Spent a solo Saturday night on the couch with some falafel and This Is England, which I've put off watching for way too long. It brought me back to a few Cockney Rejects records I should've dusted off long ago.
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NME bio: Discovered by Jimmy Pursey of Sham 69, this skinhead band came to the fore in London, England, in 1980 with an irreverent brand of proletarian-focused punk. The band comprised Jefferson Turner (vocals), Vince Riordan (bass, vocals), Micky Geggus (guitar, vocals) and Keith Warrington (drums). Daring and anti-everything, they were virtually a parody of the "kick over the traces" punk attitude, while also betraying a stubborn parochialism in keeping with their band title. The "anarchic" contents of their albums were reflected in their garishly tasteless record sleeves. Nevertheless, they had a certain subversive humour, titling their first two albums Greatest Hits when the sum of their UK Top 40 achievements rested with "The Greatest Cockney Ripoff" at number 21 and the West Ham United football anthem, "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles", at number 35. On their second album they included the "Oi! Oi! Oi!' song/chant, thereby giving birth to a musical genre that came to define the brash inarticulacy of skinhead politics. Their gigs during this time also became an interface for working-class culture and the extreme right, and like Sham 69, the Rejects were judged guilty by default. By the time of 1982"s The Wild Ones the band were veering away from their original punk influences towards heavy metal. Significantly, their new producer was UFO bass player Pete Way. Equally significantly, their career was well on the decline by this point. They disbanded in 1985 but re-formed to public apathy at the turn of the decade, Lethal hardly living up to its title.
HEAR Greatest Hits Vol. 1
HEAR The Power and The Glory
HEAR The Wild Ones
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oi!
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