Debora Curry
English Dept - Administrative Assistant
Email: debora.curry@gcccd.edu
Office Hours: Monday-Friday 8am to 10am and 2pm to 4pm - email Debora for link for her Zoom Office hours
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Cassette, LP, ROIR, U.K., A103 (1981)
Transcription and annotations by Lester Bangs Archive management.
The Sound of NYC
by Lester Bangs
Over the last few years there've been a whole lot of catch phrases bandied about to describe what folks kept insisting was "new" music unlike anything aforeheard on planet Earth: "minimalism," "industrial music," etc. etc. etc. But there is one group which authentically exemplifies both of those concepts in their purest state, and was there way ahead of the pack: you're holding an authentic document (which you can also eat) of their visionary innovations in your hands.
I first heard of Suicide about ten years ago, though they were probably hanging out together formulating this for a good while before that. Back in '71, even in a magazine interview, they struck me as the first real IRT-lurking[1] move anybody had made since the Velvet Underground.[2] They played the Mercer Arts Center with The Dolls[3] and all the glitter bands like the Magic Tramps[4] and Ruby and the Rednecks[5] a couple years later, but they were never really a glitter group any more than the Velvets or the Stooges (their second major influence) were. What they have been all along is primal prototype street punks (with the best of hippie) thrown in on the side: Alan is expert enough at living without money he's been known to give away what little he had, and the first time I interviewed them in '78 he asked me, before my first question: "Want a hit of acid?" When I politely declined, he just popped it in his own mouth. Alan was wearing ripped black leather jackets with chains and razor-blades and all that long before it became fashionable, and all you have to do is take a gander at all these worthless synthesizer-art bands around now to realize both how far ahead of his time martin Rev's approach to keyboards was, and how much more soul he's always had. It's just a real shame they go so little of the credit for what others turned into piddle, although when I played the first Suicide album for Ralf and Florian of Kraftwerk[6] (other two prototype-geniuses of this approach to the idea of the "rock 'n' roll group") early in 1978, they understood immediately and practically strongarmed me into giving them both copies of the record to take back to Germany.
What we got here is vintage studio Suicide from the archives and live tapes on a par in atmosphere if not violence with "23 Minutes In Brussels," their own notorious Metallic K.O.[7] There is none of the onstage carnage which frightened early audiences, but maybe that wouldn't have transferred to tape anyway. "Space Blue," "Long Talk" and "Speed Queen" were recorded at Suicide Home Studios in 1974/5, "Dreams" at Sun Dragon Studio in '75, and are not all that different from their later work except perhaps in murkiness which is all to the good. "Dreams" is very close to their later Island single "Dream Baby Dream," and also sounds a lot like certain things Eno would be doing in the mid-to-late-Seventies. Similarly, "Love You," recorded at Suicide Home Studios in '79, displays Suicide's little recognized sense of (no joke) pure pop. Play the Velvet's original "Waiting For the Man" back to back with the Ohio Express's "Yummy Yummy Yummy,"[8] then this back to back with Archies' "Sugar Sugar"[9] and the connections are clear. "Cool As Ice" from the same sessions is the coolest (only?) take on Stooges' "Penetration" ever, and proves once again that Alan can scream like nobody since Iggy at his pinnacles.
Of the live cuts, "Sister Ray Says" is a chip of darkness, monomaniacal as opposed to cover version or "tribute," while "Johnny Dance" (recorded, like "Ray," at London's Marquee Club in '78) is a more congenial, less paranoid "All Night Long," which later was taped at the Toronto Horseshoe Club in '78 and counterpoises Alan's nervous requests for a dance with his girl—his voice actually trembles—against the ominous monotone buzz of Rev's synthesizer, culminating in rave-up of Rev mechanized boogie and Vega becoming truly frenzied. "Goin' to Las Vegas" and "Harlem II" were both recorded live at CBGBs in '78, the former a stark tableau of Elvis dead in the neon slot machine jaws, the latter a true dry of rage and pain set to subway rhythms and feedback like the grinding of the train gears. I don't know where you live, but like the Velvet Underground's, the Dolls' and damn few others, Suicide's music is truly the sound of New York City for me. Trendies can keep laughing or just refusing to comprehend, but the ten years they've given this city are just the beginning.
[1] IRT: New York City's Interborough Rapid Transit Company.
[2] Lou Reed's groundbreaking New York band was heralded by Lester Bangs and many since as one of the most influential avant-garde rock era groups of all time, despite its commercially disappointing performance. Reed formed the group in 1964 with John Cale, Sterling Morrison, and Angus Maclise (whom Maureen Tucker replaced in 1965). Andy Warhol managed The Velvet Underground for a very brief time before Reed went solo in 1972—which, for Lester, signaled an end to Reed's greatness; his scathing excoriation of him in his 1973 interview, "Lou Reed: A Deaf Mute in a Telephone Booth," is now legendary.
[3] Hard rock Big Apple group New York Dolls banded in 1971 and, besides The Stooges and Velvet Underground, are classified as among the earliest to hit the punk rock scene.
[4] The Magic Tramps began in Hollywood as an improv rock band called Messiah, then, in 1971, moved to New York City with the intention of catching the attention of Andy Warhol, who reinvented the group as a glam punk band. The group performed its first gig at Max's Kansas City, where Velvet Underground, and later Lester Bangs, himself, performed.
[5] Ruby and the Rednecks is the brainchild of New York satirical performance artist Ruby Lynn Reyner, who formed the group as a glam punk act and opened for The New York Dolls at The Mercer Arts Center.
[6] Ralf and Florian is the instrumental third studio album from German electronic group Kraftwerk (Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider), released on the Philips-Vertigo label in 1973.
[7] Iggy Pop and The Stooges 1974 live album liberally reviewed by Lester Bangs, who called the album a "documentation of the Iggy holocaust at its most nihilistically out of control." Bangs is quoted among the sleeve notes, along with other British and French punk/new wave artists and rock journalists. (See sleeve notes for Metallic 2 x KO.)
[8] Ohio Express was the brand contrived for the sessions musicians enlisted to record the 1967 bubblegum pop standard, "Yummy Yummy Yummy," written by Arthur Resnick and Joey Levine.
[9] Working under the brand "The Archies," a fictional band featured in CBS's 1970s cartoon, The Archie Show, unknown sessions musicians were enlisted to record the 1967 bubblegum pop standard, "Sugar Sugar," written by Arthur Resnick and Joey Levine, with Ron Dantes on lead vocals. Not only was the song a surprise mega-hit in 1967, it has since become one of the biggest bubblegum hits of all time.
Debora Curry
English Dept - Administrative Assistant
Email: debora.curry@gcccd.edu
Office Hours: Monday-Friday 8am to 10am and 2pm to 4pm - email Debora for link for her Zoom Office hours
8800 Grossmont College Drive
El Cajon, California 92020
619-644-7000
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