V.A. Saturday

The 1977 various artists compilation album New Wave looks like a major label cash in (it came out on Vertigo, a subsidiary of Phillips/ Phonogram). The cover, bright red with a photo of leather jacket clad punk spitting beer at the camera in front of a corrugated iron fence, is typically ’77 punk. The album’s title looks like an attempt to make something threatening palatable, new wave rather than punk. But the fact is, it’s a really good primer of mainly American 1977 punk bands with some pre- punk or proto- punk acts thrown in and there’s hardly a song on it you’d skip (I make an exception for The Boomtown Rats who I’d always skip). The sleeve thanks Linda and Seymour Stein (who scooped up most of the US punk/ New Wave acts for Seymour’s label Sire) and also Jake Riviera and Kosmo Vinyl from Stiff Records, both of whom knew their stuff. 

New Wave opens, as all punk compilation albums probably should, with The Ramones and one minute thirty two seconds of rushing buzzsaw guitars and Joey’s snarled vocals about Judy and Jackie…

Judy Is A Punk

From there it’s bam- bam- bam of U.S. punk and proto- punk- The Dead Boys, Patti Smith’s Piss Factory, The Runaways, New York Dolls, Richard Hell and The Voidoids and Love Comes In Spurts. France and Australia are represented by Little Bob Story a Skyhooks. Flip it over and side two kicks off with Talking Heads (if you’ve placed the needle past The Boomtown Rats), jerky, staccato, New York art with two loves  that go tweet tweet tweet tweet tweet like little birds. 

Love Goes To Building On Fire 

The Damned show up with New Rose, the first UK punk single and the one that got them blackballed by the punk crowd for the crime of speeding up the recoding in the studio, studio trickery being NOT PUNK. More Ramones, more Dead Boys, more Runaways, more Dolls and The Flaming Groovies who always seem like the outliers on this record, their 1967 San Francisco garage rock always feeling a bit too studied and retro for 1977 despite Shake Some Action being most definitely a good song. 

New Wave was a second hand shop staple for years- all the way through the 80s a record you could guarantee finding in the Punk section. Pulling it out again and playing it for this post, it still packs a punch, a 1977 sock to the face. 

Ronnie Spector

Ronnie Spector RIP. A genuine legend, the led singer of The Ronettes with that voice, tough and with a street edge but with a softness too and capable of taking you by surprise. There aren’t many records that can compete with Be My Baby, a song that is one of the foundation stones of rock ‘n’ roll/ pop music, a song that raises the hairs on the back of your neck from the moment that kick drum and snare thump into earshot. I’ve said it before when I posted Be My Baby back in 2014 but you can put it on any playlist, any compilation tape or CD with any other song either side of it and it works. 

Be My Baby

As a bonus here’s the vocals from Baby I Love You, on their own. 

Baby I Love You (Isolated Vocals)

I have a real soft spot for The Ramones cover of Baby I Love You from their 1980 album End Of The Century, a record I used to play to close sets back when I did that kind of thing. The Ramones hated it, all refusing to play on it except Joey who was forced to sing on it by Phil Spector, allegedly at gunpoint. Joey loathed the song saying it didn’t sound anything like The Ramones but I love it despite it all. 

Baby I Love You 

Ronnie survived her brief marriage to Phil, a marriage that was abusive and controlling on every level. She fled Phil’s mansion in 1972, barefoot and without a penny to her name, fearing for her life. Ronnie was further tormented by Phil in the years following their marriage and then divorce as her tried to prevent her recording, singing and receiving any royalties until the late 90s when he was ordered to pay her over $1 million in royalties. She stuck it all out, outdid him (eventually) and outlived him. 

RIP Ronnie Spector.