Category: Buzzcocks

A guest series by Fraser Pettigrew (aka our New Zealand correspondent)

#8: Spiral Scratch – Buzzcocks (1977)

While a series on EPs would not be complete without it, what can I possibly write about Spiral Scratch that hasn’t already been said? It is probably the subject of more column inches than any other EP in music history, weighted with significance that puts a price of more than £200 on some copies offered for sale. To those who still hold an original purchase from 1977 it is almost priceless.

I do not possess an original copy. Mine is the 1979 reissue, by which time the record had already acquired legendary status. Its reputation was built primarily on its self-published status: not the first punk single, but the first to be released on a newly-created, independent label with no distribution deal with a major company. It was seen to embody a quintessential DIY ethos in punk by rejecting conventional music industry pathways. The music seemed almost secondary.

To those of us who were Buzzcocks fans, however, the reissue was a worthwhile purchase because it was the band’s first release and the only record of Howard Devoto’s involvement as lead singer (apart from the similarly hard to find Time’s Up demo bootleg). By early ’79, Devoto had of course long-since departed the band and built his own place in the history of post-punk as the lead singer of Magazine, an altogether different project already onto its second album.

Buzzcocks without Devoto had also produced two albums by this time for major label United Artists, working in the studio with seasoned producer Martin Rushent, all a far cry from the circumstances in which Spiral Scratch was recorded. The Buzzcocks sound that I was familiar with was therefore rather different from that of Spiral Scratch which is understandably rougher and cruder than the albums.

I recently came across an article on the making of Spiral Scratch that, whilst it’s nearly ten years old, may be unfamiliar to some and is worth a read, even if you’re not a hardcore audio tech buff like the site’s primary readership. It’s also worth reading the brief memoir by engineer Phil Hampson on which the Sound on Sound article is based.

Hampson was the engineer at Indigo Studios in Manchester responsible for recording the epoch-defining EP on 28 December 1976. He is uncredited, while Martin Hannett (as ‘Martin Zero’) is listed as producer, but Hampson’s account makes clear that Hannett’s contribution was far from expert and more in keeping with the amateur DIY ethic that Spiral Scratch came to represent. Hannett’s experimental curiosity carried through into his subsequent production career, but it was more of a hindrance than a help in getting the Buzzcocks down on tape.

Hampson’s story reveals the tragi-comic fate of the master tape. The band couldn’t afford to buy it (and possibly didn’t appreciate its future worth) so it was simply put back in the rack to be re-used. Indigo Studios were directly across the road from the old Granada TV studios and were frequently used by various comedians and variety acts from Granada shows to record songs, skits and novelty tunes. Nobody knows who finally recorded over one of rock’s most famous master tapes, but Hampson offers up the prospect of Little and Large as the notional agents of bathos.

The other interesting viewpoint from Hampson is that the supposedly ground-breaking innovation of the EP’s independent release is somewhat overstated. Hampson says he himself worked on many self-published and pressed records in the years prior to Spiral Scratch and that the practice was not uncommon. I can see his point, but from his description it would seem that most of these ‘independent’ recordings were either private or vanity pressings and rarely if ever intended for commercial release and sale. Spiral Scratch was made to be sold like a ‘proper’ record, and it was the catalyst for dozens of similar ventures in the years that followed. In that respect its reputation is safe.

The enduring popularity of lo-fi indie guitar bands has helped to prevent Spiral Scratch sounding dated after nearly fifty years. The witty sophistication of Devoto’s lyrics contrasts with the stereotype of punk oafishness, and Pete Shelley’s enthusiasm for krautrock bands like Can and Neu married to The Ramones’ buzz-saw guitar sound undoubtedly helps the compositions avoid the clichés of fast and dirty rock’n’roll or the gormless crudity of many contemporaries.

Well, that’s another 700 words to add to the ledger. Time’s never up for this EP and people will still be writing about it in another fifty years’ time, but I won’t be around to read it.

Breakdown

Time’s Up

Boredom

Friends Of Mine

Fraser

It’s a cut’n’paste from the Buzzcocks singles series back in September 2016.

I was really sure that Love You More was a much bigger hit than #34. I think it’s the fact that it hung around in the Top 50 for a while that leads to that conclusion, but its chart run was 41, 34, 35, 35, 60,53 and so yup, mid-30s it was.

What it did do was get the band their first all-important appearance on Top of The Pops in July 1978 thus instantly making their name and sound recognisable to millions more people overnight. Which sort of set them up for the rest of the year. In the meantime, enjoy the magic of the 1 min 45 second pop single

mp3: Buzzcocks – Love You More

And having mentioned the TOTP appearance…….

JC

Singles Going Steady – Buzzcocks (1981)

There was no way I couldn’t include this ‘greatest hits’ compilation in the rundown.   Buzzcocks were one of the very best singles bands of the post-punk/new wave era.   Their first two albums weren’t too shabby either, but both had their moments when things went a little bit off-kilter or too far on the experimental side to make for a perfect listen.  Singles Going Steady, no matter which side of the vinyl you play, can make a justified claim for 10/10.

A reminder of what we are looking at here.

The album was pulled together by IRS, the band’s American label, to coincide with a tour of the USA and Canada in 1979.  It consisted of all eight singles that had been released in the UK between 1977 and 1979. Side One of the album had them in chronological order, beginning with Orgasm Addict and ending with Harmony In My Head, while Side Two had all the b-sides, opening with Whatever Happened To? and closing with Something’s Gone Wrong Again.

It wasn’t initially readily available in the UK except on import, and it was only given an official release over here, in November 1981, after the band first break-up.

I didn’t know this until doing a bit of background research for today’s post, and I certainly wouldn’t have believed anyone who told me, but Singles Going Steady failed to hit the Top 100 on the album charts back in 1981.   Six of the singles had been Top 40 – the exceptions were Orgasm Addict and I Don’t Mind – while the two studio albums from the same period had both gone Top 20.  But, for whatever reason, there was no appetite at all for the compilation.  It may well have been that diehard fans had picked it up on import, or maybe having copies of all the singles felt there was nothing to be gained from picking them up again in album form, but it’s a bit of a head scratcher.

As I mentioned earlier, it doesn’t really matter if you choose to play Side Two of the album to begin with.  Indeed, there’s something to be said from doing things that way, as it delivers a lengthy but magnificent overture prior to the main act.  Songs such as Noise Annoys and Lipstick would surely have been hit singles if released as A-sides, while Oh Shit! is one of the greatest anthems of its time, ninety-six seconds of adrenalin-fuelled pop-punk that was totally incapable of being aired on any radio station.

mp3:  Buzzcocks – Oh Shit!

Pete Shelley once told an interviewer in the early days that his hope for Buzzcocks songs was that they could stand the test of time.  I’m not sure if he quite managed that with all the later material, but there can be no doubts about the tunes on Side A of Singles Going Steady. And it’s all done and dusted in not much more than 20 minutes.

I had also forgotten that, in keeping with the ethos of the time, very few of the singles were actually included on any contemporary albums – I Don’t Mind was on Another Music In A Different Kitchen, while Ever Fallen In Love was included on Love Bites. Buzzcocks believed in the joy and perfection of 7″ singles, including the artwork and design.

mp3:   Buzzcocks – Everybody’s Happy Nowadays

Except for those of you whose favourite albums have been missed out in this rundown……

JC

aka The Vinyl Villain incorporating Sexy Loser

#011 – Buzzcocks – ‚Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)’ (United Artists Records, ’78)

Hello friends,

congratulations, you have nearly made it all the way through with bands starting with a ‘B’ … unless there is a great combo whose first letters are ‘Bw…’, ‘Bx…’ or ‘Bz…’. Or unless I come to the conclusion that The Byrds are better than sliced bread …. you wait and see until the next episode comes in!

Strange though, but I find it rather hard to find something interesting to write about a band which is as well known as The Buzzcocks are. I mean, basically everything has already been said about them, hasn’t it? At least there isn’t pretty much that I could add, I found.

So let’s concentrate on the song, shall we? When googling around a bit, I learnt that Pete Shelley was bisexual, and he had written the tune in late 1977 about a guy called Francis, apparently someone he lived together with for 7 years.

Obviously, not being bisexual myself, I always had women from my past in mind when listening to the song. Quite a lot of them, in fact. When I was younger, you see, I used to fall in love rather easily, and consequently I was easily disappointed when things didn’t turn out the way I had imagined them to turn out. I won’t try to tell you that I always dreamt about marriage whilst having something that ended up in being just a one-night stand. Or a two night stand, if such a term exists. But either way, I usually had high hopes and wanted more. A relationship, to be precise. But there were women who – I think the correct collocation is – ‘just wanted my body’ apparently. Not that I ever had much of a body, mind you, which might or might not show you how desperate these girls might have been.

So back then I often listened to today’s tune and thought to myself, when being in despair again: ‘Oh, he’s sooooo right, our Pete, I should not have fallen in love with (insert typical German female forename here)”. But the funny thing is: today, after decades of distance, I would do it all again, I think: there are no real regrets by and large … perhaps it is just because back then the fun ruled out the sorrow and the feeling of being rather unrequited afterwards. Who knows …

mp3: Buzzcocks – Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)

So, in conclusion: no, I’ve never fallen in love with someone I shouldn’t’ve … at least not yet!

But did you?

Take good care,

Dirk

JC adds…….

I’ve written about this song on a number of occasions over the years.   I slotted it in at #23 in the 45 45s @ 45 rundown back in 2008, and wondered out loud if there really were 22 singles better than it. Its most recent appearance was in October 2020.  Here’s some of my thoughts from then as an addendum to Dirk’s musings.

“One of Pete Shelley’s greatest attributes as a songwriter was the ability to write about situations that could be taken by every listener as being completely applicable to their own lives. There can’t be any of us out there who could give the answer of ‘No’ to the question. It particularly appealed to my teenage sensations, when the girl(s) of my dreams were way out of my league, preferring the company of those a couple years older or those who weren’t total bookworms. It didn’t help that my tastes in music weren’t universal…..

But as the years have passed and relationships have come and gone, it’s very clear the song can apply at any time in your life and needn’t be about unrequited adolescent relationships that lead to severe bouts of self-pity. “

So, while Dirk might say No…..I have to say my answer is Yes.

I bought a second-hand CD a long time ago, specifically for the purposes of having a bit of fun on the blog, and I’ve decided to use the normally quiet festive period, when the traffic and number of visitors drops quite dramatically, to go with it.

The CD was issued in 1996.  It is called Beat On The Brass, and it was recorded by The Nutley Brass, the brains of whom belong to New York musician Sam Elwitt.

The concept behind the album is simple. Take one bona-fide punk/post-punk/new wave classic and give it the easy listening treatment.

There are 18 tracks on the CD all told.  Some have to be heard to be believed.

Strap yourselves in.

mp3: The Nutley Brass – Boredom

And, just so you can appreciate the magnificence (or otherwise) of the renditions, you’ll also be able to listen to the original versions as we make our way through the CD in random order.

mp3: Buzzcocks – Boredom

From the Spiral Scratch EP, released in January 1977.

JC

Album: Singles Going Steady – Buzzcocks
Review: Record Collector, May 2019
Author: David Quantick

When this compilation of Buzzcocks’ singles – A-sides and B-sides from Orgasm Addict to Something’s Gone Wrong Again – was released in the US in 1981, most reviewers took the angle that here was a great singles act, best represented by its 45s, whose succinctness and excellence made Singles Going Steady the only really essential Buzzcocks album.

And while this is a perfectly valid viewpoint, based on the complete and utter lack of bad songs contained herein, it’s also a load of rubbish, as every Buzzcocks album – even the patchy Love Bites – is excellent.

That said, you can see where the reviewers were coming from. Ever since its release – both in its original form and the upgraded CD version which features the six songs brought out as singles towards the end of the band’s career – Singles Going Steady has been an ideal introduction to Buzzcocks’ work. You put it on and you marvel at the sheer hurtling rush of their work, from 1977’s Orgasm Addict with its teasing, snarky Howard Devoto lyric, to the brevity and excitement of Love You More (last line “until the razor cuts”), the droll romance and perfect catchiness of the one that should have been No 1, What Do I Get, the absolute pop song perfection of I Don’t Mind (even its opening drum burst suggests that producer Martin Rushent knew it deserved to be a hit)… every song is a step forward, a manifesto and a thrill ride.

No other band at the time was evolving as fast while at the same time retaining its identity: even the wide-eyed brilliance of Ever Fallen In Love was only a little more excellent than Diggle’s daffy Promises, or Everybody’s Happy Nowadays, or Harmony In My Head (and while the Martin Hannett-produced finale singles can be gawky and uncertain, there are moments of brilliance, from Steve’s Why She’s A Girl From A Chainstore to the Rushent return of the brass-powered What Do You Know?).

And that’s just the A-sides: there’s no better tribute to the band’s desire to experiment and change than the flipsides of these amazing singles. Whatever Happened To? and Oh Shit! are almost conventional punk. Noise Annoys is androgynous art-pop. Lipstick is the sexy cousin to its riff sister Shot By Both Sides. Why Can’t I Touch It? is The Hollies doing Krautrock. Something’s Gone Wrong Again is Waiting For My Man via Alan Bennett (“go to the pub/but the bugger’s shut”). And so on, and so on.

Singles Going Steady is a masterpiece, probably the best singles-only collection of all time. It may not be Buzzcocks’ greatest LP, but it would be anyone else’s best album.

JC adds…….

I’ve previously shone a light on the various singles with a 13-part weekly series between August-November 2016; my look included the songs on the Spiral Scratch EP which have always been absent from Singles Going Steady as it predated the contract with United Artists.

The above review was celebrating a fresh release on Domino Records.  My vinyl copy from 1981 is long missing – loaned out and not returned in all likelihood – and these days I rely on a CD version from 1990 which mirrors the original release with its sixteen tracks consisting of just the first eight singles and their b-sides or a 2001 re-mastered version which has twelve singles and their b-sides.

I think it’s fair to say that the collection provides a ridiculous adrenalin rush from start to finish, although the inclusion of the singles from 1980, with their slight dip in tempo, in the middle of the expanded version does jar a wee bit when the brain is so attuned to the order of songs on the original release.  It’s a minor quibble but it does now mean that I always put the album on random shuffle when listening to it these days on the i-pod as this offers up something fresh, and I have a bit of fun trying to guess what song will actually come up next. For what it’s worth, I rarely get two in a row correct!

The above review is a bit sloppy in places, which given that David Quantick is usually an excellent writer, is most likely down to some shabby editing.  But……

“Singles Going Steady is a masterpiece, probably the best singles-only collection of all time. It may not be Buzzcocks’ greatest LP, but it would be anyone else’s best album.”

…..is bang on the money.

mp3: Buzzcocks – I Don’t Mind
mp3: Buzzcocks – You Say You Don’t Love Me
mp3: Buzzcocks – Something’s Gone Wrong Again
mp3: Buzzcocks – What Do You Know?

JC

One of the greatest pop-punk records of all time was written in Edinburgh…..

In November 1977, Buzzcocks were touring the UK. Before a gig at the Clouds (also known as the Cavendish Ballroom) in Edinburgh, they stayed the night. Pete Shelley later recalled:

“We were in the Blenheim Guest House with pints of beer, sitting in the TV room half-watching Guys and Dolls. One of the characters, Adelaide, is saying to Marlon Brando’s character, ‘Wait till you fall in love with someone you shouldn’t have.’ “I thought, ‘fallen in love with someone you shouldn’t have?’ Hmm, that’s good.”

The following day he wrote the lyrics of the song, in a van outside the main post office on nearby Waterloo Place. The music followed soon after.

One of Pete Shelley’s greatest attributes as a songwriter was the ability to write about situations that could be taken by every listener as being completely applicable to their own lives. There can’t be any of us out there who could give the answer of ‘No’ to the question. It particularly appealed to my teenage sensations, when the girl(s) of my dreams were way out of my league, preferring the company of those a couple years older or those who weren’t total bookworms. It didn’t help that my tastes in music weren’t universal…..

But as the years have passed and relationships have come and gone, it’s very clear the song can apply at any time in your life and needn’t be about unrequited adolescent relationships that lead to severe bouts of self-pity. It’s also got a tune that is instantly recognisable.

I bought this back in the day in 1978 on 7″ vinyl, the only format it was issued in. I lost it a long ago and have never managed to replace it with a good enough copy without hisses, crackles and the occasional jump….very few of us took good enough care of the single. But, just a few weeks ago, while browsing in a shop in Glasgow, I found a near-mint first-edition copy of Love Bites, (complete with artwork insert) and from that LP, I can offer up both the single and its almost equally-marvellous b-side.

mp3: Buzzcocks – Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve?)
mp3: Buzzcocks – Just Lust

JC

I don’t care that these songs featured on the blog back in August 2016 as part of a series looking at all the 45s by Buzzcocks.  The words that follow are different….

Spiral Scratch is, without any question, one of the most important pieces of plastic in all history as it set the template for the DIY attitude that began with punk and still resonates today, probably even more so given how much new music is self-financed, promoted and released to the listening public.

The four-track EP came out at the end of January 1977, with the bands’s main protagonists – Pete Shelley and Howard Devoto – having been inspired to start up a band after initially seeing Sex Pistols play live down south and then promoting the now legendary show(s) at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in Manchester. Up until this point, the only way a singer or band could get product into the shops was through some sort of contract with a record company through which all the technical, administrative, practical, financial and legal stuff would be sorted out. It was also more difficult for any bands living or working outside of London to land any contract as the capital was where all the labels had their headquarters or satellite office if they were owned overseas.

Pete and Howard borrowed £500 from friends and family members (it equates to around £3,000 today). They went into Indigo Studios in Gartside Street, Manchester on 28 December 1976 working alongside a new producer called Martin Hannett , who, in keeping with the ethos of punk changed his name to Martin Zero on this occasion. The real hero of the session, however, is the uncredited Phil Hampson, the in-house engineer at Indigo who guided the band and the man at the controls through the three hours it took to record four songs, albeit it was Hannett/Zero who then spent a further two hours doing the final mixes….

………..except it has since emerged that just a few days later, in response to learning that Pete and Howard weren’t entirely happy with the end results, Hampson went back into the studio to do a little bit of remixing for free as the rest of the budget had to go on forming a label called New Hormones and pressing up the initial 1,000 copies.

It seems incredulous but while Hannett went on to form a production career with post-punk bands for the rest of his short life, Hampson went back to the bread and butter of what happened at Indigo which was comedy, cabaret and novelty records, most often driven by the demand from the nearby Granada TV studios. Spiral Scratch would be his only involvement with the punk/new wave scene – not that he was bothered as he thought the music was awful!

History shows that the EP quickly sold out its initial pressing and in due course would sell around 16,000 copies, initially by mail order but also with the help of the Manchester branch of music chain store Virgin, whose manager took some copies and persuaded other regional branch managers to follow suit.

Howard Devoto, almost as soon as the EP was pressed, announced he was quitting the band, going on to form Magazine, leaving the path clear for Pete Shelley to move centre stage and take lead vocal on a number of Top 40 hits in the ensuing years.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Breakdown
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Time’s Up
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Boredom
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Friends Of Mine

Yup…..the best-known of the four songs wasn’t seen by the band as being their best.

JC

And so we come to the 13th and final 45 released by Buzzcocks in their initial incarnation. The lyrics, written by Steve Diggle, kind of sum up how much of a chore it must have become trying to hit payola again now that the band had fallen out of favour.

Here in suburbia
There’s nothing left to see
Just want to spend my time running free

I’ve had enough of the day job
I can see farther than that
Just want to spend my time running free

The air of tension still is rising higher
Screaming emotions are singing to you
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)

Here in the engine room
A pulse shouts for a word
Just want to spend my time running free

I’ll pull out condition
There’s no need to face facts
Just want to spend my time running free

You better make a move before sleeping gets you
You better shape soon before the weak things make you
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)

Here in proles’ paradise
Experiments on the weak
Just want to spend my time running free

It’s a trick of the torment
You tend to forget yourself
Just want to spend my time running free

Your conscience may be changed as the plan gets harder
It’s just been rearranged to keep the strata
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)

Your conscience may be changed as the plan gets harder
It’s just been rearranged to keep the strata
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)
(No no no time no no no time)

It’s a sad, resigned lyric and it has a similarly sad and resigned tune to go with it.  But very listenable.

The b-side is a really strange one.  I never knew it until more than 20 years later (see last week’s posting for an explanation) and the first thing that hit me was that it sounded remarkably like Pete Shelley fronting The Boomtown Rats (blame the sax and shout a long chorus).  Was What Do You Know? the departing shot at the record label bosses who behind the scenes were looking for Buzzcocks to achieve the same sort of mainstream success of some of their contemporaries?  If so, it’s a great two-fingered salute to all concerned.  Even if it’s not, it was a fine way to go out.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Running Free
mp3 : Buzzcocks – What Do You Know?

Right who’s next for the Sunday singles treatment?

The fact that the final few singles from Buzzcocks sold in such few numbers means that they are now the most difficult to find on the second-hand market and are marginally more expensive to buy than the hits.

That’s one theory.  But it might well be the case that this particular single is more valued as it is something of a forgotten classic.

Strange Thing isn’t anything at all like the catchy near power-pop of the hits of the previous years.  Instead it’s more akin to the sound of many of their new wave peers – surely I’m not alone in listening to the music and hearing the sort of sounds that Weller & co. were taking to new unthought of heights of popularity?  The closing section in particular always brings to mind Private Hell from Setting Sons.

In keeping with what had happened with the previous single, the flip side was given over to Steve Diggle and this time he came up with something that proved he had indeed been playing close attention to the support band on the last big tour of 1979.  Airwaves Dream really does sound like Joy Division without the tricked up production values applied by Martin Hannett.

What I’m kicking myself about is that I didn’t buy the single on its release.  In fact, I didn’t discover these two gems until many many many years later when I picked up a cheap copy of the re-released and re-packaged Singles Going Steady CD which had been expanded to include the final four singles from that great era (the initial release of the compliation ended with Harmony In My Head/Something’s Gone Wrong Again).   Given that the younger me had felt let down by Are Everything I wasn’t expecting much from these unknown songs; it was a surprise that they both turned out to be pleasures.

It’s fair to say that the teen me might have struggled with Strange Thing/Airwaves Dream on its release as my mind and tastes would have been attuned to the poppier side of Buzzcocks, and so I’m glad it took me 20+ years to hear them for the first time.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Strange Thing
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Airwaves Dream

Enjoy.

Moving forward to 1980 and what proved to be the beginning of the very end of things first time around for Buzzcocks.

They were no longer press darlings and the events of late 1979 when they had been blown out of the water on tour by their support band caused something of a crisis.

It would also seem, looking back, that they had fallen out of favour at United Artists and with no guarantees of hit singles the money spent on promoting and releasing the material was cut back.  Thus, the rather lacklustre sleeves as compared to the previous singles on the label.

It was also clear that the band were now being seen as a singles-only outfit which is why the first new recording from 1980 has ‘Part 1’ on the sleeve. Just how many ‘parts’ there would be in over the following months none of us knew.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Are Everything
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Why She’s A Girl From The Chainstore

With the benefit of hindsight, Are Everything is not the worst thing you’ll ever hear in your life but on release it felt awfully flat and devoid of imagination in comparison to what had come before.  And the gimmick of it seemingly fading out and then suddenly bursting back into life again some 45 seconds from the end must have it made a difficult sell to radio producers.  And yet it sold enough copies to spend three weeks in the UK singles charts in September 1980, peaking at #61 which was more than You Say You Don’t Love Me had ever managed.

The b-side is a Steve Diggle number that seems to have its roots in the rough’n’ ready stuff of new wave bands hoping to be discovered on the back of a catchy shout-out-loud chorus without much else to back it up.

The end truly was nigh.

As mentioned last week, the release of the third LP was always going to be crucial in terms of what happened next for Buzzcocks.

But before then, the Spiral Scratch EP was given a re-release and climbed into the Top 40 in August 1979.  A few weeks later a new 45 was released to precede the new LP.  It was a single now regarded with the benefit of hindsight as one of their finest but which on release was a total flop.

This must have been hard to take.  A single containing everything that had brought the band to the fore wasn’t playlisted by Radio 1, which in those days was basically a death sentence.

Unperturbed, the band announced a major UK tour to promote the new LP which they called A Different Kind Of Tension which, although it could be thought of as a swipe at their critics, was in fact the name of one of the new songs.

It was 1979 that I started going to gigs and I got myself a ticket for Buzzcocks at the Glasgow Apollo – looking it up now I can see the gig was on Friday 5 October.  I got along early, as has always been my practice, to catch the support act. This lot had been getting a great deal of coverage in the music press.

It was Joy Division.

The intensity and power of their set, which to be honest wasn’t universally enjoyed as there were a lot of slow songs which wasn’t quite what the audience were there for.  But their front man really made a huge impression.  The fact that Pete Shelley took  to the stage a short while later and opened with the words ‘excuse me while I put out my ciggy’ instead of blasting into a great hit from days of old showed that he knew the game was up and new bands were about to become the media darlings.

The album did hit the top 30 but no other single was lifted from it and released in the UK.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – You Say You Don’t Love Me
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Reason D’Etre

Decent enough old-fashioned b-side too.

Enjoy.

As with all new music back in 1979, the first place you would get to hear it would be across the airwaves of BBC Radio One, 247 on the Medium Wave.

I’ve no idea what DJ was spinning the discs when this came but he did introduce it as the new single by Buzzcocks.  I thought he had made a huge error.  Yes, it did musically sound like them, but unless Pete Shelley had been replaced as vocalist by one of The Stranglers, then this was most certainly another group.

A couple of weeks later and I saw them perform the new single on Top of the Pops and the mystery solved itself when the camera panned over to the mimed performance and it was Steve Diggle who was doing the singing as Pete moped around in the background trying unsuccessfully to be a team player.

Maybe it was the criticism of the vocal delivery on ‘Happy’ that had hit home or maybe it was just that the lead guitarist had come up with the best available song for the next 45.  Harmony In My Head was as post-punk/new wave as it came but the record buying public didn’t fall for it as it spent just three weeks in the Top 40 and got no higher than #32 – it was a far cry from the heady days of Ever Fallen In Love less than a year previously.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Harmony In My Head
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Something’s Gone Wrong Again

Three singles in 1979 had suffered declining sales.  The third LP was going to be critical…..as indeed was the UK tour that had just been announced.

The Buzzcocks juggernaut showed no signs of slowing down as yet another brand new song became the latest 45 in March 1979.

However, this one didn’t do as well as hoped or expected, spending a miserly four weeks in the Top 40 and peaking at #29.

Not everybody would be happy nowadays.

I do recall there being something of a critical backlash against the band around this time.  Magazine had just released their second studio LP, Secondhand Daylight and its ambition and breadth led some to suggest that Pete Shelley was a bit of a one-trick pony incapable of lacing the Doc Martins of his former band mate. The fact that the new Buzzcocks single had the vocalist straining to hit the high notes was also a source of some amusement and ‘Happy’ took a bit of a caning when compared to what had been written before.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Everybody’s Happy Nowadays
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Why Can’t I Touch It?

The b-side is a strange one.  A band which specialised in the classic 2-3 minute pop song put down something that stretched out over six minutes.  This could have been a pleasant surprise except for the fact that the song is not all that good and leaves listeners pining for the more simple shouty catchy stuff of old,

All the while that Ever Fallen In Love was riding high in the charts so too was Love Bites the album it had been lifted from.  Like many other bands who were coming to the fore in the post-punk/new wave era of 1978 Buzzcocks were quite prolific and it was no real surprise when it was revealed that a brand new song was set to be the next 45.

The problem was that Ever Fallen In Love showed no sign of drifting out of the charts completely and so United Artists delayed the release of its follow-up all the while claiming, with the support of the band, that it was even better than the big smash.

In the event Promises was eventually released in late November 1978 but it only reached #20 in the charts as opposed to the previous single’s #12 showing.  However, it is worth remembering that this particular single was in the shops in the run-up to Christmas 1978 – indeed it was in the Top 30 on Xmas Day – and it is very likely that it actually sold more copies and in effect became the band’s best-selling 45.

It is an absolute belter of a record which, if there hadn’t been an Ever Fallen In Love would probably have been held up as the band’s all-time classic.

mp3 : Buzzcocks – Promises
mp3 : Buzzcocks – Lipstick

The b-side uses the same tune as Shot By Both Sides, the debut single by Magazine – a song which had been attributed to Devoto/Shelley.  But Lipstick is attributed solely to Pete Shelley thus robbing Howard of some deserved royalties.