From The Velvets To The Voidoids (2CD) (Limited card sleeve)
£10.99
Description:
'From The Velvets To The Voidoids' is the companion album to Clinton Heylin's book of the same name. This 2 CD, 32 track collection, was compiled by Heylin with Stuart Batsford and comes with specially written liner notes by Heylin himself.
As he says in the introduction to this collection, virtually a greatest hits of seventies U.S rock's finest and most influential alternative moments: ..'For me, and for so many post-Bangsian scribes, 'modern music' begins with the Velvet Underground'. Hence, we kick off with perhaps their two most radio friendly toons, lyrical and loaded, 'Rock & Roll' and 'Sweet Jane'.
From there, it's straight on with their Detroit cousins, the Stooges and the MC5 plus a host of handpicked, no-nonsense followers, Alice Cooper, the New York Dolls, Patti Smith, Television's monumental Ork single 'Little Johnny Jewell' in its full uncut form, Blondie, The Heartbreakers, the Dictators, Suicide, Rocket From The Tombs, Pere Ubu, Devo, Johnny Thunders and a clutch of Sire Records astute signings, the Ramones, Talking Heads, Richard Hell and the Dead Boys.
These bands and this music has influenced every generation since all over the world. It's interesting, while many of these artists and groups would notch up huge hits after 1978, only the Modern Lovers' 'Roadrunner' could make such a claim in the UK charts of the day. Yet absolutely every one of these tracks is a classic: The Stooges' 'No Fun', Alice Cooper's 'I'm Eighteen', the song John Lydon auditioned with for the soon-to-be Sex Pistols, the New York Dolls 'Personality Crisis', Suicide's 'Rocket USA', Heartbreaker's 'Chinese Rocks', Talking Head's 'Psycho Killer' et al & etc.
Name any halfway decent band over since the eighties and they would cite any number of these tracks as the reason they wanted to be in a band in the first place. A remarkable near-30 years since Richard Hell wrote the anthem for 'the blank generation', this collection spits and spurts with true rock & roll energy. Timeless stuff.