So Alone

40 years ago now Johnny Thunders released his first album after L.A.M.F. with The Heartbreakers. I got into his music after his work with the New York Dolls as the forerunner of punk. This record hit me like less other records in these days. Thunders was a drug wreck at these times but he collected his energy to make a testament of his abilities. So Alone was the highlight of his output. A lot of songs with energy and also fragile. This is one of those records that guided me into the new music that came from Britain and across the Atlantic ocean. On this record he was supported by another great musicians from this time like Phil Lynott, Steve Marriott and Chrissie Hynde - and this shows his credit in the London scene in the late 70's.

Johnny Thunders - London Boys
Johnny Thunders - Subway Train
Johnny Thunders - You Can't Put Our Arms Around A Memory
Johnny Thunders - Pipeline

Indie Scene 1985

Another fine year for independent music. Old heroes like The Fall, The Cure and Johnny Thunders showed up with good records, traditional (Irish) music taken roots in music and some artist appeared to stay like Billy Bragg or to fade away too soon like the Woodentops. There was no direct movement in action but the indie sector was, as usual, throwing up quirky three minute slices that embraced politics, guitars and sheer madness. So enjoy a trip to music we've listened to 30 years ago.

Icicle Works - When it all comes down
Johnny Thunders and Patti Paladin - Crawfish
Love & Rockets - Ball of Confusion
Milkshakes - Ambassadors of love
Rain Parade - You are my friend
Robert Wyatt - The Wind of Change
Sonic Youth - Death Valley 69
That Petrol Emotion - VP
Rain Parade - Action Paintings
The Fall - Cruisers Creek
The Men They Couldn't Hang - Ironmasters
The Woodentops - It will come

Pills and Trash

On my way to work New York Doll's 'Pills' shuffled up on my mobile phone. I really forgot how good this song was. I am not sure if I should call them proto-punks, travesty queens or kings of glam-rock or just the best of all. Anyway, David Johansen and Johnny Thunders was a main influence to the upcoming punk-rock scene. I really love their short and simple songs with them magic riffs. I found this life appearance in German television shortly after the release of their first record.

Enjoy.

Indie Scene 1977

I made many thoughts during the last days how to replace the foreign correspondent series. Then I found the CD-collection Indie-Scene: The story of British Independent Musc in my archive recently. When I have read all the titles on the backside of the cover I have to admit that this was a golden era of music. It's music Dirk presents on with his superb series of girls tapes . So I will start a series about these era, the music we listened to these days and maybe reflecting these days.

At that time in 1977 the charts are filled with pop songs by ABBA, David Soul, The Eagles, Leo Sayer and dreadfully bad songs like Baccara with 'Yes Sir, I can boogie' and 'Mull of Kintyre' by The Wings. Punk and New Wave started to appear in this year and new bands paved the way to new music. American bands like The Ramones, Johnny Thunders and New York Dolls brought their music that was raw, fast and full of energy to London. And very fast kids adapted this music and created a very own scene. Punk was born. In Kings Road, London Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood established their boutique selling S/M-accessory to the kids. Everything was possible in these days. For me it was a rather new experience listening to different kind of music my friends used to listen to. Anyway, this was the dawning of a new era in music and this CD's are a good overview what happened in this 10 years.

The Heartbreakers - Born to loose
The Ramones - Sheena is a punk rocker

And one of my all-time favorites:

Wreckless Eric - Whole Wide World

Some other remarkable bands/songs from this year are: