Second in a series of bite-sized posts about 7″ singles I own – shameless nostalgia from the days of vinyl.
The Damned – New Rose b/w Help (Stiff Records, 1976).
Not the first ever Punk Single, but the first British Punk 7″ and still a great record. I had a friend who worked in a record shop and got this on the day of release together with a poster of the grainy black and white band photo on the back sleeve. It was produced by Nick Lowe “at Pathway for Leather Nun Productions” with a breakneck version of Help on the B side that’s done and dusted in about a minute and a half.
The plundering of the line from The Shangri-La’s ‘Leader of the Pack’ (“Is she really going out with him?”) and the less than respectful cover of The Beatles give notice of a musical changing of the guard but also showed the importance of humour in these early punk records. The past was up for grabs and the future uncertain – to borrow Nick Lowe’s album title, this was “pure pop for now people”. Continue reading
