19 GERMS
(GI)
SLASH, 1979

The short life and largely unnoticed death of Darby Crash (he committed suicide two days before John Lennonโ€™s murder) gave LA punk its own doomed hero. Heroin-addicted and chaotic, however, isnโ€™t the full story of the Germs. After the nagging simplicity of their debut single โ€œFormingโ€, the leap into focused aggression made by the Joan Jett-produced (GI) (โ€œGerms Incognitoโ€) is huge. A band that matched its intensity with rugged lyricism (โ€œWhat We Do Is Secretโ€), tracks like the deadly โ€œShut Down (Annihilation Man)โ€ find the band staggering towards the sick blues later cultivated by The Gun Club and Nick Cave. JR

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20 THE CONTORTIONS
Buy
ZE, 1979

The sound of James Brown torturing a seagull, Buy epitomises the No Wave sound that dominated high-end post-punk discourse. Short and violent, it was the musical embodiment of the Contortionsโ€™ Cuban-heeled founder James Chance, a Milwaukee sax maniac who received his first music lessons from nuns and happened upon CBGBโ€™s after coming to New York in an attempt to make it as a jazzman. Tired of the dead-eyed responses the Contortions received from SoHo loft smugsters, Chance gained a reputation for physical confrontation. โ€œI just started slapping some of them,โ€ he recalled. For a more sustained aural beating, try โ€œDesign To Killโ€ or โ€œContort Yourselfโ€. JW

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21 THE DICKIES
Dawn Of The Dickies
A&M, 1979

The LA cover version kingsโ€™ bad-taste orgy peaked with their second LP, featuring Sammy Davis Jr tribute โ€œWhere Did His Eye Go?โ€ and a reading of The Moody Bluesโ€™ โ€œNights In White Satinโ€, issued as a single in a superbly crass Ku Klux Klan sleeve. Sharp-witted for all of their dimbo reputation, things went dark for the Dickies; keyboard player Chuck Wagon shot himself in 1981, and singer Leonard Graves Phillips recalled: โ€œI was strung out on drugs โ€“ all of us were โ€“ and we just sat in front of a TV for about seven years.โ€ JW