Originally Posted by The Batlord

Ian Dury: New Boots and Panties!!

I woke up today with the express intent of listening to Ian Dury's "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll". It's awesome along with being hilarious and historic (it's where the term comes from if you didn't know). Then I figured I'd review his debut album, only to find that "Sex..." was only a single. Balls. Oh, well.




So this is pub rock. The only other pub rock I was familiar with was Dr. Feelgood and I got the impression that they weren't really representative of the genre. This is much more middle-of-the-road, but it's still got that simple, R&B worship quality that comes with at least some energy like a Big Mac comes with fries. If you've grown up on punk then this certainly won't be setting off your pacemaker, but if you're an early Stones fan then you could do a lot worse.

Ian Dury certainly has an...interesting singing voice. Usually when I hear such a heavy, lower class British accent I expect the band to be chasing itself to the end of the song while the "singer" shouts about communism or poop or something. I hear that Johnny Rotten actually took a lot of his act from Ian, and that's kinda what he sounds like. Like Johnny Rotten if Johnny Rotten wasn't pissed off about everything and would rather just sing a little tune in a ridiculous accent. Alright so maybe that doesn't sound like such a great selling point, but he has more than enough charisma to make up for any possible vocal shortcomings and keeps things entertaining even when the music is kind of "meh".

What the? Third song from the end and they went punk. Ian's yelling, the band's going all Clash. I'm not saying it's terrible, but it's just completely out of place. I guess we're seeing the point where the bottom of pub rock fell out and punk rock took over.

All in all it was about what I was expecting, except for the end: fun, catchy R&B that was just waiting for punk to make it irrelevant. It's not the kind of thing I'd feel compelled to listen to everyday, but at some infrequent intervals when I'm in the mood for some simple rock'n'roll, I must just think of Ian Dury.

Originally Posted by eraser.time206

If you can't deal with the fact that there are 6+ billion people in the world and none of them think exactly the same that's not my problem. Just deal with it yourself or make actual conversation. This isn't a court and I'm not some poet or prophet that needs everything I say to be analytically critiqued.

Originally Posted by Unknown Soldier

A good take on London pub rock, I never liked it at all and bands like Dr.Feelgood and Ian Dury and the Blockheads were quite representative of it. "Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick" was a fantastic song for its time and a song that everybody still knows. Ian Dury suffered from polio from a young age and had quite a tragic life.

Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien

There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamiting factories and power-stations; I hope that, encouraged now as ‘patriotism’, may remain a habit! But it won’t do any good, if it is not universal.

Originally Posted by The Batlord

You don't like D. Feelgood? Shame on you you douchetool. Dr. Feelgood are ****ing fantastic.

Originally Posted by eraser.time206

If you can't deal with the fact that there are 6+ billion people in the world and none of them think exactly the same that's not my problem. Just deal with it yourself or make actual conversation. This isn't a court and I'm not some poet or prophet that needs everything I say to be analytically critiqued.