I woke up today smiling, which is very unusual because I am a "morning person" only in the sense that I am a person and there is such thing as morning. Ususally it seems as though there is some force-field that oppresses me when it's time to get up no matter how much sleep I've accumulated, although the force of the field is considerably weaker after 10 hours sleep than after 5.
But anyway, last night I finished up painting the basement, a project of seemingly endless duration, and while I switched from roller to brush to get those recalcitrant corners and spots behind the pipes, I listened to the new Buzzcocks record and woke up this morning with the tunes still rolling around my brain - in a good way.
Buzzcocks? Another name from the cradle of British punk along with the Sex Pistols, the Clash, the Damned, Wire, etc., that speaks of the rebirth of rock 'n' roll in '76-'77 as youthful energy, rage, rebellion, assaulted the bloated corpse that was corporate rock and reconnected the music with its explosive birth.
In late-December of '76, the late great Martin Hannett (Joy Division, Magazine, New Order), under the nom de punk of "Martin Zero," produced the Buzzcocks first and last recorded work with lead singer Howard Devoto (who left shortly thereafter to form Magazine), an EP called Spiral Scratch.
Little more than a no-budget demo released on the band's own New Hormones label, the EP is pure and brilliant. "Boredom" is the highlight with Devoto's spirited vocals belying the title, and the band's angular, almost-mechanized rhythms foreshadowing Joy Division. Hannett also produced some of the Buzzcocks' great, cheerfully despondent pop punk of the early Pete Shelley-led period, including "Everybody's Happy Nowadays," "Lipstick," "Noise Annoys," "Oh Shit!" and the convulsive "Orgasm Addict."
Article comments
1 - Bill Sherman
This is great to read: I've got one of the 90's edition Buzzcocks discs and, while it's fun, it's nowhere near as prime as Singles or even Different Kind of Tension. Good to know the lads have returned to form. . .
2 - Jim Carruthers
One of the things which made the Buzzcocks special was they were one of the first rock groups to publize DIY, make your own records as a real rock group. The godfathers of indie. Bless them for that in addition to their pure blasts of pure pop genius.
3 - Eric Olsen
I have been informed that the credits are wrong and that Martin Rushent produced the Shelley-led singles credited to Hannett above. I am not going to argue with Pete Shelley about it.
4 - Douglas Mays
Good action! The Buzzcocks are back. I never saw them until the late 90s when they did a reunion tour type thing, but I was a fan since the beginning.
"Hollow Inside" is another song that has been in my head forever. I like the "Love Bites" album also. I remember an instrumental that is like standing in a sonic windtunnel from that album ('Waiting for the Train' or something like that).
Bittersweet punk, the Buzzcocks!
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