After watching a drunk and drugged Johnny Thunders stumble his way around on stage, insult the audience, and eventually pass out, then 18-year-old audience member Paul Westerberg went home and wrote the song "Johnny's Gonna Die." The song—one of two Westerberg would write about his idol Thunders—was a rare unhurried moment on The Replacements' otherwise racing 1981 debut Sorry Ma, Forgot To Take Out The Trash . The wildly influential Thunders—a member of punk pioneers the New York Dolls in the early 1970s and then leader of the Heartbreakers—died ten years later from drug-related circumstances . Thunders' cult [...]
Johnny Thunders feeds on lightning " The Heartbreakers blew everyone away, for no more reason than that they were just more experienced -- they had their roots in R&B and rock 'n' roll. They were able to go onstage and draw on all that, whereas these kids ( The Damned , Clash , and Sex Pistols ) couldn't draw on anything yet. Real rock 'n' roll would start to happen and there's no fighting that, no getting around that. No matter how anarchic an audience thinks it is, [...]
The finalists for the 2010 Irish Blog Awards were announced this weekend and Town Full of Losers lived up to its name by losing out in all three categories for which it was nominated. I must admit that I was delighted to be nominated in three categories and I hope to be back next year. [...]
Cool interview with Dee Dee Ramone about the song Chinese Rocks (which he wrote but was made famous my Johnny Thunders & The Heartbreakers)
another wasted year. fuck. Johnny Thunders & The Heartbreakers "Born To Lose"
Johnny Thunders & The Heartbreakers: Born To Lose [ purchase ] Johnny Thunders: You Can't Put Your Arms Around A Memory [ purchase ] Johnny Thunders may have had a junkie's appetite for self-destruction and few figures in rock history have certainly done less with more. Hell, in terms of pure work ethic, Gram Parsons looks good by comparison. But, make no mistake, Thunders was a monster talent and is absolutely essential in the "godfather of punk [...]
It seems most of the world has its eyes firmly focused on an event centred around Beijing. I love my sport - I'm totally addicted to watching all sorts of drama unfold before my eyes, particularly in football (world version and American versions alike), golf, cricket, baseball, basketball, ice hockey - hell I'll even watch darts for a laugh. But the whole Olympics thing leaves me utterly
This week the seventy-seventh episode of Contrast Podcast takes us back to 1977. Ah, what a year! You see, dearest Friends, 1977 was my Year Zero. Twice. I saw Star Wars for the first time in 1977 and my eight-year-old imagination was completely enraptured. Thirty years on, the film still gives me thrills and chills, which I'm hopefully imparting to my very own children. Why, just the other day Little Man and I watched Empire Strikes Back together and now we have a splendid little game where I [...]
The following is a guest post by Will from, one of my favorite blogs, Be The Boy. If you read (and enjoy) Chuck Klosterman's stuff, then by all means, Be The Boy should be a daily stop on your Blog Ride. I hope you all enjoy this piece, on the late Johnny Thunders, [...]
Sorry, honeys of the Interweb -- Ha Meen has a special soulmate. In special salute to my one and only, here are the two sweetest, most heartfelt songs I know. This is for you, we did it! Happy Ballantine's Day, baby!
One band that still seems as fresh today as when they first rose up from the gutters of Manhattan's lower east side is the NY Dolls. That's not to say their junkie shtick wasn't a bit tiresome, and their odoferousness challenging even back in their heyday, but I just mean that the band seemed so far ahead of themselves, that their influence is still being felt all over the world today. The sheer youthful jerk off jubilation and utter societal disregard that is felt in their music makes it almost impossible to recreate, yet many have tried and [...]
Today is “National Talk Like A Pirate Day,†an annual event where the easily amused can indulge their inner Blackbeards, much to the chagrin of irritable misanthropes and shallow dig-me types whose ironic hipper-than-thou worldview holds no place for unselfconscious whimsy. The former I can empathize with, the latter can fuck off home to cry into their Snakes on a Plane commemorative pillows. I don’t understand this fixation on things pirate, myself. Given a choice, I’d rather pretend to be an 1870’s American cavalry officer, minus the genocidal mandate and smallpox blankets, of course. Last Sunday, [...]
Everybody Taste
The Adios Lounge
A Town Full of Losers
Dreamtard
She's Making Whoopee in Hell Tonight...
death from below
Star Maker Machine
THE VINYL VILLAIN
BadmintonStamps
pogo a go-go
An Aquarium Drunkard
Lil Mike's Last Known Thoughts & Random Revelations
Armagideon Time
I’ll Just Leave This Here #161
BAND OF HORSES – The Funeral (Sound Remedy Remix)
K-Holes - "Frozen Stiff"
Angger Dimas – Ribon Dooh (Preview)
