring guitar riff in a way that reminds me of “Running with the Boss Sound” by Generation X; I also love the line “wake up, the whole world’s gone limpwristed”. 

As Broken Bones and G.B.H. veered toward crossover/thrash and death metal, anarcho-punk also split further into D-beat, which is a term describing bands that continued to follow the rumbling, bludgeoning sound of Discharge (for whom its named; the “beat” in D-beat refers to the speed-of-light drum tempo that Discharge took from bands like Motorhead), and crust punk, a term that described an even heavier hardcore sound with a “dirty” or “crusty” bass sound, hence its name.  One of the main D-beat bands was the Varukers, who formed in 1979 and who’s lyrics were often extremely political.   Early singles like “Die For Your Government” and “All Systems Fail” were heavily influenced by Discharge and the Exploited’s bass-heavy sonic attack but also have sing-along choruses ripped from the Oi! textbook. 

Meanwhile, crust punk was evolving toward a more metallic sound too.  Amebix was an early standard bearer of crust punk, with early songs like “Arise!” and “Spoils of Victory” off 1985’s Arise).  “Arise!” lurches forward on a chugging rhythm that almost reminds of “For Whom the Bell Tolls” by Metallica before picking up the tempo.  The growled vocals would not sound out of place in the black metal genre either, but the song itself definitely comes from a punk approach and not a metal one.  This is a really great, stirring punk anthem.  The interestingly named Flux of Pink Indians were another crust punk pioneer.  My favorite song by them is “Tube Disaster” off the 1997 compilation Not So Brave.  The sound of this is so raw, so unpolished.

Hellbastard formed around 1985; unfortunately iTunes and Amazon.com don’t have any of their early singles, but “Interrogate Them” and Justly Executed” off 1992’s Natural Order show that they were still keeping the flame alive into the early 90’s.  “Justly Executed” has a very metal beginning that reminds me of the Dogtown punk metal of bands like Beowulf and Excel.  It was Hellbastard’s 1985 song “Rippercrust” that gave crust punk its name.

The Electro Hippies also had a heavily metallicized hardcore sound like Hellbastard. “Unity” off their 1988 album The Only Good Punk draws heavily from Discharge and Metallica (who by this time had become much more renowned).  Other songs off this album like “Run Ronald” and “Scum” are closer to grindcore, with growled, incoherent vocals and a wall of guitar noise.

D-beat became very popular in Sweden.  Several Swedish punk/hardcore bands took up the D-beat banner, including the Rude Boys (their song “Raggare is a Bunch of Motherfuckers” is on YouTube) , KSMB (ditto their song “Slemmig Torsk”), and Anti-Cimex (their song “Raped Ass” is one of the noisiest, most insane punk songs I’ve ever heard; it reminds me of “White Minority” or “Six Pack” by Black Flag mashed together, covered by Discharge, with Bobby Ebz of Genocide singing vocals).

In America, crust punk never really caught on as a major movement, but three bands in three geographically distinct locales took some of the sound and leftist political stance into their own sound.  One of the earliest and most committed was San Francisco’s Crucifix. Actually formed in Berkeley in 1980 by Cambodian refugee Sothira Pheng, Crucifix rapidly adopted the leather, bristles, and studs look of their UK82 brothers.  In 1983 they released an album heavily influenced by the sound of classic anarcho-punk and English hardcore bands like Crass, the Subhumans and G.B.H. entitled Dehumanization.  Pheng’s vocals displayed a heavy Darby Crash influence, particularly on songs like “Annihilation” and “Skinned Alive”.  Amazingly, iTunes has this album available and its regarded as a bona fide anarcho-punk classic.  Most of their song titles and lyrics reflect a mix of political topics (“Prejudice”, “Indo China”, “Seeing Through Their Lies”, and “Stop Torture”) and a less political and more thematically dark content more in line with the ideals of Broken Bones and G.B.H. (“Skinned Alive”, “Death Toll”).

Austin, Texas band the Stains formed in 1979 alongside such other first-wave Texas punk bands as the Big Boys and the Dicks.  In 1982 they relocated to Frisco and renamed themselves MDC, for Millions of Dead Cops.  Their songs tended to be heavily political and reflected the anti-establishment, anti-corporate beliefs of classic anarcho-punk:  “Death Burger”, “Business On Parade”, and one of their most legendary songs, “John Wayne Was a Nazi”. 

Raleigh, North Carolina might seem like an odd place for the third major American anarcho-punk band to form, but Corrosion of Conformity both sonically and lyrically were often very much in line with first-wave English anarcho-punk and crossover/thrash.  My favorite songs by this band are “Mine Are the Eyes of God” and “Vote with a Bullet” off 1991’s Blind.  “Mine” is big and chugging with staccato drums and sounds like something off Master of Puppets.  Formed in 1982, CoC evolved from a heavily Black Flag-influenced sound (which itself wasn’t too far from the sound of Discharge in the Damaged days) into a much more speed metal-influenced sound.  Unfortunately, iTunes does not yet have their pre-metal hardcore debut Eye For An Eye, but Blind and 1985’s Animosity (“Intervention” is a good track, apocalyptic and ominous) and 1987’s Technocracy all capture the band in their crossover/thrash prime.    I, uh, obtained an MP3 of “Minds Are Controlled” off Eye many years ago, it’s a song that lurches between a slow chugging rhythm and superfast tempos interspersed and sounds like a cross between Black Flag and the Germs. 

In retrospect its incredible how popular anarcho-punk, crossover/thrash, and the like were in Southern California when I was growing up there in the early and mid-80’s.  On leather jackets throughout the Southland you saw the logos and names of many of the bands featured in this post, most notably G.B.H., Crass, the Subhumans, and Corrosion of Conformity.  Eventually these bands started strongly influencing the first generation of speed metal bands, including most obviously Metallica, Megadeth, and Slayer.  These bands and their followers built upon the bridges between punk and metal established by these bands (as well as the hyperfast metal of bands like black metal pioneers Venom) to create speed metal.  Speed metal continued to grow underground throughout the 80’s and eventually created death metal and other genres.  Punk and metal had truly crossed over.

Cool Names and Retro Revivals

Norway's answer to Motorhead, Chrome Division

In my roamings through iTunes recently I’ve discovered a handful of bands to whom I was attracted initially solely based on the coolness of their name.  Now, a band’s name isn’t always going to tell you everything about a band, but it often gives you some indication of their musical direction.  Take the Diamond Dogs, for example.  Their sound  of this Swedish band nestles nicely in the mid-70’s niche between Bowie’s immediate post-Ziggy work (obviously) and the arena rock strut of Kiss, Nugent, etc.  “Generation Upstart” off their 2006 album Up the Rock even starts with a tinkling piano and rollicking tempo of classic T. Rex, but with raspy vocals that evoke Jim Dandy of Black Oak Arkansas .  “Come Away” has bluesy kick and blustery horns but rides along like a cross between “Strutter ‘78” and Cherie Currie’s “Call Me At Midnight”.  “You’ve Got Nothing On Me” starts with a countrified guitar riff but evolves into a catchy blast of 70’s inspired guitar-infuse blue-eyed soul in the “Young Americans” vein.  The Diamond Dogs are worthy peers to their more rockin’ fellow countrymen the Hellacopters and Finland’s Flaming Sideburns, both of whom worship at the idol of Iggy, Kiss, the Dolls, etc.

Speaking of the Stooges and Dolls, the Chelsea Smiles (another great name) play a raucous 21^st century take on their classic protopunk sleaze.   “Nothing Wrong” off their album Thirty-Six Hours Later in fact sounds like a perfect amalgamation of “Raw Power” by Iggy and the Stooges and “Puss In Boots” by the Dolls, two of my favorite songs ever.  It’s got the lurching, bludgeoning wall of guitar of “Raw Power” and even adds some skirling James Williamson style guitar over the top of it.  “I Want More” also has the three chord rhythm of “Raw Power”; any fans of this album and song will love either of these contemporary takes on Iggy’s classic sound.  “Nothing To Lose” comes across like a cross between Johnny Thunders and the MC5, all flashy strut and jackhammer rhythm guitar again with the blasts of Williamson “Search and Destroy” style lead guitar licks pasting it together.   “Alright, Alright” has an even faster tempo and reminds me of some of the Hellacopters’ manic take on 70’s protopunk.  The Smiles even do a cover of “Chatterbox” by the New York Dolls that’s a turbocharged update on the original.

And talk about a great name:  the Lords of Altamont from my hometown of LA are amazing purveyors of 60’s garage rock with a contemporary blast of energy and amplification.  One of my favorite songs by them is “$4.95” off 2005’s Lords Have Mercy, with its bludgeoning low-fi 60’s vibe and swirling Farfisa organ sound that builds into a repeating, heavy but catchy riff and bombasting drums.  This is music that makes me want to frug AND slam and must be amazing live.  This song is very strongly recommended for anyone who wants to see what the Human Beinz or the Standells would sound like in the 21^st century.   The song “Intro” which starts their third album The Altamont Sin is really nothing but the big guitar intro from Joy Division’s “No Love Lost” fuel injected and fuzzed out and is thoroughly enjoyable.  “Going Nowhere Fast” off this same album starts with a drum kick that makes me think of the Three O’Clock’s “With a Cantaloupe Girlfriend” before launching into a catchy chorus that sounds a little like “Search and Destroy” too but again the delicious organ, particularly the solo at the break, keeps it more firmly anchored in an updated 60’s garage sound.  “F.F.T.S” off their most recent album, 2011’s Midnight to 666 is less overtly garage-y, sounding more like a reboot of the MC5 crossed with Guitar Wolf, possibly “American Ruse”? 

I don’t have too much from them, but the Cherry Valence named their group after Diane Lane’s character in the classic 80’s teen movie “The Outsiders” (which was based on the book by Susie Hinton).  Their sound centers on a reinterpretation of classic 70’s hard rock and southern fried boogie like Skynyrd, Nuge, Black Oak Arkansas, etc., but adds a soupcon of Detroit protopunk that lifts this music even higher.  “Sunglasses and Headlights” from 2005s TCV3 has that southern stomp but adds a liberal dose of Guns ‘N’ Roses snarl.  “Two Steps Forward” has the bump and bounce of Foghat or “Stranglehold” but the vocals remind me of Rob Tyner’s on MC5 songs like “Back in the USA”.  “You’ve Got To Wait” and “Caves of Steel” continue with a grinding rhythm still firmly grounded in the whole Molly Hatchet, .38 Special vibe but again there’s an MC5 flavor here too.

And finally, Chrome Division are Norway’s answer to Motorhead, playing music with jackhammer tempos and bludgeoning punk/metal riffs that is the best thing this side of Lemmy’s warts.  The are a side project of vocalist Shagrath, who sings for several Norwegian black metal bands.  “Chrome Division” off Doomsday Rock and Roll is a great example here; the Motorhead vibe is broken only by the dark/black metal interlude in the middle of the song and the guitar harmonies that remind me of Thin Lizzy’s dual guitar attack at the end.  I even love that they wrote a song named after themselves, much like Lemmy named his post-Hawkwind band after one of the only songs he wrote for that band before leaving.  “Serial Killer”, also off this same 2006 album has the growled Lemmy vocals and triphammer tempo of “Ace of Spades”; even the guitar here sounds like “Fast” Eddie Clarke’s work on that legendary album, except toward the end, where again the guitar harmonies evoke Thin Lizzy or Wishbone Ash. “The Angel Falls”, also off 2006’s Doomsday Rock and Roll ,starts quietly, like “No One Like You” by the Scorpions but quickly builds to a thunderous AC/DC-like riff (it actually sounds to me like something that might have come off the Cult’s Sonic Temple Album guitar-wise) that occasionally chugs like “South of Heaven” by Slayer.  This is Chrome Division at their mellowest and most melodic and while it’ll never supplant Leo Sayer or Roxette in terms of pop sweetness, it’s a refreshing change of pace (literally) from the blitzkrieg assault of songs like “Serial Killer”.  “Wine of Sin” off 2008’s Booze, Broads and Beezlebub has a crisp guitar riffing that almost reminds me of the riffage on Metallica’s “Jump into the Fire” with elements of GnR’s “Nightrain”. And finally, “Satisfy My Soul” off 2011’s 3^rd Round Knockout is another slow heavy chugger.  My only problem with Chrome Division is that the growled vocals can occasionally veer away from Lemmy and toward Norwegian death metal or even nu-metal, neither of which I much like. 

Let's Get It Up: AC/DC and Their Many Imitators

The third greatest rock band ever.

I’ve mentioned many times on this blog what a latecomer I was to heavy metal, being as I was a child of the punk/new wave explosion of the late 70’s and early 80’s.  But perhaps surprisingly the one genre of music that I DID start liking early on was hard rock a la AC/DC.  My exposure to AC/DC started pretty early actually; back in the early 80’s, the line between punk/new wave and hard rock like AC/DC wasn’t as hard and firm as it is now, and specifically I can remember legendary Southern California new wave radio station KROQ playing “Let’s Get It Up” by AC/DC often, and it remains one of my favorite AC/DC songs to this day.   

But it wasn’t until 1986 or 1987 that I started actually exploring hard rock music in more detail and seeking out this music.  In the summer of 1987 I lived in a frat house on UCLA campus rather than going home and living with my parents; it was my first real attempt at independence.  I can remember buying AC/DC’s Back In Black album around that time and just loving the catchy but rocking simplicity of the songs; the title song and “You Shook Me All Night Long” were obvious standouts but some of my favorite songs were ones that allowed new lead singer Brian Johnson to really show what his voice could do.  To his immense credit, and indeed to AC/DC’s credit in hiring him, he never tried to be a Bon Scott clone; his higher pitched delivery, which had already brought him renown in England as a member of the Newcastle glam rock band Geordie, was very unique and distinctive from Bon’s raspy yowl.  In particular, I really like the bump and grind of “Given the Dog a Bone” and “Shake a Leg”, the slow steady build of “Hell’s Bells”.   “Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution” has one of my favorite lines from a song:  “I took a look inside your bedroom door, you look so good lyin’ on your bed”; I always picture ugly Brian Johnson peering with his bug eyes into some gorgeous woman’s bedroom and laugh to myself.  And finally, I love “Shoot To Thrill”, an extremely under-rated AC/DC song; I once saw a video montage of violent, gun-laden images set to this song being shown at the legendary 80’s LA hard rock club Scream that has stuck with me to this day. 

After getting into Back In Black my next discovery was of Bon Scott era AC/DC and what an amazing vocalist he was.  The first song I remember hearing of his was “’74 Jailbreak”, which was recorded in 1974 but wasn’t released in America until 1984.  The thing I love most about this song is the very first line; “There was a friend of mine on MURDER, and the judge’s gavel fell; the jury found him guilty, gave him FIFTEEN YEARS IN HELL!”  The thing was, when Bon Scott talked about knowing someone up on murder charges, YOU BELIEVED HIM.  He was one of the last true great rock and roll icons, someone who walked the walk and talked the talk, and eventually of course died way too young, choking on his own vomit (or someone else’s, they can’t really dust for vomit).   But before his tragic demise he created some magnificent music, completely different (certainly in vocals) than AC/DC’s work with Brian Johnson, so much so that I almost treat them as two different groups. 

My next discovery was the first two songs off Highway To Hell, the title song and “The Girl’s Got Rhythm”, arguably one of the best one-two punches of any album ever;  actually, one of the only ones I can think of that can best it is another Bon Scott era AC/DC album, If You Want Blood, You’ve Got It, which starts with a blistering version of “Riff Raff” then segues into a bludgeoning take on “Hell Ain’t a Bad Place to Be”.  But getting back to Highway to Hell, the riff that starts the title song, building it up before the rhythm section lurches in, is one of the most iconic and electrifying in all of rock to me; even today when I hear it it makes my heart speed up.  I first heard it at some random apartment party near UCLA campus in 1987 or so with my roommate Gil; everyone was very drunk by the time we arrived so Gil and I hijacked their tape deck and blasted those first two songs continuously all night.  I was so taken with them that I ended up stealing the cassette and taking it home!! 

And my love affair with AC/DC has continued ever since, though the last album I bought by them and really enjoyed was 1988’s Blow Up Your Video (I love “Heatseeker”, “That’s The Way I Want To Rock and Roll”, and “Go Zone” (one of the greatest surfing songs ever).  I did like the single “Money Talks” off their 1990 album Razor’s Edge but otherwise my fixation has been on older AC/DC, “Who Made Who”, “Flick of the Switch”, “Let There Be Rock”, “Rock and Roll Damnation”, “Riff Raff”, What’s Next To The Moon”, “Sin City”, “Whole Lotta Rosie”, “High Voltage”,  “It’s a Long Way To the Top (If You Want To Rock and Roll)”.

Despite my heavy leanings toward punk and new wave, I would honestly put AC/DC as the #3 greatest rock band of all time, behind only the Beatles and the Sex Pistols.  They have so many memorable, iconic, catchy songs in their canon that by sheer volume they’d make the top 5, but it’s also their image, their longevity, the distinctiveness of their sound that count here too.

Because here’s the thing:  AC/DC makes music that’s simple, direct, honest . . . but VERY few people have managed to make music as MEMORABLE as they do.  Some have come close though, whether by aping every aspect of their sound or by simply creating music that while sonically similar isn’t identical. 

Falling into the former category is the 80’s band Rhino Bucket, who’s lead singer, Finland-born Georg Dolivo, sounds like an exact freaking clone of Bon Scott.  The band has endured snipes by AC/DC fans because their sound is SO identical to that of AC/DC but frankly I’ve never understood this.  Bon Scott was dead nearly a decade by the time Rhino Bucket came on the scene and nobody else was doing anything like that at the time.  Songs like “One Night Stand”, “Beg For Your Love” and “She’s a Screamer” are like missing Bon Scott era AC/DC gems and are among my favorite hard rock songs from the 80’s.  I would honestly put Rhino Bucket’s self-titled debut album up against almost any Bon-era AC/DC album, it’s simply that good.  Anyone who tells you otherwise is some stick-up-the-ass AC/DC purist, pure and simple. 

There was a rash of Hollywood bands that strived for an AC/DC-influenced sound in the 80’s, incorporating the bluesiness and simplicity of AC/DC but the vocals and songs were not nearly as identical as those of Rhino Bucket.  Junkyard, the Sea Hags, and the Hangmen have all been written about in by me in other posts.  The best songs are “Waste of Time” by Junkyard and the classic morning after song “Rotten Sunday” by the Hangmen.

Another 80’s hard rock band that edged into AC/DC’s territory was Jetboy.  I had an early connection to this band; in early 1987 I saw them play live for free on Kerckhoff Patio at UCLA’s campus, soon after they’d relocated from San Francisco and very shortly after original bassist Todd Crew died of a drug overdose in the hotel room of Guns ‘N’ Roses guitarist Slash in 1986 (to be replaced by original Hanoi Rocks bassist Sam Yaffa).  I was really struck by their image; at a time when most hard rock and heavy metal bands were growing their hair longer and longer, lead singer Mickey Finn had a peroxide blonde Mohawk!  Quite a dramatic fashion statement at the time.  Their debut album Feel The Shake was released in ’88 and the title track is an absolute gem, with its slow, ominous guitar riff, which starts the song (and album) before the rest of the band catapult into the mix; I love the line “electric music played as loud as it comes, YEAH!”  This is vintage AC/DC boogie and groove.  I’m always a sucker for a song about rock music and this one really captures their vibe perfectly.    Their second album, 1990’s Damned Nation, was a little bluesier and the song “Stomp It (Down to the Bricks)” is another standout.  Unfortunately too much of the other material on both albums suffers from the typical late 80’s over-production and doesn’t catch the ear like either of these songs.

Switzerland’s Krokus also made riff-centric AC/DC hard rock; formed in the mid-70’s as a prog rock act, they evolved toward a metal/hard rock sound after seeing Bon Scott era AC/DC play live in the late 70’s.  They sacked their former vocalist and hired Marc Storace, who, like Georg Dolivo of Rhino Bucket, was the spitting sonic image of ol’ Bon.  They released two excellent albums in the 80’s that captured this sound (and several sucky ones that did not), 1983’s One Vice at a Time and Headhunter, which contain several could-be-mistaken-for-lost-Bon-Scott-era-AC/DC songs, including “Bad Boys, Rag Dolls”, “Night Wolf”, “Eat the Rich”, and best of all, “Long Stick Goes Boom”, with its huge guitar build-up and thumping tempo.

At the start of the 90’s Rick Rubin produced an album (Nobody Said It Was Easy) by the band the Four Horsemen that really recaptured the catchy crunch of classic AC/DC.  “Rockin’ Is Ma Business” has that classic 4/4 stomp and the simple but memorable guitar riffs that one associates with AC/DC songs like “Down Payment Blues”.  “Let It Rock”, “Lookin’ for Trouble”, and “Hot Head” have the same great hard rock flavor and are strongly recommended.

In the mid 90’s AC/DC style hard rock seemed to fall out of favor, eclipsed by first grunge, then alternative and electronica.  LA’s own Buckcherry got the hard rock ball rolling again toward the late 90’s with their debut album; hit single “Lit Up” was a catchy blast, and lead lead singer Josh Todd’s smoky, angry yowl was perfect.  “Lawless and Lulu” and “Related” are other fantastic songs that capture this band at their peak.  2001’s Time Bomb continued in an even more AC/DC influenced vein, particularly on songs like “Riding”, “Time Bomb”, and “Slammin’”, all of which capture the simplicity of AC/DC at their riff-heavy finest.

In 2004 I attended a conference in Austin Texas, and just happened to be there during some weekend music festival.  Basically for like 10 or 15 bucks you got this bracelet that got you into every participating venue, which in a music-crazy town like Austin means a LOT.  It was one of the funnest musical nights of my life; because I’d already paid it didn’t matter if I stayed or if I left, so if I walked in and the band didn’t immediately grab my attention I would walk right back out.  I probably saw two dozen bands over two nights in nearly as many venues, everything from techno to punk to early Crue-inspired glam metal to Texas blues.  It was fantastic.  Two bands I saw that really caught my ear were the Yuppie Pricks, a punk rock novelty act that wore tennis and golf clothes and sang humorous, Dickies-inspired songs like “Coke Party”, “Poverty Sucks”, and “Stock Market”; the Pricks were signed to Jello Biafra’s Alternative Tentacles label, which might not be surprising since lead singer Trevor Middleton sounds eerily like Jello form his Dead Kennedys days.  Another band from the opposite end of the spectrum I got to see soon after their formation was The Sword, who have become a critical darling in the metal world.

But the band that blew me away the most was Broken Teeth.  Formed by former 80’s glam metal band Dangerous Toys lead singer Jason McMaster in the late 90’s, Broken Teeth were a revelation live; the venue exploded with frenetic fans singing and belting out every song.  It must have been like seeing AC/DC play small clubs in Sydney circa 1974 or 1975.  “Undertaker”, from their eponymous debut album, is a fantastic slab of AC/DC-style bar boogie; even the constantly thrumming bass sounds exactly like Phil Rudd’s classic work for the brothers Young.  “Guilty Pleasure” off the 2004 album of the same name even has the “oy” backing vocal of AC/DC’s classic “TNT”.  “Hanging by the Skin” off this same album is also almost eerily AC/DC-like, the rhythms and riffs and even the big sing-along chorus,  and sounds for all the world like an amalgamation of “High Voltage” and “Flick of the Switch”.  2009’s Electric even has a song called “Bonfire”, about as close as a direct nod as you can get! 2010 saw the release of their fifth album, Viva La Rock, Fantastico!; “Spitting Nails”, “Breaking Spells”, and “Twister” all continue their AC/DC obsession.

I haven’t been able to find out much about them, but Scottsdale’s Big Cock have released a handful of albums that bridge the gap between AC/DC and Guns ‘N’ Roses.  “Real Man” off 2006’s Got Big Cock? Is a great example of this hybrid beast, vocals that yowl like Axl in fine fettle but with that classic AC/DC groove.  But its “Road To Ruin”, off 2008’s Motherload that really captures the classic AC/DC feel while still maintaining the uniqueness of the vocals so as to not sound like a tribute band. 

Two Swiss bands are also plying their hard rock trade to good measure.  Sideburn formed from the ashes of Euro metal band Genocide (not the Bobby Ebz Jersey punk metal band of the same name) in 1997 and were named after Elvis’ facial hair (definitely a plus).  “Hell on Wheels” off 2002’s Crocodile has the sound and lyrical feel of classic Bon Scott era AC/DC (albeit with a European accent), while the title track off 2003’s Cherry Red comes on like some weird cross between AC/DC and Tom Petty’s song “Running Down a Dream”, definitely a good combo in my book.  “Ghost of 1980 (Tribute to Bon Scott)” is, as the title implies, a slow, sleazy strutter that Mr. Scott would have appreciated for sure.  Also hailing from Switzerland, Backwash released just one album, 2006’s Kick Ass!  It’s got a couple of terrific rockers, “My Good and Bad” and “Crash”, which have an AC/DC-meets-the-Hellacopters vibe to them.

Also on the European front, Scotland’s Wired Desire released one excellent EP in 2008, Barely Illegal.   Each song is good but “The Hard Stuff” comes across like a cross between Flick of the Switch era AC/DC and Dr. Feelgood era Motley Crue.  The guitar solo is beautiful and unlike anything of either group though, going for a high noodling sound more reminiscent of GnR. 

My absolute favorite hard rock song of the moment though is “Suck It” by the now-defunct Long Island band Dirty Rig.  This takes its rumbling bass and boogie rhythm from AC/DC but this song is actually a magnificent amalgamation of just about every great metal band of the last 30 years;  the apocalyptically huge riff that begins the song sounds like a 21^st century reworking of “Black Sabbath” or something off Hallow’s Victim by Saint Vitus.  It’s big, doom-laden and heavy, but then it segues into a classic AC/DC boogie bass while the guitar sounds like something Rob Zombie would be proud to call his own.  The guitar solo is an almost note-for-note crib of Slash’s guitar lines from “Paradise City” by Guns ‘N’ Roses.  That’s a pretty good romp through the metal of the past three decades!  This song is everything a metal/hard rock song should be, and when it comes up on my iPod while I’m running I usually end up sprinting by the end of the song.  “Dogs” off this same album (Rock Did It from 2006) is good but “Suck It” is in a class by itself, truly.

In a similar vein are North Carolina’s Crank County Daredevils; their song “Kings of Sleaze” falls right between the elegant simplicity of AC/DC and the dangerous blast of classic Guns ‘N’ Roses, most specifically “It’s So Easy”, which is still one of my favorite GnR songs ever.  “Ride the Dog”, also from 2009’s Kings of Sleaze album, sounds almost identical.From N'Awlins comes Supagroup, who have a mellow, bluesier take, which evokes AC/DC songs like "Gone Shootin'" and "What's Next To the Moon"; "Jailbait" off their album Fire for Hire is a great example of this slow grinding vibe.

“10,000 Miles” by the Charm City Devils is another great song that captures the bluesy yowl of Bon Scott in his heyday.  This band, which is signed to Nikki Sixx’s Eleven Seven label, has released one album, 2009’s Let’s Rock and Roll, and I hope to hear more from them in the future.

Perhaps one of the strangest hard rock outfits I’ve run across is Young Heart Attack from Austin, Texas.  Their sound mines some of the classic hard rock sounds of the 70’s but with a decided 21^st century alternative twist.  Specifically, their dual vocals shared between male vocalist Chris Hodge and female vocalist Jennifer Stephens give this a uniqueness that almost evokes something like the Hellacopters crossed with Sleigh Bells.  Another way to think of it is if Evanescence, instead of combining douch-y goth with even douchier nu-metal mixed mid 70's cock rock of Black Oak Arkansas and Nazareth and "Who Are You" era Who and the digital hardcore full frontal assault of Atari Teenage Riot.  “Mouthful of Love” of their 2004 album of the same name is almost manic, like a cross between “Shoot To Thrill” and Foghat’s “Slow Ride”.  “Over and Over” is an MC5 cover and surprisingly is a little less manic, but only slightly, but builds to a crescendo that sounds again like classic Nugent crossed with Kiss crossed with Elastica.  This is truly crazy stuff and these kids are committed to it, for sure.  The title track off “Rock and Awe” is more elaborately rocking than anything AC/DC has ever done but comes across like the MC5 crossed with Nazareth.  “Get It Hot” off their 2004 EP Tommy Shots features Motorhead’s Lemmy sharing vocals and has the most overtly AC/DC rhythm and feel.  I can’t recommend this weird shit enough. 

Two Australian bands have done their best to keep their homeboys’ music in the spotlight.  Perhaps the most renowned is Airbourne, who sound like a carbon copy of Brian Johnson era AC/DC, kind of a pleasant change from the Bon obsession most other groups have.  Their albums Runnin’ Wild and No Guts No Glory are absolutely chock filled with fantastic rockers in the AC/DC vein, including “Too Much, Too Soon, Too Fast” (love the amalgamation of the Dolls and Crue album titles), “Diamond in the Rough” (which reminds me of “Rockin’ Is Ma Business” by the Four Horsemen crossed with “Flick of the Switch” by AC/DC), Fat City” (shades of “Whole Lotta Rosie”), “No Way But the Hard Way”, “Rattle Your Bones”, and “My Dynamite Will Blow You Sky High”.  The other band, Sydney’s Hell City Glamours, have a DC-like vibe but also mine some pretty unique territory; “Flyin’ Away” has a southern fried, Lynyrd Skynyrd feel to it and is my favorite by them right now.

Holy Grails and Forbidden Fruits

I fully admit that I’m completely obsessive when it comes to music collecting.  I always want to find and listen to (and if possible, get a copy of in MP3 format) the weirdest, most obscure music imaginable.  And at any given time I usually have some number of “holy grails” I’m searching for, songs or artists whom I’m trying to find.  Obviously the internet in general and the digital music revolution in particular are what have made nearly all of this musical obsessiveness possible; without the ability to search nearly every topic or band or song or genre and be likely to find it, my holy grail searches wouldn’t get very far. 

At present I have two big holy grails.  The first is to hear anything by a legendary band called the Spastics.  I first heard of this band while reading the book Hardcore California, which was written in the mid-80’s and which documents the early days of the LA and SF punk scenes.  In the section written by Craig Lee (himself a pioneer of the LA punk scene who played with the Bags among many others) about the earliest days of LA punk, he mentions that the Dickies’ first concert at the Masque followed a punk band that was supposedly so awful that a bunch of punks turned a fire extinguisher on them, a contention that was confirmed by Dickies lead singer Leonard Philips in the Darby Crash biography Lexicon Devil; Leonard claims it was Darby himself or one of his Uni High pals who did this.  This has always fascinated me; given how sloppy and amateurish most punk was back then, how bad did you have to be to have a fire extinguisher pointed at you?

For literally the better part of three decades, this is as much as I knew.  But as always the internet provided some more information.  Turns out one member of the Spastics was singer David Baerwald, an absolutely fascinating figure in rock music.  David was born in Ohio to a German-born father who was an academic political scientist and a Midwest-born mother who eventually became a psychologist.  When David was young his father moved his family to Japan for a period before moving back to accept a faculty position at UCLA in 1972.  David grew up in the very affluent Westside suburb of Brentwood and spent his teenage years, in his own words, living the ‘Less Than Zero’ lifestyle of drugs, clubs, and excess. 

David formed the Spastics in ’76 or ’77 from friends of his who also lived in Brentwood.  David has claimed in interviews that the Spastics were less of a band and more of a gang or youthful clique.  They played around LA a bit (including the now-legendary Masque show opening for the then-unknown Dickies).  After the Spastics broke up he played around LA with a club band called Sensible Shoes. 

In 1986 David hit the big time as part of the duo David + David with David Ricketts, another musician on the LA scene.  David + David’s only album was Boomtown, a slickly produced but lyrically very dark look at the underside of the Reagan boom years.  The song “Welcome to the Boomtown” was a top 40 hit that year and the album also went platinum.  Musically the album reminds me of an amalgamation of Tonio K., Scarecrow era John Mellencamp, and Bruce Springsteen.  It’s a little too slickly produced for my tastes but there’s no denying  the passion and honesty of the lyrics.

After David + David broke up, Baerwald worked as a session musician and songwriter for a large number of artists, including Joni Mitchell, Waylon Jennings, and many others.  In the early 90’s Baerwald began playing regularly on Tuesday nights with a large and revolving group of musicians, including a then-largely unknown female artist by the name of Sheryl Crow.  Baerwald eventually played guitar and co-wrote 7 of the songs on Crow’s solo debut, which she appropriately titled Tuesday Night Music Club, including the smash hits “All I Wanna Do”, “Leaving Las Vegas”, and “Strong Enough”.   David has continued to be a strongly-in-demand songwriter and has worked with a vast array of artists over the years.

But my main interest in him is in hearing about his work with the Spastics.  Amazingly, considering their reputation as the worst punk band of all time, the Spastics actually DID record some songs.  A few years back, Wondercap Records released a compilation album of early LA punk songs called What Is It.  In addition to the usual Dangerhouse-era offerings by the Germs, the Dils, etc., it also featured  previously unreleased recordings by the Spastics, “I’m a Spaz/Fuck the World” and “Baby, You String Me Up/You Head Exploding”.  At present nobody seems to have digitized these and placed them online, though it is possible to order this album via the Wondercap web site. I may need to just bite the bullet and order it just for the sake of completeness. 

However, the reviews I’ve read reveal little indication as to why this band was so hated.  Supposedly their sound is pretty typical of the time; I’m picturing something along the generic lines of the Viletones.  However, What? Records founder Chris Ashford did say in his commentary on this album is that one reason they may have been so detested was that they came off as rich snobs slumming it, an impression seconded by Baerwald himself, who described them in an interview on another web site as “twerpy nerds and rich kids”.  At a time when the “Hollywood 100” ruled the punk scene with an iron fist, chasing away suburbanites and other poseurs, any band that came off as being from LA’s wealthy Westside was likely to not go over too well. 

A second current “holy grail” of mine is another 70’s LA band called Eulogy.  They hail from the opposite musical shore from the Spastics, however; Eulogy was a hard rock outfit playing the LA bar band circuit through the mid to late 70’s.  Formed by Rusty Anderson (lead guitar), Mike Jones (rhythm guitar), Myles Crawley (lead vocals), Dirk Van Tatenhove (bass) and the late Ross Holly on drums in Whittier, CA in 1973, Eulogy gained momentum when they promptly won a local battle of the bands contest and started playing around LA in the same club circuit that saw bands like Van Halen, W.A.S.P., Quiet Riot, as well as lesser known LA hard rock acts like Snow, Smile, Calico Jack, Sleeper, Naughty Women, and A La Carte. 

I first found out about this band again while reading the chronicle of early LA punk Hardcore California; this book has a picture of the cover of the very first issue of the seminal punk fanzine Flipside from August 1977, which, in addition to advertising stories on the Germs, the Clash and “punk roq”, touts a story on Eulogy.  According to the official Flipside Memorial site (http://www.flipsidefanzine.com/FlipsideFanzine/FS_Issues_1-6.html), it sounds like Flipside did this interview mostly because they could (i.e., Eulogy was eager to get their name out there on the scene) and not because of any strong connection Eulogy was thought to have with the emerging LA punk scene. 

 I find it extremely amusing that such a traditional hard rock band was featured in the first issue ever of such a seminal punk magazine.  However, in another way it isn’t such a stretch.  During the mid 70’s live music was dying in LA, a victim of the combined forces of disco and apathy.  People no longer cared enough to try to go out and see live music, it was easier to just stay home and smoke a joint or drink some Boone’s Farm wine or get zonked on ‘ludes and listen to Frampton Comes Alive.  Besides, if you WERE going to go see live music, you’d go see Emerson, Laker & Palmer at the Forum, not some unknown band you might not even like at a pungent club like the Starwood.  Groups like Eulogy were at least still trying to maintain a viable live music scene in LA, which actually does make them punk pioneers in a sense. 

I haven’t been able to find any MP3s by Eulogy online.  However, several ex-members have set up good tribute sites with pictures and information about the band in its heyday; now they even have a Facebook page too.  The best of these pages is by former bassist Dirk Van Tatenhove, who goes by Dirk Van now:  http://www.dirk-van.com/eulogy/eulogy.html  .  This site has snippets of about a dozen or so Eulogy songs.  Their sound seems to range widely across the 70’s hard rock spectrum, everything from Nugent to Aerosmith to Zep to Styx.  I only wish there were full MP3s of this interesting, long-lost band. 

After the breakup of Eulogy, Dirk Van and guitarist Rusty Anderson formed another band, Soldier.  Dirk Van has a few Soldier MP3s on his Soldier web page; this band seems to float ethereally in the nether world between hard rock and synth-driven new wave, which may perhaps explain why they eventually opened for such varied acts as the Vapors and Ambrosia. 

One other holy grail of mine is one I have little hope of ever obtaining, and that’s a group called Mod Squad.  I saw them play live once, at the legendary all-ages dance club 321 in Santa Monica, sometime in 1984.  They played a catchy mod/punk style of music and as I recall they had a female singer who was pretty cute.  I never heard anything else about this band and have never been able to find anything about them online. 

Along with Holy Grails, another thing I’m always fascinated by are what I call “forbidden fruits”.  These are albums that, for one reason or another, ended up being shunned or denigrated by the music critics and/or fans.  What’s interesting to me is to examine these albums objectively with the passage of time to see if they are actually as bad as claimed. 

One obvious “forbidden fruit” is Tusk, Fleetwood Mac’s follow up to the international smash Rumours.  While obviously not the end of Mac’s career or popularity, at the time most critics and especially fans felt it was a tremendous letdown from Rumours, and it was almost immediately beset by rumors (ha ha) that it was a bloated, coke-fueled vanity project for Lindsay Buckingham.  It peaked at #4 in the U.S. charts and its two singles, “Sara” and the title track reached  numbers 7 and 8, respectively on the U.S. singles charts, but this was a pretty far comedown from the massive, worldwide success of Rumours; indeed it sold literally a tenth of the 40 million records Rumours did. 

With the tincture of time critics have gone back and re-evaluated this album and it is now considered one of the great studio achievements of the 70’s.  Far from being an indulgent mess, Tusk is now recognized as an ambitious if sprawling and somewhat unfocused masterpiece, which the success of Rumours allowed Buckingham to create.  Fleetwood Mac were falling apart, both romantically and as a band, during the recording of this album, and this does show in the separation between the principals involved and the overall lack of musical or lyrical cohesion of this album.  But Christine McVie, Stevie Nicks, and Buckingham himself all had some of their best musical moments on this album, which is saying a lot considering their incredible talent and achievement till this point.  “Think About Me”, “Honey Hi”, and “Never Forget” are hands down Christine McVie’s greatest achievements as a Mac lead singer, three incandescent songs that highlight her immense vocal talent; “Never Forget” in particular is one of my favorite songs of all time, and probably comes closest to capturing the lightning in a bottle magic of Rumours.  Nicks probably gets the shortest shrift here, with only her hit single “Sara” “Sisters of the Moon” (which has an ominous tone that evokes the sultry “Rhiannon” off Rumours), “Angel”, “Beautiful Child”, and the light, haunting “Storms” really highlighting her vocals or writing. 

Its Buckingham’s contribution that gives Tusk its manic, frantic edge.  By 1979 Buckingham, like many other 70’s musical artists, was familiar with the punk and new wave explosion happening across the globe and was trying to integrate something of its energy and drive into his own music.  It is for this that Tusk was most castigated by the critics, the same critics who chastised Linda Ronstadt and Billy Joel and other 70’s artists for trying to bring some of the freshness of punk and new wave into their own sound.  Frankly I’ve never understood this, and in fact I have always admired artists willing to explore new sub-genres.  The people I personally have less respect for are the reactionaries who seek to denigrate new movements because they’re too old and stuck in their ways to understand and appreciate them. 

On Tusk Buckingham incorporated the quirky time signatures, frantic tempos, and pulsing synths that were so prevalent in new wave music to incredibly great effect.  In fact, it’s amazing to me how well he succeeded given how isolated Fleetwood Mac’s success had made them from anything approaching the real world and the music happening therein.  “I Know I’m Not Wrong”, with its smooth harmonies, lilting rhythm and concertina-like accompaniment is the best synthesis of the smooth pop of classic Mac with the interesting sonic palette of new wave.  But to me the absolute standout track on this entire album is the pulsing, frantic, angry stomp of “Not That Funny”; here is the weird, bitter, paranoid post-breakup Buckingham utilizing his unique vocals to their greatest extent to rave disconnectedly about making him wait and blaming him and whatnot.  It makes an almost perfect counterpoint to the desperate, pleading Buckingham of “Go Your Own Way” off Rumours, frantic to avoid the breakup he knows is coming; here he’s bitter but still hasn’t lost his sense of humor.  This is hands down my favorite Mac song ever, and indeed one of my favorite NEW WAVE songs ever.  Buckingham just absolutely nailed the edgy vibe of the best new wave, much the same way Billy Joel did on songs like “You May Be Right”, “It’s Still Rock and Roll To Me”, and “Sometimes A Fantasy” from around this same time.  On still other songs he’s almost frantic; the rapid fire rhythm of “That’s Enough For Me” and “The Ledge” remind me of the coke-fueled comedic onslaughts of Steve Martin and Robin Williams from this era—fast, furious, hysterical. 

There’s another reason why “Not That Funny” is noteworthy:  legend has it that the way in which Mac ended up doing a song with the (ugh) USC marching band was that they were recording in a studio next door and kept hearing the horns of the marching band bleeding through into their own recordings.  Not sure if this is true or not but toward the end of “Not That Funny” it sure sounds like you can hear some horn flourishes in the background, so perhaps this rumor is true and this is the proof.

Another “forbidden fruit” from the late 70’s for me were the Kiss solo albums.  Kiss itself was an amazing phenomenon.  They started in the same early 70’s New York glam rock scene as the New York Dolls and toured relentlessly throughout the early-70’s.  But it was only with the release of the live album Alive in 1975, followed quickly by the studio album Destroyer in 1976, that they started to achieve their massive fame.  By fall of 1978 Kiss had released three more albums (Rock and Roll Over, Love Gun, and Double Platinum), all of which went platinum, and between their album sales, sold-out arena and stadium concerts, media blitz (Marvel comic books and movie deals), and massive merchandising (dolls, posters, almost anything else), Kiss had become the biggest band in the world. 

Which is when the backlash started.  Their movie, Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park, was a hokey disaster, portraying the band as buffoons of the highest order.  I can still remember watching this on network TV in the 70’s and even as an 11 year old literally laughing at how corny it was.  Most of their albums subsequent to Destroyer were much weaker, containing only one or two memorable tracks at most. 

It was at this time that Kiss and their management team and record company made what has often been referred to as the biggest mistake of all:  it was decided that each band member would release a solo album on the same day.  The idea was to capitalize maximally on the worldwide popularity of Kiss while also allowing each member to showcase his own talents and/or collaborate with other artists.  A great idea in theory but of course it ended up being a total disaster in practice for two reasons:  first, as mentioned, the public was started to reach media over-saturation with respect to Kiss, and second, the albums were considered to be pretty bad.

But were they?  Because of the Kiss backlash many, myself included, never really gave them a chance.  I actually have had a unique relationship with Kiss.  In the 70’s I thought they were the lamest, corniest, hokiest band in the world, which was completely ironic considering that Kiss used many of my favorite things, including Japanese monster movies and Marvel comic books, as inspirations for their look and stage show.  But somehow their image left me completely cold.  As a result I never really tried that hard to listen to their music.  I remember an older tomboy cousin of mine playing me some songs off Destroyer, including “Detroit Rock City”, but I never really remember hearing their music or liking it much in the day.  It was only much later, in the late 80’s, that I started getting into pre-punk glam rock like Queen, Bowie, Slade, etc., that I started to give Kiss a try.  And of course I fell in love with the classics:  “Shout It Out Loud”, “Cold Gin”, “Strutter”, etc. 

Recently I went back and purchased a whole slew of classic Kiss from iTunes, including “Do You Love Me?”, “Firehouse”, “Deuce”, “Love Gun”, “Christine Sixteen”, “Plaster Caster” (I love how the Donnas ripped off the bass line intro for their song “Are You Gonna Move It For Me”), “Shock Me”, and four songs from their Dynasty album:  “2000 Man”, “X Ray Eyes”,  “Sure Know Something”, and the worst abomination of all, their disco song “I Was Made For Lovin’ You” (I have a soft spot for cheesy disco, having lived right in the midst of that era; some of my other cheesy disco MP3s are Carl Douglas’ one-hit wonder “Kung Fu Fighting” and Leif Garrett’s “I Was Made For Dancin’”).

So how do the Kiss solo albums stack up against the legions of classic songs Kiss had recorded by then?  Actually, not as bad as everyone made it sound back in the day; this is another great example of how the passage of time has removed some of the taint associated with a product at the time.  Let’s start with Paul Stanley’s album, which hewed the closest to the Kiss formula of catchy pop rock.  The leadoff song, “Tonight You Belong To Me”, doesn’t start well; its cheesy twinkling acoustic guitars seem to presage the entire pop metal balladry of the late 80’s best evinced by bands like Tesla and the ironically named Extreme.  But it then builds to a strong, memorable guitar riff that is reminiscent of “Sure Know Something”.  This song is still a bit too slow for me but it’s certainly not out of line of the typical Kiss song. 

It’s the center of the album really starts to hit some great classic Kiss style musical moments.  “Move On” is more up-tempo and is way catchier; this song would have likely been a decent hit had Kiss gone the traditional route and released a single album rather than 4 solo albums.  I would definitely stack this into the middle-tier of Kiss songs such as “Christine Sixteen” and “Do You Love Me?”  “Ain’t Quite Right” drops the tempo again, and is utterly forgettable 70’s pre-metal balladry, but Stanley hits another high spot with “Wouldn’t You Like To Know Me”, a phenomenal blast of hard rocking powerpop.  This is the standout track, with a big, catchy, hook-laden chorus that equals or betters anything Kiss had done.  This remains an under-appreciated piece of work of the Kiss canon and should be better known.

The other great song here is another up-tempo number, “Its Alright”.  Not quite as catchy as “Know Me”, its still a great little rocker, nothing fancy or complicated, just a crunchy guitar sound and Stanley’s catchy refrain.   Where Stanley erred was in putting so many bland, turgid ballads on this album, including the only single, “Hold Me, Touch Me (Think Of Me When We’re Apart)”, which only got as high as #64 on the Billboard charts (and must have required a lot of coke bribes by Casablanca Records to reach even this high).  It’s simply AWFUL, at least as bad as I’d ever envisioned and may be one reason why critics and fans alike were so ready to write this whole escapade off.  The mid-tempo metallic rockers “Love In Chains” and “Tonight” partially salvage the end of the album, but aren’t anything to write home about.

Ace Frehley’s effort was far harder rocking than most of his work in Kiss; “Rip It Out” has a hard edge, and Frehley’s vocals aren’t nearly as smooth as Stanley’s (this was clearly the reason all other three members of Kiss sang but Frehley rarely did, with the exception of “2000 Man” of Dynasty).  Frehley’s album benefitted from the presence of now-legendary drummer Anton Fig (who later became the drummer for David Letterman’s Late Night Band); Fig’s propulsive drumming highlights “Rip It out” and several other tracks. The next track, “Speeding Back To My Baby” starts with a skirl of guitars but then settles into a blues stomp.  Again the vocals aren’t quite up to the material but they aren’t terrible either—Ace sounds like a slightly less capable Alice Cooper here.  The sing-song chorus has elements of “Cold Gin” and “Firehouse” to it.  “Snowblind” and “Ozone” are a little too turgid, falling between the sludge of Deep Purple and that of other 70’s proto-metallers such as Argent or Kansas.  “What’s On Your Mind” has a more melodic, powerpop feel; if Robin Zander had sung this it might have been a big hit off Dream Police.

The big hit off this album, and indeed the biggest hit off ANY of the Kiss solo albums, is Frehley’s cover of “New York Groove”, originally a hit in 1975 for the group Hello.  This deviates from the hard rocking formula of Frehley’s other songs here and is more of a weird, fun funk/disco stomp.  It’s unlikely Kiss would have ever have allowed him to record this for a group album so in this regard Frehley was lucky to get a stab at doing this, and it paid off:  the single reached #13 on the Billboard charts and has since become the theme song for the New York Giants football team (its played whenever they score a touchdown). 

Gene Simmons’ solo album is perhaps the biggest surprise, ranging from lusty metal come-ons to balladry to the sheer weirdness of Gene singing Jiminy Cricket’s song “When You Wish Upon A Star” from the animated film “Pinocchio”!!!  Simmons also brought in the largest and farthest ranging group of collaborators here, everyone from Helen Reddy to Cher to Donna Summer as backup singers; Jeff “Skunk” Baxter of the Doobie Brothers, Rick Nielson of Cheap Trick, Joe Perry of Aerosmith and Bob Seger all contribute musically.  Unfortunately, the results are a little TOO mixed, too schizo to mesh well.  “Living In Sin”, for example, simply sounds like a listless reworking of “Plaster Caster”.  “True Confessions” has so many backing vocals that it sounds more like a gospel song!   “Tunnel of Love” is a rehash of all the usual single entendre sexual tropes Simmons had loaded too many of his Kiss songs with.  Only on “Burning Up With Fever” and “Radioactive” does Simmons give us something approaching the quality of his Hammer of the Gods contributions to the Kiss canon, with the latter slotting in nicely beside such Kiss Klassics as “Do You Love Me” and “God of Thunder” once it overcomes its indulgent neo-classical/show tune intro.

The one Kiss solo album I find the weakest is that of drummer Peter Criss.  A mushy combination of bluesy soft rock and acoustic ballads designed to capitalize on Criss’ success with the Kiss ballads “Beth” and “Hard Luck Woman”, nothing on this album ever really coheres.  “I’m Gonna Love You” comes closest to capturing even a little of the magic of Kiss but it’s nowhere near the level of most of their hits.  “You Matter To Me” is utterly generic 70’s soft rock, except of course the appallingly cheesy 70’s keyboards; this sounds like something the Partridge Family might have recorded had David Cassidy not gone solo.  “Tossin’ and Turnin’” is an old R&B cover that Criss gives nothing memorable beyond the original.  “Don’t You Let Me Down” is so laid back its horizontal, evoking the soft rock cheese of America.  “That’s The Kind of Sugar Papa Likes” and “Hooked on Rock and Roll” are fifth rate heartland bar band rock that never comes close to being as good as Bob Seger; “Easy Thing”, “Kiss the Girl Goodbye” and “I Can’t Stop The Rain” all reach (and fail) for the lightning in a bottle of “Beth”, with “Kiss” being the best of a bad lot.

So what’s the final verdict?  If forced to give grades, here’s what I come up with:

Paul Stanley—B+

Ace Frehley—B

Gene Simmons--C-

Peter Criss—D-

So not exactly a complete disaster, though far from a triumph.  Still, there are some good moments here.  I’m envisioning a Kiss album made with the following tracks culled from each solo album:

“Wouldn’t You Like To Know Me (Stanley)

“Move On” (Stanley)

“Its Alright” (Stanley)

“Radioactive” (Simmons)

“Burning Up With Fever” (Simmons)

“See You In Your Dreams” (Simmons)

“What’s On Your Mind?” (Frehley)

“Rip It Out” (Frehley)

“Kiss the Girl Goodbye” (Criss)

This would definitely NOT be the worst album Kiss ever recorded.  In 1979 Kiss rebounded from the media debacle of the solo albums with their platinum album Dynasty, though this was based primarily on the admittedly dubious achievement of the popularity of their disco song, “I Was Made For Lovin’ You”, long a sore spot with their fans.  1980 brought the album “Unmasked”, which showed further cracks in the Kiss brand.  While not actually that bad—“Tomorrow” and “Is That You?” capture the catchy Kiss of old—it veers schizophrenically between the slickly produced hard rock/powerpop of Cheap Trick that Kiss tried (and mostly failed) to incorporate on previous albums) and the metal lite direction they eventually would take.  Fans were unenthusiastic about this less rocking fare and stayed away in droves; it became the first Kiss album since Destroyer not to go (multi) platinum.

Which leads us to a forbidden fruit so legendarily awful that for a long time even *I* wouldn’t bite into it:  “Music from ‘The Elder’”.  After the lack of success of “Unmasked” (the band didn’t even tour to support it), Kiss felt they needed to get back on track and back to their hard rock roots.  They hooked back up with Bob Ezrin, the legendary Alice Cooper producer who had produced their breakthrough smash Destroyer.  Unfortunately, however, Ezrin was coming off another commercial and critical triumph, Pink Floyd’s ambitious concept album The Wall, and somewhere along the line, the album morphed into a concept album with strings and choirs telling a semi-mythical, semi-autobiographical (about Simmons) tale of a boy who joins a mysterious order of heroes to fight evil.  Instead of a hearkening back to their hard rock roots, the resulting product was the absolute epitome of over-indulgent, overwrought concept rock at its very worst.  The best things on it are “Dark Light”, sung by Ace Frehley, “The Oath”, and “I”, which seem to retain the ghost of the return to hard rock form that was supposedly the inspiration here in the first place, but even here the incredibly cheesy lyrics kill any real joy of the sound.  The worst songs sound like either covers by a medieval Kiss tribute band (“Just a Boy”, “Under the Rose”) or sad and inferior echoes of The Wall (“Only You”, “Odyssey”).  “Only You” in particular sounds like Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir” as interpreted by Mr. Roboto era Styx, a song that is almost cringingly bad.  They literally couldn’t have recorded a song LESS like classic Kiss if they’d tried.  “Just a Boy” at least has a majestic air about it but Stanley’s shrill falsetto on the chorus gives this song an element of cheese that’s hard to overcome.  Still, in its very cheesiness it reaches a kind of magnificence: the introspective acoustic guitars that sound like out-takes from the Wall left on the cutting room floor; the lilting, almost medieval vocals by Stanley to start it out; the uber-pretentious triangle tings between guitar riffs in the intro; the overwrought chorus and its bombastic guitar accompaniment;  Stanley's silly falsetto.  All add up to make this a moment of almost transcendental cheesiness to the point where its actually currently one of my favorite Kiss songs!! 

Kiss would of course rebound, not just once but twice.  First they removed the makeup and went in a hair/pop metal direction, cashing in on the success of this music trend in the 80’s; later they returned to the makeup and appeal of “classic” Kiss in the mid-90’s.  But I remain fascinated by their late 70’s early 80’s nadir.  It’s compelling to imagine the hubris that went into releasing 4 solo albums on the same day; it’s fascinating to think of their decision to record a disco song, further alienating their fans; it’s incredible to imagine the cluelessness that led to “Elder”.  How could they have thought a turgid, overwrought concept album would somehow bring back their long-departed fans?  Why imitate The Wall two years and an entire generational sea change in music later?

In all likelihood it probably doesn’t matter what Kiss would have done, they would have fallen from grace anyway.  The shift in music toward punk and new wave augured the end or at least a hiatus in the career of many 60’s and 70’s acts that couldn’t make the adjustment.  But even more than that, I’ve always believed in the old adage “what goes up must come down”; music, like everything else, is cyclical, and Kiss’ moment of riding high had to eventually end.  Nobody stays popular forever, and this is particularly true of bands like Kiss that came out of one scene, got so big, moved into other scenes, and invited an inevitable backlash.  They HAD to fall, it was inevitable.  Still, it’s always interesting to look back on how it happened.