Was the success of “Sound Of The Suburbs” a help or a hindrance to the band? Was it really exciting at the time doing “Top Of The Pops” and hearing the song everywhere? What do you feel when you hear the song now?
[Nick Tesco] I love the song but the funny thing is we were accused of “selling out” because we’d had a hit whereas the Clash signed to this huge monolithic major label and they’re deemed to be revolutionaries. It was really exciting and doing TOTP was a bit of an anticlimax being as it’s not really what you expect, but then dreams never are when they come true. I’m proud of the song and there’s a lot of people out there who see it as one of the defining moments of punk.
Indeed, makes a good point too about selling out and the comparison with The Clash
Wish I still had my copy of Chelsea Nightclub, listening back now, big smile
Heh, the crowd I was with were a little bit sniffy about The Clash and ‘selling out’ - being in a small band, I think we were secretly jealous as hell!
The fact that The Clash had signed with a major from the outset was uncomfortable for many at the time whilst conveniently ignoring the fact, middle class grammar school boy forms “punk” band and signs with CBS
OK because this has been all over the forum, I decided to listen to this on Tidal, but abandoned it after about 20 minutes. It’s awful – this woman’s screeching and caterwauling is nothing like Percy and the facsimile backing is hamfisted and lacks the swing and ‘x-factor’ that Zep had.
Also, what is the point of this, when you can just listen to Led Zep, who are a grillion bazillion zintillion times better? Life’s too short…
I remember when our singer and me were talking one night about how we were the only people in the band/band supporters who hadn’t been to university, and had working class backgrounds…ah, such times!
Sigh…if you’re right, Kev (and after the Pharoah/Floating Points snoozeathon,I suspect you possibly are!) it’ll be going on the sell-pile in short order…
The aural cleansing and purification continues with another Classic Records 200g Zep. Soon, hopefully, Beth Hart will be a distant – if still ghastly – memory.
Interesting to see John Baine (Atilla The Stockbroker) on the credits, nice guy, co organiser of the brilliant Glastonwick Festival and member of my local CLP
