The Last

"While L.A.'s late-'70s rivalry between pogoing punks and skinny-tied new-wavers never matched the intensity of Britain's mods-vs.-rockers violence in the mid-'60s — punks here were more threatened by the very real prospect of LAPD beatings than by power-pop geeks — the mutual contempt and bitter separation of the two scenes was real, pointless as it seems now. The Last were one of a few groups at the time — think Flaming Groovies, the Zippers or the Real Kids — that could convincingly travel in both worlds, aggressive enough to appear with punks like the Gears, the Avengers and the Alley Cats, and melodic enough to fit in with 20/20 and the Plimsouls. Even singer-guitarist Joe Nolte's angriest songs, like the epic Difference, which decries those police riots, are infused with a diehard romantic's melodicism and layered with ruefully pretty harmonies and 12-string-guitar jangle. Need convincing? Ask Mike Watt, who recently covered the Last's proto-pop-punk classic She Don't Know Why I'm Here."— Falling James, 2002 from the LA Weekly