"underpants are naff" (nuddy not-so-slight unsightly return)

 

"Latrine lunacy"!

In the same 1980 issue of Sounds, wholly gratuitous shot of depantsed but thankfully still underpanted Judge Dredd

In another issue Phil Mogg of UFO - one of Sounds frequent pin-ups - lays down the law: 

Unclear if this is an ahead-of-its-time(-for-UK) pro-boxers sentiment or simply a belief in going commando style under your spandex metalgod leggings or leather jeans 

This picture has appeared in Hardly Baked nearly as often as in Sounds at this point

UFO were on the cover of Sounds a ridiculous number of times - at least three times in end of '70s, early '80s heyday-of-sorts for the band.

Here's quite a good cover, and Mogg is fully clothed for once

Here's another with Mogg in a striking sweater

Sounds was a pretty sexist paper (the John Peel column alone is gross - not even hiding in plain sight his proclivities, but flaunting them).

But they did seem to maintain an equal opportunity thing with the scantily dressed pix of both genders - reflective I think of an earthier sensibility than NME or Melody Maker, rooted in a feeling for rock as a below-the-belt kind of music. 

1976: The Arse End of Old Wave (the New Wave barely in sight)

Feels like any week now it ought to be kicking off in terms of Punk Fiftieth Anniversary coverage. Magazine retrospectives, TV programs, exhibitions, books, documentaries... 

But what will they pick as the commemorative fulcrum?  The first, or the second, performance of the Sex Pistols at Lesser Free Trade Hall, Manchester? (The first is coming up very soon anniversary wise, just three days off, June 4... the second was in July).  The Ramones arriving in London for their July 4 1976 concert at the Roundhouse, all the fledging British groups in attendance?  The 100 Club Punk Festival in late September? The Damned's "New Rose", released October 22? Sex Pistols's "Anarchy in the U.K.", November 26? 

As you've probably noticed, I spend a lot of time perusing old music papers. And recently - mainly because I've never seen many of that year's issues until now - it's been the weeklies from 1976.

And here's the thing - judging from the contents of NME and Sounds that year, you would hardly know that something new and revolutionary is budding. The overwhelming preponderance of the coverage is Old Wave. Which of course doesn't know itself to be Old Wave yet, since the term New Wave doesn't exist and the Discourse of the Boring Old Farts only emerges towards the end of the year. The features, the record reviews, the record company adverts are business as usual,  the continuation of  early Seventies sounds:  prog, blues-rock, country-rock, sophisto-rock, hard rock, pomp rock, some final dribbles of glam. Nobody has the slightest idea they are about to be obsolesced.

Here below are some gleanings that give you the true Arse End of Old Wave flavour of 1976. So many artists I'd never even heard of - Roderick Falconer! Supercharge! Orleans! Spriguns! Cajun Moon! American Flyer! Frogmorton! Sparrow! La Seine! Widowmaker!

Post dedicated to Solstice, the Bolton longhairs who supported Sex Pistols at their June 4 1976 show at the Lesser Free Trade Hall, Manchester.

 

Yes, you are right - that is the future frontman of The Dream Academy right there

Even in the end of year critics picks, when the writing on the wall was writ large, the chart could not help reflecting the year's Arse Endiness, simply because there were hardly any punk / new wave records to figure in the tabulation

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This Arse End of Old Wave vibe actually persisted quite strongly even into 1977 - as advertising, as feature selection, as the front cover artists featured - even though 1977 is vastly more jam-packed with New Wave stuff. It takes a while for the newly signed New Wavers to get records out and there is a time lag effect, the residual hang-over of A&R decisions made in 1975 and 1976....  the newly-decreed Old Wave in sound and look signings are now putting out their second or third albums, contractual commitments have to be honored... adding to the fustiness is that the papers have yet to redesign, they still have the look of pre-punk graphically...

The Old Wave staleness wafted on into 1978

And is even addressed in the headline of this review - a rare appearance of “Old Wave” as a term

Here is Peter Stansfield with a different take on 1976 focusing on the punk glimmers 

He includes this July front cover on Sounds whicb is indeed an early sign of what to come 

 

But noticeable that the other featured artists are Old Wavest - Jeff Beck, Curved Air, Dave Byron