The Cortinas and The Heartbreakers

There’s never going to be a reason not to post something from Bristol's first punk band, The Cortinas. Formed in March 1976 when Jeremy Valentine (vocals), Nick Sheppard (guitar), Mike Fewins (guitar), Dexter Dalwood (bass) and Daniel Swan were still at school. "Jer put the band together, he definitely had a vision of what he wanted; he was very hip - Dexter and Mike went to the same school as him" remembers Nick. "He found me via Mark Stewart, who I went to school with, and I brought Dan in; we had played in a band together before. We used to practise at the back of Jer's Dad's shop".

The Cortinas soon built up a big local following, and a break came when the band supported The Stranglers at the fabled Roxy Club in Covent Garden on 22 January 1977. Nick recalls how it came to be: "Hugh Cornwell was staying at a friend of his' flat near the university, on holiday, and me and my girlfriend met him in the street. This would have been in the summer of 76. We started talking to him because we recognized him from seeing The Stranglers and hung out for the afternoon. I told him about the band. Later on, in January 77, he sent us a postcard asking us to play at the Roxy, so we rang up and said yes! I remember my mum telling me not to be too disappointed if people didn't like us...". Things then moved quickly for the band. Miles Copeland and Mark Perry's Step Forward label released the classic singles 'Fascist Dictator' in June and 'Defiant Pose' in December, the band recorded a fine Peel session, and they appeared on the front cover of the April/May issue of Sniffin' Glue. Heady stuff, but sadly, it was over all too soon. The following year, after a poorly received album, the band were no more, but in 1977 they were unstoppable - simply one of the best first wave punk bands around.

Few other rock musicians have ever danced on the edge of drug oblivion for as long and hard as Johnny Thunders did. The theme of hard drugs (namely heroin) cropped up time and time again in Thunders' music, perhaps never more evident than in one of Thunders' best-known songs, "Chinese Rocks." While the song is pure Johnny Thunders (ragged guitar riffs, an almost drunken vocal delivery, lots of attitude, etc.) Thunders did not pen it. The song's main author was the Ramones' bassist Dee Dee Ramone. He set out to write a song that would out-do the Velvet Underground's "Heroin," as the song shed light on the grim and desperate life of a junkie (strangely, it was more comparable to another VU song, "I'm Waiting for the Man," rather than "Heroin"). Dee Dee supposedly wrote the song in Debbie Harry's apartment, but when he showed it to his Ramones bandmates, they rejected it since they didn't want any drug-based songs. Dee Dee then showed it to friend Richard Hell, who was in Johnny Thunders' band the Heartbreakers at the time. The Heartbreakers recorded it for their classic L.A.M.F. release, but, over the years, Thunders was erroneously assumed to be the song's author, even though he had nothing to do with the song's creation.

True Romances

The Cortinas, forming in March 1976 had soon built up a big local following, and a break came when the band supported The Stranglers at the fabled Roxy Club in Covent Garden on 22 January 1977. Things then moved quickly for the band. Miles Copeland and Mark Perry's Step Forward label released the classic singles 'Fascist Dictator' in June and 'Defiant Pose' in December, the band recorded a fine John Peel session, and they appeared on the front cover of the April/May issue of Sniffin' Glue. Heady stuff, but sadly, it was over all too soon. In 1977 they were unstoppable - simply one of the best first wave punk bands around.

Interest in The Cortinas was at its peak. They had released two singles on Miles Copeland's Step Forward label. They'd supported The Stranglers and headlined at the Roxy. They'd been top of the bill at The Marquee played with Chelsea and Sham 69 and toured with Blondie and Television. Promoters had booked them with the caution befitting a punk reputation, which had been further guaranteed by a photograph in the NME precariously close to the incident involving Shane MacGowan and the missing ear lobe.

It was time for an album; Miles who had his finger in every punk pie going and was the king of the record deal gave them to CBS and consequently the album True Romances was recorded. 'Real' punk does still exist there; even though the critics of the day argue that it was lost on the album, released after the band had split, the spirit still seeps through the 13 tracks on offer.

Never able to shake off the schoolboy image, much was made of Mike Fewings and Dexter Dalwoods waif-like image and drummer Danny Swan was still just 17. CBS used the bands age to counter criticism but did nothing to promote the album or further its member’s careers. Hamblett further suggested they'd either grow into fine young musicians- either that or Oxford Dons - well they did more or less, but he didn't manage to foresee the famous artist Dexter was to become.

By their own admission much of the punk stuff had been 'hastily written and perhaps a bit formulaic’; many said the tracks that became True Romances had returned them to their formative R&B roots. Whatever the verdict, you'll find Ask Mr Waverley' going round and round in your head for days after hearing it and if you remember him, you probably know the answer already.