Standing Over By The Record Machine: In The Red Records (now officially) reissues The Greatest Punk Single Of All Time

The embargoed review, at last! The Saints’ “(I’m) Stranded” wasn’t the first punk 45. But it beat all of the UK to the punch, and remains pogo rock’s single most definitive release. ALSO: R.I.P., Duck

The Saints, 1977: (l-r) Kym Bradshaw, Chris Bailey, Ed Kuepper

NOTE: Early last week, I received a care package from my friend Larry Hardy at In The Red Records, which I feel is one of the finest punk/garage labels in current operation. Among the goodies enclosed were three copies of all three versions of a reissue he drops August 2nd of my all-time favorite punk rock single, The Saints’ “(I’m) Stranded b/w “No Time.” In my excitement, I composed a Substack post about it, uninformed that the records were unreleased, that I was getting a preview, and that anything I wrote was embargoed until an official announcement. I get it — Larry was excited, knew I’d be excited, and he was excited to get the records in my hands. Details get lost in all that excitement, sometimes!

This is why I love Larry and In The Red — he’s a fan. I am, too. I can relate.

Unfortunately, this meant orders from management to take down my post until the official announcement, which happened today — click this link to preorder, including some swanky t-shirts and hoodies. And here’s my review/article, including some updated information.

Like a snake callin' on the phone

I've got no time to be alone

There is someone coming at me all the time

Yeah, babe, I think I'll lose my mind

'Cause I'm stranded on my own

Stranded far from home, alright

Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, May 1976: Ed Kuepper, guitarist and chief songwriter with a local band called The Saints, receives a visitor one day at his parents’ house, where he still lives. His pal brings over a copy of the debut album by a New York group getting a lot of press attention since it was released on April 23rd. The four-man group, called the Ramones, write nothing but two-minute songs based on ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll and ‘60s pop structures. Their lyrics are terse, sharp and funny. The tempos are relentlessly charged, based on the same revved-up straight-eighth-note drive heard on old Little Richard records. Underpinning it all is a viciously downstroked “buzzsaw” guitar that sounds like a minimalist reduction of The Stooges.

Kuepper sighed to his friend. “We’ve been beat.”

I'm riding on a midnight train

But everybody just looks the same

A subway light it's dirty reflection

I'm lost, babe, I got no direction

And I'm stranded on my own

Stranded far from home, all right

Truth be told, many around the world had that reaction to Ramones upon its release. Stories abound over the years of the staff of Oar Folkjokeopus, a beloved independent record store in Minneapolis, throwing JohnnyJoeyDeeDeeTommy’s first LP on the store turntable upon unpacking it. The general reaction? “Wow, this band in New York sounds just like the Suicide Commandos!”

This is because punk rock was not invented in NYC or London in 1975 by any one band. It was actually invented in Detroit in the late ‘60s by the aforementioned Stooges and MC5, who handed this delinquent energy, this overloaded and unstable guitar sound, and this middle-finger attitude to the New York Dolls. But no one was calling it “punk rock.” That term was applied to the ‘60s garage bands Lenny Kaye compiled on Nuggets in 1973, though it originated at Creem Magazine, when writer Dave Marsh seemingly pulled it out of thin air to describe Farfisa organ-drenched one hit wonders Question Mark And The Mysterians in a 1969 article. 

But The Stooges, the Five, and the Dolls implanted a virus in rock ‘n’ roll’s DNA that mutated and spread across the planet’s surface, roughly from 1973 to 1976. Disaffected kids all over the world caught it. These little cadres, working in complete isolation, formed the band they were hearing in their heads, because they were not hearing that band in the real world. They were hearing Elton John and Barry fucking Manilow! So, they made music as close to The Stooges and Dolls ideals as they could get, stamped with their own particular odor, unaware anyone else had a similar notion, nor did they care.

The following year, these bands (along with the press) looked around, probably around the point they heard Ramones. All involved realized a buncha bands arrived at the same conclusion, though none sounded like copycats of one another. And some rock press wag or other – maybe it was the scrappy crew at NYC’s Punk Magazine, maybe it was Melody Maker correspondent Caroline Coon – borrowed Marsh and Kaye’s term to name it: Punk rock. 

But no one saw The Saints’ “(I’m) Stranded” b/w “No Time” coming upon its release on the band’s own Fatal Records in September 1976 – months before either “New Rose” or “Anarchy In The UK”’ were issued. The 530 copy 45 was recorded in June 1976, one month after Kuepper heard that first Ramones album and realized they’d better hurry. Most people’s reaction was the same when they heard it: “Holy shit! Some Stooges cargo cult in an inaccessible region of Australia developed the Ramones’ sound themselves!” 

Stranded, I'm so far from home

Stranded, yeah, I'm on my own

Stranded, you gotta leave me alone

'Cause I'm stranded on my own

Stranded far from home

Come on.

The Saints had been working in isolation in Brisbane since 1973, a high school band based around a bond developed between the German-born Kuepper and Irish-born Chris Bailey in after school detention. Was the connection that both were foreign-born, aliens in this still-raw former penal colony? Was it the shared love of ‘50s/’60s rock ‘n’ roll, as well as more esoteric tastes such as The Stooges, or rowdy local acts with a refined pop sense from just a few years before, like The Easybeats or The Master’s Apprentices? Perhaps. But what they got up to initially as Kid Galahad & The Eternals, with Ivor Hay settling in on drums and Kym Bradshaw on bass, gained in speed and aggression via performance jitters. They learned to work with it across a series of shows held in the dilapidated dump where some members of the renamed Saints lived, because they could get booked nowhere else. It was a stroke of insanity that they resided directly across the street from the local police station.

And none of us would have heard this glorious blast of teeth-grinding distortion and stoned ennui in 4/4 time, had Ed Kuepper not taken a job at a record pressing plant, Astor Records in Melbourne. He noticed minor country singers and truck drivers coming in with tapes featuring one or two songs, getting them pressed up in small numbers of 45s. It was the first time he was made aware of the idea of custom pressings. He realized The Saints could do the same thing.

Thus, Australia was introduced to the idea of DIY. Kuepper took delivery of those 530 singles on August 2, 1976. A good chunk were sent overseas to various British and American music mags, plus retail outfits such as London’s Rough Trade and Greg Shaw’s Bomp! mail order operation in the US. Within six months, “(I’m) Stranded” came to the rest of the world’s attention.

Look at me, I'm looking at you

Babe, there ain't a thing that I can do

You're lost, your mind is stuck in a whirl

Yeah, honey, such a stupid girl

Now I'm stranded on my own

Stranded far from home, come on

“Single of this and every week,” Sounds’ Jonh Ingham declared when he received a copy that Fall. This is damning “(I’m) Stranded” with faint praise. It is likely so definitive a track, it’s the one piece of music I’d play for the extraterrestrial who lands in my backyard, asking what punk rock is.

21 years after the release of “(I’m) Stranded,” long after Kuepper, Hay, Bradshaw and his replacement Algy Ward (R.I.P.) had left The Saints to Bailey’s stewardship, he brought his current lineup to Austin’s Fun Fun Fun Fest. Over the years, the thousand million lineup changes the band underwent veered hard from their original wild and primitive R&B garage punk to something of an American Heartland rock sound. But word was out: These Saints had returned to the “(I’m) Stranded” sound.

I walked up to Chris Bailey in the vast backstage area in the park where Fun Fun Fun was held. “Chris, may I please shake your hand?”

He peered at me over his shoulder, through round, purple-tinted granny glasses: “Whatever for?”

“Because ‘(I’m) Stranded’ showed me the route out of the small Texas town where I grew up, then brought me to the rest of the world.” He grinned and offered me his hand.

Livin' in a world insane

They cut out some heart and some brain

Been filling it up with dirt

Yeah, baby, don't know how it hurts

Now I'm stranded on my own

Stranded far from home, come on

In The Red Records, possibly America’s best modern punk/garage label, has made the “(I’m) Stranded” 45 accessible to a new generation, and a few old ones. ITR’s done the public service reissue of the year with three different editions of The Greatest Punk Single Of All-Time, in red, orange and blue pressings, housed in three picture sleeves reproducing the art from a trio of international releases. The total run is a limited edition of 2000 copies.

Veteran Australian mastering engineer Don Bartley’s done an excellent job cutting these plates. The new 45 sounds burlier, with a fat bottom end and tight, thumping drums. Kuepper’s guitar cuts even more, with lots of sawtooth midrange. And has Chris Bailey’s snarl ever sounded more laconic and stoned? 

As brilliant as The Saints were, as crucial as their first two LPs and various singles and EPs were in the run-up to second LP Eternally Yours, it all almost feels superfluous in the wake of “(I’m) Stranded” b/w “No Time.” (And remember: The key word here is “almost.”) No record has communicated alienation, disaffection, and existential despair better, set to music that resembles The Pretty Things hurtling face-first into a brick wall at 175 MPH. Everything else claiming to be “punk rock” sounds distinctly lacking, in comparison. 

Stranded, I'm so far from home

Stranded, yeah, I'm on my own

Stranded, you gotta leave me alone

Come on!

Stranded, I'm so far from home

Stranded, yeah, I'm on my own

Stranded, you gotta leave me alone

'Cause I'm stranded on my own

Stranded

Thanks for indulging me this week, as I continue toiling on this book. Next week (hopefully): Captain Sensible, Part Two; Galen and Paul, Part One; and new records from Joan Jett And The Blackhearts, Boris The Sprinkler and Thee Headcoats! Bonus: Enjoy an Australian TV documentary on The Saints’ (I’m) Stranded album!

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R.I.P., Duck

Duck belonged to my roommate, Aaron Stewart. Like most every animal any place I’ve lived, Duck adopted me. He’d come into my room as I wrote, have a brief conversation with me, and then curl up on my blankets contentedly.

He’d been in poor health the whole time I knew him. He had a pair of strokes before I moved in, and had two or three more after. His mobility was bad, and he was even blind for awhile. But still, he insisted on coming to see me.

As of this morning, Duckie is no longer with us. I miss the fella already. He always had great advice on whatever I was writing. He was sometimes a harsh critic.

See you somewhere down the line, Duckie.

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