The first music I ever bought with my own money was a trio of singles that I loved when I was eleven years old. It was 1973. I went down to the local record store and picked “Brandy” by Looking Glass (already an all-timer in my book), “Signs” by the great Canadian OHW Five Man Electrical Band, and my latest obsession at the time, “Long Train Runnin’” by the Doobie Brothers.
(This was pre-Michael McDonald, when the Doobies were cool).
I should say before going any further that I could be entirely wrong about this. It was a long time ago, and such is the nature of memory and music. It all runs together after a while. Still, I know I bought those 45s at some point and listened to them often.
Those were not punk songs. I wasn't a punk fan when I was eleven. But by the time I hit twelve.... different story. And so with no disrespect intended toward "Brandy," (still an all-timer), let's dive into one hell of a decade for punk, beginning at the beginning….
Punk songs that defined the 1970s
“Personality Crisis” by the New York Dolls (1973)
More typical of American glam, the Dolls brought a Big Star-type of bright guitar but layered an attitude of outright punk coming from singer David Johansen. They wore garish costumes and makeup and scared the parents, and in doing so, laid the groundwork for much of the pop punk that would emerge twenty years later.
“Cherry Bomb” by the Runaways (1976)
ABBA’s Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad were showing off one brand of female pop in 1976. Out in SoCal, Cherrie Currie and Joan Jett were offering a different flavor. The mythic band, with Lita Ford on lead guitar, Jackie Fox on bass, and Sandy West on drums, was not the first all-female punk band.
They were just the ones that got noticed, in part due to the marketing guile of sleazy manager Kim Fowley. And though they did not have great success or last very long, their fingerprints are all over the second half of the decade and beyond. “Cherry Bomb” didn’t cause quite the country-wide explosion that Fowley envisioned when it was released, but it did register with a lot of young rockers.
“Anarchy in the U.K.” by the Sex Pistols (1976)
Want to know what register is in all circles? The Sex Pistols. They didn’t invent punk. They weren’t the first punk band. But the history of punk can be divided into two early stages – pre-Pistols and post-Pistols.
The impact in the USA wasn’t felt until the following year when their first (and only valid) album was released. It’s hard to capture what Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols meant to the world of rock. Even in the States, where the impact was not quite as keen, they were a sensation.
In the U.K., their first single, “Anarchy in the U.K.,” hit in late 1976, announcing the end of one type of youth-centered rock and the beginning of something completely different. “Don’t know what I want, but I know how to get it” is one of the most incisive lyrics of all ‘70s music.
“I Wanna Be Sedated” by Ramones (1978)
While the Sex Pistols were launching the punk movement in the U.K., a somewhat friendlier, more melodic version of punk was taking root in the USA with the release of Ramones in 1976. They got a lot of attention for their speed and their wit, but the quartet from NYC wanted mainstream success.
That’s what they were going for in their fourth album, Road to Ruin. Their fans didn’t buy in. It didn’t spawn any hits. But a B-side single gradually emerged. “I Wanna Be Sedated” became one of Ramone’s signature songs. Its emphasis on ennui – “nothin’ to do, no where to go, oh” – became one of the defining themes of a great deal of punk and pop punk that was to follow.
By 1980, “I Wanna Be Sedated” was already iconic enough to be included on the soundtrack of the movie Times Square. Though not a hit in its initial release, when released as a single as part of the soundtrack album, the song went platinum.
“London Calling” by the Clash (1979)
I’ll keep this short. London Calling, in my humble opinion, is the most excellent album in the history of rock. The title track, which opens it, is a revolution that took what bands like the Sex Pistols were attempting to do and simply did it better. “Phony Beatlemania has bitten the dust.” Indeed.