Pure Punk Picks
Warm Leatherette – The Normal
“See the breaking glass, in the underpass (2x)
Hear the crushing steel, feel the steering wheel (2x)
Warm Leatherette”
Warm Leatherette released in 1978 was often played on Boston and Cambridge college radio back then.
I would have to say that Suicide’s first album released in December of ’77 would have been my first introduction to electronic punk music. An album, by the way, that was almost as shocking to me as The Ramones
first album.
But this song played a huge part introducing me to electronic music, though I had been a big fan of the German group, Kraftwerk, for several years.
And for me- Well, Kraftwerk is as important to electronic music as Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley was to rock’n’roll.
And may I add, my first trip to The Rat was to see The Cars, before their major label signing and of course, they had a synthesizer player.
Hearing this song now reminds me of such great, early electro-punk bands such as L.A.’s The Screamers and San Francisco’s Tuxedo Moon. And maybe we can add Cleveland’s Pere Ubu and Devo, as well.
There was a time when synthesizers and punk music didn’t immediately cross the street when seeing each other, as it seems to be the case nowadays. I still envision and hope for a time when they come together and create a new form of modern punk rock, that combines the wild array of sounds available with the wild energy and rawness of punk.
Warm Leatherette was based on J.G. Ballard’s 1973 controversial novel “Crash” which was made into a controversial film in 1996. It revolves around people who receive sexual pleasure from car crashes, displaying a fetish that in real life no one actually has!
“Warm leatherette, melts on your burning flesh. You can see your reflection, in the luminescent dash. A tear of petrol is in your eye, the hand brake penetrates your thigh. Quick- let’s make love, before you die.”
This song moves swiftly along like a conveyor belt on an assembly line. There’s whirring twirls of sound and a monotone sounding voice, with a slight British accent reciting the words.
There’s a touch of emotion revealed in the lyrics of the verse but it always returns to the cold, icy proclamation of the title- delivered so unwarm, decisive and direct.
I could see how some might think of this song as the antithesis of punk rock and especially the punk rock of 1977 and 1978.
But as I stated before, this was played alongside The Ramones, The Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Damned and no one objected then it seemed.
But the line, the correlation of this song with those punk bands, was that The Normal, the band who recorded this, was also rejecting all that had come before them in rock just as the punks were.
Both sides were exploring a new way of expressing oneself, both lyrically and musically, and I feel there’s no doubt, whether one cares for this tune or not that this was accomplished.
And be aware that creating a song that had no guitars, no bass and no drums and even no melody, was not really happening then.
This song may be more influential than I had previously thought. All I know is that it arrived around the same time Devo did, but preceded Ultravox, Gary Numan and of course, the whole group of British synthesizer pop bands of the early eighties.
I’ve always liked the synthesizer, I even owned a cheap one around the time of this song. I wish that its use had taken a different course in music and not become primarily associated with lifeless, commercial pop. I wish it could have been pulled into the wild creativity of punk more, where it could’ve flourished.
This song is said to be an influence on industrial music and that’s a music genre, I believe contains some excellent, uncompromising stuff.
There’s a wonderful collaboration on YouTube between Trent Teznor of Nine Inch Nails and Peter Murphy of Bauhaus playing this song in a studio that I think is great. I’m gonna suggest to Andy that he consider using that video for this item but then, it is his call.
Plus, I’ll keep hoping electronic and punk music collide into each other creating some fiery car crash burst into creative/destructive flames art!
But in the meantime, all I know is that I’m gonna have to seriously consider joining-
The Car Crash Set!
(Slimedog)
