Stranglers, The

Upon arrival, the Stranglers were perhaps inappropriately corralled into London's boisterous Punk camp. Like many Punk bands, they specialized in offensive, woman-baiting song lyrics and chord-defacing guitar speed, and they were notorious for mercilessly hectoring their fans who appeared to enjoy the abuse. But though they've been around long enough to witness the style's evolution through its Pre- and Post- phases, calling the Stranglers "Punk" dilutes the term's precision. In the band's early days, they sounded more like a faster, harder Dr. Feelgood with tracks like "no more heroes", "peaches", "something better change" "straighten out" than the Sex Pistols. Later they started to sound more "sing-a-long" like Genesis with releases like "strange little girl" & "always the sun." If you compare the bands first LP Rattus Norvegicus (preceding the arrival of the Pistols' Never Mind the Bollocks by a number of months), and 1986's flame-retardant Dreamtime there is a world of difference, this for me is the sign of a good band. Id compare their evolution to that of the Clash, from the early "in your face", two fingers to the establishment sound to the more artistic, easy listening sounds as the band matured, ["Golden brown" will forever be a classic]. Having said that,they once played on Top of the Pops with no strings in their guitars, and were forever refusing to answer the press [most notably JJ Brunel in interviews!!]. However,the band have continued in the abscence of singer Hugh Cornwell who thought the band had run out of steam and has pursued a solo career, but like the Jam touring without Weller i cant help thinking this is just like panto, and a band going through the motions, cashing in on past success. Over their quarter century career in music these quasi-Punk dinosaurs seem to be going the way of all dinosaurs by slowly calcifying into fossils.