1977 was a good year. You had the Sex Pistols, Clash and basically every “classic” punk album ever. The bands and albums that unfailingly appear on the covers of magazine retrospectives, the bands and albums that dominate the sanitized acceptable narrative of what punk was and how it progressed. 1977 is overrated. My money is on 1979. 1979 saw the first album from Gang of Four, Wire’s 154, the beginnings of Mission of Burma and U2, and the peak of the Screamers, Joy Division, and Public Image Ltd. Infinitely more interesting than the stuff from 1977 and most of it rocked harder too.
The Magnificents [MySpace] are a punk band but they’re a 1979 punk band. Not in the horribly clichéd mid-2000’s post-punk revival way but in the sense that they eat the same influences as the second wave of punk bands and digested them similarly and when they play, they sound like 1979. 1979 but with considerably improved production values.
The Magnificents are from Scotland (is it just me or are there a lot of good bands coming out of Scotland recently?) and Year of Explorers is their sophomore album. It is taunt but not clichéd, full of piss and vinegar but in control. Album opener “Ring Ring Oo Oo” starts off invoking The Edge’s guitar on “New Years Day” but then, instead of Bono wailing about MLK, you get a dark turn into something vaguely reminiscent of early Joy Division but more danceable. “No Dialogue With Cunts” reminds me of a less sparse Devo, and the titular track appropriates some of the indie horror rock of Do They Know It’s Hallowe’en. As a whole, the album represents a fresh, catchy, and highly enjoyable 37 minute journey through all sorts of versions of 1979.
Score: 4/5
“Ring Ring Oo Oo” [mp3]
“No Dialogue With Cunts” [mp3]
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I don’t necessarily think ‘77 is overrated. I just think the music is easier to digest for most people which is why it enjoys such wide acclaim. ‘77 is the “punk” year — Ramones, Clash, Sex Pistols, etc. Meanwhile, ‘79 is where post-punk developed like a second head off the body of punk. Look at most of the ‘79 bands you listed — Wire, Gang of Four, Joy Division. These aren’t bands generally associated with punk rock.
This is where punk started growing outward, incorporating many different influences with electronic elements starting to creep in (Wire, Joy Division), worldbeat finding more ground (Talking Heads), and much denser material to try to wrap your head around. Punk was mostly two-to-three chords of rockabilly, garage, and surf culled together in to two minutes. These styles are all fairly easy to digest as they lend themselves well towards concise pop songs. Then there’s a band like Suicide which was putting out a ten minute schizophrenic dirge like “Frankie Teardrop.” It’s a lot harder to get into the latter.
So I don’t think ‘77 is overrated. I just think it’s easier to work it into the pop music mythos because the bands being represented are easier to market today. You can hear The Clash or The Ramones on almost any rock station nowadays. Cabaret Voltaire? Not so much.