Pop & Punk
Guilty Pleasures v. Noisy Medicine
I’ve been listening to early ’70s pop, Elton John, Big Star, Bread, and Badfinger … and I’ve ordered several things to fill gaps including stuff by the Raspberries, Todd Rungren, and Harry Nilsson. Fun stuff. I’ve been trying to build my ’70’s collection so that I can start exploring another book idea … and wanted to focus on classic rock and punk … And although punk is a real weak point for me, I still find myself more interested in early ’70s pop right now.
I like some aspects of the punk/ post-punk albums I’ve listened to recently—the Clash’s London Calling, Pere Ubu’s The Modern Dance, and Richard Hell and the Voidoids’ Blank Generation—but I’m more likely to put on No Dice or Straight Up by Badfinger. Neither of the Badfinger albums are perfect—both have spotty tracks—but when the band gets it together on songs like “We’re for the Dark” or “I’ll Be the One,” they’re incredible.
I wonder if a certain aspect of punk—the shock of a new sound juxtaposed against the old—is lost when looking back. It’s as though you have to work at liking punk, overlooking the fact that no one can sing that well (Joe Strummer, Hell, or David Thomas), or that the best songs on a disc like Blank Generation—“Blank Generation” and “Love Comes in Spurts”—overshadow everything else or that too much of The Modern Dance runs together.
It’s reasonable to ask if there is much or any depth to, say, Bread or Elton John, and I admit that I find myself less patient with albums like Baby I’m-a Want You (1972) and Yellow Brick Road (1973) after digging deeper into better pop bands like Badfinger. Still … I’m not in any hurry to pick up another Pere Ubu album … though I’m sure I will eventually.
