Now, this isn't the first "Fake Punk" compilation ever. That honour goes to "The Great Rock'n'Roll Swindle" soundtrack,but even that pile of exploitative shite contained at least one absolute classic in the live "Belsen Was a Gas";thanks mainly to the 2 seconds of silence that greeted the ending of the song before the wild applause kicked in.
Punk Rock in general is an abject lesson in how the powers in the unelected real government orchestrate events to stifle dissent.
First 'they' demonise the dissenters, turn them into a monster that's gonna take away your children.This creates a climate of fear, and the natural animal response is to attack without really investigating what you are attacking. So messages are ignored, lies are believed and the subject of your implanted fears are immeadiately marginalised.
Second comes the ridicule, when you get establishment figures,popular comedians, making "funny" punk songs. Its slowly becomes a joke that nobody takes seriously. Caricatures of drunk leather clad morons with dyed mohicans, spitting and moaning about being on the dole; become what "Punk" is all about (The Exploited in fact!).
Thirdly, comes the absorbtion into the system and culture. Now the subject has been pacified it can be commercially exploited,and a sanitised version can be piled on the shelves and distributed to the people.
Don't listen to those prats who say that Music can't change the world! The world we live in today is unrecogniseable to the pre-rock'n'roll society. Culture and attitudes were exclusively shaped by pop culture. The philosophers of the past, were replaced (note the past tense here) by the Pop stars of the 60's through to the 80's, and the alternative underground figures linked to the new rock inspired counter culture.
You don't need to argue this fact to the intelligence agencies, they have released declassified files on The Sex Pistols and John Lennon; albiet only the harmless ones. They know the power these messianic figures can have over the masses. You could link the flood, and ready availablity of CIA developed 'Mind Control' drug LSD in the sixties, to a recognition of an opportunity to test the euphoric effects of these drugs on a large number of willing victims; at the same time as the military was spraying it over the Vietmanese jungle. And, somehow, nearly all the US army was dosed up on the very potent 'Orange Sunshine' variety of acid. This leads to a suggestable state of mind, and a feeling of euphoria that rarely leads the subject to question life in general.Alternatively it can lead to the Syd Barratt effect, and you can see what a danger to the status quo he became!
Aldous Huxley, advocate of LSD, and member of the Tavistock Institute (MK Ultra experimental centre), provided a rather insight giving quote about this dodgy drug:
"There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological
method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship
without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration
camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their
liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they
will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or
brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And
this seems to be the final revolution."
(Aldous Huxley, Tavistock Group, California Medical School, 1961)
Check out the excellent books by Neil Sanders for more detailed analysis on the subject, HERE!
The same three steps were equally applied to Psychedelia,as well as Hip-Hop,Punk,Original Rock'n'Roll,and (cough) Grunge. (I am discounting Acid House and subsequent "Dance" culture,as I believe that to be another drug feulled crowd control experiment, that was far TOO sucessfull, they have your children).
It all can be rather eloquently summed up by "Punk Poet", Patrik Fitzgerald, which opens this compilation and donates the title from the first line of "Make it Safe":
"Come and get yer Punk in Woolworths,
Bondage trousers 12 pounds,
Mohair jumpers sold next to cardigans,
It always comes around.
They turn it into a joke,
anything that threatens them.
They turn it into a dog or cat,
that they can stroke,
but couldn't bite its own tail.
They make it safe."
Such insight, from a marginalised punk figure!.......but he did sign to fucking Polydor i suppose.Unfortunately very few people are perfect.
The records on this compilation range from the Fake Punk bands that went wrong for the record companies; like The Vacants and FU2, who were actually very authentic.
Then we have the bandwagon jumping watered down clichéd "Punk" of The Drones and Satan's Rats, who were the first wave of the cultural absorbtion bands. This was betrayed when Satan's Rats become the awful Photo's with pop android Wendy Wu. The Drones were just a joke basically; opportunistic pub rock also-rans, spewing out punk platitudes about the queen and being "Yourself"; they helped to turn it into a joke without the help of third rate comedians like the despicable Charlie Drake (see The Water Pistols).
Then we have punksploitation that is actually rather good, like the Alan Milman Sect and Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias. They looked great and they sounded great; but can't discount them from the culpability of helping to turn it all into a joke.
Next we have the Fake Punk's of Horrorcomic, who were formed from Record company backroom staff, to fill the Punk band slot on their label.And the fake Punk of The Exile, who looked like the cast of a 1970's London Pub in The Sweeney. This is probably a good look, considering that Dr. Feelgood looked that that too; but I rather suspect that they actually were four blokes from a 1970's pub, albiet one from Glasgow.
The godfather of Fake Punk was Stewart Copeland, ex-progger and member of Fake Punk royalty, The Police. His irritating alter-ego was Klark Kent, who released several coloured vinyl recordings around 1978/80; disturbingly with the help of his CIA connected brother Miles.In fact their father was a long serving CIA agent! Wouldn't surrprise me if the lovely Stewart wasn't in the club too! That'd explain a lot.Cunt!
Then you've got the inadvisable cheese of Fakery, in The admittedly entertaining Plastic Bertrand (one of the Five famous Belgians of folk lore).With the moronic and repetative "Pogo Pogo", which is great stuff. And the unashamed cash-in of Pistols demo maker,Chris Spedding(s), "Pogo Dancing", which is loveable pop cheese of the highest order; and the Vibrators were his backing band for this single bizarrely enough.
There's american Punk cheese from various prositutes and exotic dancers, the marvellous Mary Monday (one of thee greatest singles ever or what?), and the laughable Cherry Vanilla. Dunno what the americans have got about cross-dresserrs and pole dancers, but it certainly helps marginalise the more meaningfull part of the counter culture.Some people find this fun, but it bores the shit out of me.
Last, but definitely not least, come the god-awful Novelty Punk discs. These are the 'Man's' secret weapon. How to turn dangerous ideas into a lame joke with even lamer jokes. Fuck me, there are some shit, unfunny, and interminably irritating bollocks on display here.
I left the most unforgivable examples for the last four tracks. Which include, two complete Twats (Buster Gobsmack,ha fucking ha)from the even twattier TV lowest common demoniator rubbish vehicle called "That's Life" (on UK Tv from 1973-1994). Admitedly it did once feature a dog that said "Sausages" to order (check out his single,yes!, HERE);
But these hideous pricks were so off the loop, that they did this crap punk parody in 19 fucking 88, when punk had been long sanitised and forgotten.This is how unbelievably shite this show was!
Alvin and the Chipmunks, from their lp "Chipmunk Punk", give us their rendition of some soft rock tune called "Refugee", and recreates what it must feel like to be trepanned by a rusty spike.A definition of Evil if ever I heard one!
Talking 'bout EVIL, the closer is an infinitely unfunny piece of utter shit, by career peadophile and record biz insider, Jonathan King. With a response record to the Pistols "God Save the Queen", with him doing a shit impression of her majesty thanking the pistols for their good work.This creature is a perfect example of an establishment insider defending his bosses; and god knows what sexual deviency he was involved in with his public shool chums in MI5/6. This fellow is a total cunt,and execution without trial is probably too good for him!
On a lighter note, we have Los Punk Rockers album "Los Exitos de Sex Pistols", which is a hilarious cash in remake of Never Mind the Bollocks, where the singer hasn't even bothered to find out the lyrics; so he just makes up stuff that sounds like what Rotten is singing. Ranks up with William Shatner's "Transformed Man" as one of the best good/bad albums ever made!
"I'm a Lazy seeeeven" (Seventeen, by Los Punk Rockers).
Track Listing:
1- "Make it Safe" - Patrik Fitzgerald
2- "Fuck You" - Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias
3- "Pretty Vacant - Paul Jones
4- "Pretty Vacant" - Los Punk Rrockers
5- "Pogo dancing - "Chris Spedding
6- "Pogo Pogo" - Plastic Bertrand
7- "You Make me Sick" - Satans Rats
8- "I've Seen it Vomit" - Bog Ugly
9- "I Just Want To Be Myself" - The Drones
10-"Punk Rocking Granny" - Duggie Briggs Band
11-"Beat on the Brat" - The Vacants
12-"Sniffin' Glue" - F.U.2
13-"Don't Care" - Klark Kent
14-"The Punk" - Cherry Vanilla
15-"I Gave my Punk Jacket to Ricky" - Mary Monday and the Bitches
16-"Down at the Vortex" - Yellow Dog
17-"Seventeen" - Los Punk Rockers
18-"England 77" - Horrorcomic
19-"Jubilee 77" - The Exile
20-"I Wanna Live in NW3" - Johnny Rubbish (disturbingly, a mate of Hugh Cornwell!)
21-"Johnny B. Rotten" - The Monks (These idiots were The Strawbs, and definitely NOT the Monks of 'Black Monk Time' fame;-shifted a lot of units in Canada????)
22-"Kill" - Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias
23-"Stitches(demo)" - The Alan Milman Sect
24-"Gob on you" - Not The Nine O'Clock News
25-"Gimme that Punk Junk" - The Water pistols
26-"Punk Strut" - Kevin Short and his Privates
27-"I Might be a Punk(but I love you)- Norman Gunstone
28-"Punk Bashing Boogie" - Don E. Sibley
29-"Going out with a Punk" - The Punkettes
30-"I'm a Punk" - Norman and the Hooligans
31-"Punky Christmas"- Matt Black and the Doodlebugs
32-"I want to be a Punk Rocker"- Andy Cameron
33-"Punk Prrincess" - Dave and the Derros
34-"We Wanna Be Famous" - Buster Gobsmack eats Filth
35-"Refugee"- Alvin and the Chipmunks
36-"God Save the Sex Pistols"- Elizabeth R.
DOWNLOAD direct from woolworths HERE!
Bobalouis (First and Second Singles)
-
Hope all of you are doing well, it's been a while. Sorry the blog hasn't
been very active lately; it seems as though I'm apologizing for long
absences ever...
1 hour ago
22 comments:
And in one fell swoop Mr. Zchivago lays waste to fifty years of popular culture... I would agree or maybe disagree with some of your points, but being under the influence of government mind control drugs I'm not sure what I think any more...
Although I will ask if this is really meant for listening to? You're a cruel bastard.
Tis not me who has laid waste to 50 years of pop culture, I am merely an observer now I am clean of govt lab developed pharmaceuticals. They may label me a conspiracy theorist, but that just fulfills rule one, Marginalise the dissenter, and has a smattering of rule 2, ridicule the marginalised.
Its all great fun, but I mean it.
Yes, it is to be listened to, but I will allow you to skip the last four tracks at least.
No man should be put through that outside of Guantanamo Bay!
I'll also admit to liking The Drones, on a purely superficial basis of course.
But Jonathan King should definitely be killed!
Cool!! ...actually Charlie Drake wasn't involved in the Water Pistols record but his own cash-in from late '76 "Super Punk" is actually pretty good in a near pubpunk/proto-Cock Sparrer kinda way.
Other stuff missed worth a mention include Airship, Gyppo, Richard Newman, Teddy & The Terrifics (Doc Cox again!), Christ Moose, Trainspotters (Mike Read), Public Zone, Kursaal Flyers ('Television Generation'), John Dowie ('Mew Wave') and Brum cabaret punks Brent Ford & The Nylons (most of whom backed John Dowie). Then there's the Euro fake-punk like Too Much, Praetors ('Pink'), King Louis & The Memphis Maffia, Fancy Rosy ('Punk Police'), Stefan (a 9 year old Plastic Bertrand protege!), and the wonderful 'Punke Punke' by Bobby Ranger.
One to avoid is Richie Hale & The Stormers 'Punkrockmusic', he's only having a pop at punk and is pretty awful. Much better is vintage rocker Freddy Cannon's 'Hey Punk Rocker!', stupid but great (by accident!).
Hi Worthless,
Yeah,realised the Charlie Drake cock-up when i perused the Drake entry in Wikipaedia;and now can't be arsed to amend it!
Veery impressed with your extensive knowledge of Punksploitation.
I already included the Kursaal Flyers track on the "Television's Over" mixtape i did earrlier, and not being one to rrepeat myself too much, i passed that one over.Great track though!
Christ Moose attracts me! But I have an understandable aversion to anything by Doc Cox!
Cheers for your valuable input.
The Teddy & The Terrifics (Doc Cox) track 'I'm Jolly Mad' (aka I'm Fucking Mad') is a really good Pistols pastiche, much better than that other thing or any of his Ivor Biggun stuff.
Forgot to mention Mondo Billie Davies, Septimus ('Do You Wanna Touch My Safety Pin'), Neville Wanker & The Punters, and Johnny Palermo (from Belgium). Two of note from across the Atlantic are 'I'm A Disgrace' by Tommy Trash, a bit late in the day (1983) but a total classic. Also 'Why Don't You Shoot Me With Your Sex Pistol' by the European Liquidators, only 3 (yes three!) acetate copies pressed which might make it the rarest punk record on the planet.
I feel unclean.
Thankyou!
Amazing compilation. Such good/bad music. Thanks for putting these together!
I wondered why the comments had jumped up by so many, spamming cunts.
Fuckin 'ell I know! If this carries on i'm gonna have to introduce those god awful 'Captcha' thingies to sieve out the spam robots!
I don't believe it. [fake British accent:] You...bloody...bastard!
I was gonna do a fake-punk post on my blog!
Well, actually we don't have too many overlaps. I'll remove the Mary Monday from my collection. Guess I'll leave in the F.U.2 and Los Punkrockers as they are dif. songs. And if I can find any of Worthless Trash's suggestions, I'll throw them in.
Gotta step up my game!
Synchronicity, I think those Fake Punk Prophets ,The Police, called it!
Look forward to your collection, see if you can find Charlie Drakes' "Super Punk".
Was gonna follow up my Los Punk Rockers post, with The Bollock Brothers "Never Mind The Bollocks 1983", but I appear to have mislaid the fucker! Thats pretty awful as well! (all of this was written in a fake american accent)
I'd agree with almost all of these selections, but Patrik Fitzgerald? Really??
uh? Patrik is there because his poem inspirred this collection.He puts it all in context, wether you agree with the selection or not!
Ah, fair enough... I thought you were tarring him with the same brush as the rest of the old shite on this compilation!
Satan's Rats and Mary Monday fake? When did you decide that? You woke up one morning and decided they were fake! Damn!
On What planet are Mary Monday and Satan's Rats 'Real Punk'? You're the only person on this planet that thinks they are! It was not my decision. They are fake as Fuck, and what is wrong with that?Heavens to Betsy,you americans!
As a Canadian, I loved the first Monks album. The Strawbs and the second Monks album, not so much...
Thanks for the post!
Canada is a fine country, and has every right to have put The Monks in their charts.I quite enjoy their first lp too, except "Nice Legs Shame abhaaaat the boatrace".
Check out the moment(on You Tube) when they met J.Rotten on Jukebox Jury."pleased to meet me" the carrot topped one was heard to mumble whilest avoiding their gaze. The Strawbs were beyond awful....did well in the U.S. says it all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83euqFBL7Ko
Shit....and it is very shit....The Village Peoples "Food Fight".Must go on volume two.....if it ever gets compiled.Suggestions welcomed.
Damn! I personally knew Mary Monday back in the 70's and 80's. She was a good friend of mine. I just googled her to read about her and i stumbled on this page. I knew her back in the early punk days and all i can say is that she was for real. She was not faking and she wasn't an act. She was one of the very first punk rockers. She was totally real and in it for real. I don't know why she is featured on a fake punk mix! But anyway, the people who knew her in real life know how she really was. By the way, she is dead now.
1/ Whats wrong with being Fake? Thats quite subversive in its own way.
2/ Just because you're in it 'for real' don't mean you can't make a Novelty Punk Record; which Punk Jacket undoubtedly is/was!And one of my fav singles ever made!
3/ Mary was probably a wonderful person, and we love her records; so no need for any guilt trip tactics. I mourn her passing, and you should see this as a tribute.
Z.
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