runaways

...little did bomp magazine and kim fowley know when they placed that advert in summer '74 the eventual combo that was formed would have their career take off and dovetail into the nascent punk underground explosion that was erupting in different parts of the western world...the runaways first and decidedly best LP took suzi q. vocal attack, t.rex riffs/slade thud/iggy-sleaze/left-over glam swill/sweet (live) heavy rock slop and melt the seperate parts into a not necessarily new version of rocking, but an urgent 'street-level' sound with a quaalude haze smeared all over...they may have been teenagers but the stoned weariness is already present due to the massive drug overdose the amerikkkan kids were going through due in no small part to growing up with war images and draft card madness that was creeping through all stratas of TeeVeeLand by the late 60's/early 70's when boogie rock grabbed ahold to help keep the wasted youth vaguely awake if not fully conscious...the semi claustrophobic production helps give this an underground feel that goes with the gutter/drug/nightlife lyrics nicely...seventies subterranean worlds of sleazed out junkies on angel dust living the dangerous back alley existance come into being...the stoned denizens of rodneys english disco on the sunset strip populate the grooves tottering about on their platform boots trying to stay upright through the course of any given tune...cats who dig teen exploitation movies from the prime era of such flix, the 50/60s will really cop a buzz off the last track with its bad attitude/low rent subject matter (but real enough for layabouts of all description who live in the pig terror zone that is the city of the angels)...very cool wax that benefits from listening in the same frame of mind as the original satin and silk hollywood wasters...

...summer 75 and the nascent runaways (joan/sandy/mikki) along with kari krome and kim fowley get some time at gold star studio to tape some tunes...self penned along some cool covers are laid down and the resultant efforts have been released many times over the years both on cassette and the trusty wax, plus naturally enough latterly a few times on booted coasters...rough and ready production/reproduction give the required hazy view on this now distant time and place...clunky playing maybe more in evidence than the participants may wish to remember but these teens give a good account of themselves and certainly show they knew what they wanted if it was a more hard rock sound than glam...some girl group pop noise surfaces under the murk showing some roots further removed than the pablum that was on FM as well as AM radio...watch out suzi q. the futures leaking through from unsuspected places...