Excerpt from The Boys bio by Steve Metcalfe on WWW.THEBOYS.CO.UK
Casino Steel had been in the influential Hollywood Brats who formed in London in 1972 around the songwriting partnership of Steel (keyboards) and Andrew Matheson (vocals). Similar in style and looks to the New York Dolls they were born out of disgust and aimed to shock. They were originally called The Queen until they had an altercation at the Marquee with Freddie Mercurys Queen who subsequently had a hit single, forcing them to change their name to the Hollywood Brats. They played regular gigs in London including the Caf Des Artistes and the Speakeasy building up a small band of followers, which included Keith Moon of The Who. Their debut album Grown Up Wrong captured the raw energy and excitement of the band but was initially only released in Scandinavia in 1974 after the Brats had broken up.
Following the demise of the Brats Steel met up with Matt Dangerfield, who had converted the basement of his rented flat in Maida Vale into a recording studio. 47A Warrington Crescent became extremely important in the development of the UK punk scene in the mid seventies.
Mick Jones, Tony James, Bryan James, Rat Scabies, Gene October and Billy Idol amongst many others were regular visitors. The Damned, The Clash, Generation X and the Sex Pistols made their first recordings in Dangerfields studio.
Out of these jamming sessions legendary UK punk band London SS were formed and boasted a line-up which included Dangerfield, Steel, Mick Jones and Tony James and others. At one session Honest John Plain joined them on drums and another drummer, Geir Waade, came up with the name with the SS standing for Social Security rather than the German secret police. Dangerfield left the London SS to join up with Steel, Andrew Matheson (vocals) and Wayne Manor (bass), all from the Hollywood Brats along with Geir Waade (drums), an old friend of Steels from Norway. Honest John Plain, who had been at art school in Leeds with Dangerfield, later joined the line-up.
After several rehearsals Matheson, Manor and Waade left. Plain worked as a foreman in a T-shirt factory with two young musicians who had been at school together. Duncan Kid Reid and Jack Black joined in June 1976 on bass and drums respectively. Numerous vocalists were auditioned before it was decided that the vocal duties would be shared between Dangerfield and Reid. With the backbone of some classy Steel/Dangerfield originals, The Boys were about to unleash themselves on the unsuspecting music world. They played their first gig at the Hope and Anchor Pub in Islington in September 1976. Mick Jones, Billy Idol, Tony James and Gene October were all present and the pub was packed for The Boys debut performance. Further gigs followed at The Brecknock, Kensington and Rochester Castle before they supported Bebe Ruth at Dingwells and some men from NEMS Records came along to see what all the fuss was about.
On 16 January 1977 The Boys naively signed a five-year deal with NEMS and became the first UK punk band to sign an album deal (The Damned had a one-single deal with Stiff and the Sex Pistols had been sacked by EMI). Although Polydor, a major label, offered to buy out their contract NEMS wouldnt allow it so The Boys were left to make the best of NEMS limitations.
The Boys recorded their first single I Dont Care c/w Soda Pressing on 3 February in a small recording studio in Ecclestone Street, Victoria. The single finally hit the streets on 9 April. To coincide with the release of their first single The Boys embarked on a national tour supporting ex Velvet Underground legend John Cale.On 5/6 May 1977 they laid down 16-tracks for their debut album. NEMS had employed Pete Gage to produce it and The Boys became unhappy with the production considering it to be too polished rather than the raw, energetic punk sound they were seeking. After removing the Hammond Organ, lowering the vocals and adding some real sounding guitars the album was finally ready for release. Unfortunately due to NEMS incompetence it wasnt available in the shops until 9 September by which time a couple of other punk bands had released their first albums thus wrestling the initiative away from The Boys.Their second single, an edited version of Plains classic punk anthem First Time was released on 30 July 1977 to great critical acclaim achieving Single Of The Week in Sounds. It received considerable airplay on John Peels radio programme and he was so impressed by The Boys that he invited them to record a live session for his show, broadcast on 8 August.
First Time had climbed to No.77 in the UK charts but then on 16 August 1977 the rocknroll world was shook by the news of Elvis Presleys death. This had dire consequences for The Boys as NEMS were distributed by RCA who switched all their efforts and resources into keeping up the huge posthumous demand for Elvis records. The Boys saw both their debut self titled album (which peaked at No.50) and First Time quickly slip out of the charts as no one could buy them! Despite the setbacks The Boys began to build on their growing UK fan base with a substantial following in Europe where their Beatles influenced power-punk songs and energetic live performances were going down a storm.Every Christmas The Boys rearranged the B and the Y and became The Yobs releasing a Christmas offering (to read The Yobs Story click here).
Unruffled by all their problems with NEMS The Boys went to Rockfield Studios in Wales on 27 November to record their second, self produced album, and on 10 February 1978 they released arguably their finest single Brickfield Nights, without doubt Dangerfields finest moment as a vocalist. Their second album Alternative Chartbusters followed a month later on 17 March and was, as the title suggests, crammed with potential hit singles.
Unfortunately once again because of distribution problems NEMS failed to get the album out in time for the tour set up to promote it! Despite containing many well-crafted, commercial and catchy powerpop/punk songs the album failed to chart. Nevertheless John Peel invited them back to the BBC where they recorded their second Radio Session on 2 May.
They returned to Rockfield Studios in the late summer of 1978 to record their third album, provisionally titled Junk. They laid down over 15 tracks in the week they were in the recording studio but NEMS refused to pay the bill and so Rockfield, understandably, refused to relinquish the master tapes! Fortunately Dangerfield had saved many of the monitor mixes, which were to finally to see the light of day many years later (on Odds And Sods and Punk Rock Rarities). By this time The Boys had had enough of NEMS and decided drastic action was required to free them from their recording contract. So confident were they in their music and their ability to bounce back that they literally went on strike until NEMS agreed to release them.
After an 18-month absence The Boys were back, this time with Safari Records and with a new album recorded in Trondheim, Norway. To Hell With The Boys came out on 27 November 1979, complete with a free 16-page music booklet with the first 5,000 copies.
It was preceded a week earlier by Kamikaze, Plains first vocal outing. The Boys appeared live on the Old Grey Whistle Test on 8 January 1980 before securing a support slot on the Ramones national UK tour.The brilliant Terminal Love (another Plain classic) followed on 7 February mid tour. At the end of the tour they recorded a third Radio Session for the BBC as well as a BBC In Concert, which was broadcast on 13 February 1980.Steels outstanding Jimmy Brown was recorded as a potential single before being rejected, although Pojat took their own version to No.1 in Finland. The old Stones song Youd Better Move On was finally chosen as their next single before Steel left the band and returned to Norway to have considerable success with Gary Holton of Auf Wiedersen Pet fame. The Boys then embarked on a French tour, their first without Steel and flew to Germany mid tour on 22 May 1980 to perform Youd Better Move On on German music show Musik Laden.
. On 17 October 1980 The Boys released their penultimate single Weekend which became a Peter Powell Radio 1 record of the week, with the video even being shown on Noel Edmonds Multi Coloured Swapshop. Despite some radio airplay the single once again failed to chart. On 30 January 1981 their final album Boys Only and final single Let It Rain were both released, unfortunately not to the same critical acclaim as their previous material. Following the commercial failure of Boys Only Safari Records dropped the band and the band decided to call it a day. They did temporarily reform with various line-ups to undertake an Italian tour and two concerts in New York (with the Members). A Spanish tour which ended with gig in Ibiza Castle high above Ibiza town, proved to be their final gig for 17 years.
Although The Boys never achieved the commercial success they richly deserved, their music has refused to die. Campino, lead singer with highly-successful German punk band Die Toten Hosen and longtime fan, has championed their music for more than a decade, covering several songs and introducing new fans to The Boys unique brand of music.
The late 1980s and 1990s saw a mini revival with their original albums being re-released on CD as well as some material being released for the very first time.
Many new bands began discovering The Boys for the first time and in 1998 Michelle Gun Elephant had a massive hit in Japan covering Soda Pressing and Sick On You. This prompted the re-release of several Boys albums during 1999 including The Peel Sessions with encouraging international sales (more than 30,000 albums were sold in Japan alone). Vinyl Japan also released the first Boys tribute CD Satisfaction Guaranteed which featured 13 bands from around the world. A second tribute album You Wanna Know What Its Like? featuring 21 international bands has been compiled in Italy and is due for release shortly.On the back of this success The Boys were invited to play some dates in Japan and finally agreed to come out of retirement. Four of the original members along with Steve Vom Ritchie (replacing Jack Black on drums) played two hugely successful dates on 31 July and 1 August 1999. Further album releases tempted The Boys to play at the Holidays in the Sun Festival in Bergara, Spain on 23 September 2000 with the same line up as Japan.
Drummer Jack Black made a guest appearance playing the drums on Kamikaze and also filmed the gig. It was the first time in 20 years that the five original Boys had been reunited on stage. .
Their first UK date in 20 years followed on 6 July 2001 at the Holidays In The Sun punk festival at Morecambe and The Boys were featured in BBCs regional news programme North West Tonight. Further offers followed and The Boys played their first-ever German gig in Dusseldorf on 21 December with TV Smith of the Adverts as one of the support acts.In 2002 The Boys were invited by Die Toten Hosen to play at their end of tour "Grill Party" in Loreley, Germany. The Boys appeared in front of 5,000 fans on Friday 6 September and joined Die Toten Hosen on stage the following evening in front of 20,000 fans for a joint rendition of "First Time" and "Brickfield Nights".There continues to be plenty of speculation of further Boys dates and even the possibility of an album of new Boys material being recorded. Although The Boys will never become a working band again they are far from forgotten and their cult following continues to grow with many new musicians citing The Boys as major influences on their careers.
