This appeared in Record Collector in May 2000 No 249 - the bible for CDs - Records and Pop Memorabilia - all pictures are variants on those from [Time's Up 00].
The author is Kieron Tyler.
"I'm tired of noise and short of breath. I'm sick of having to address people out of breath and under my breath" - that was how Howard Devoto explained his departure from Buzzcocks to the NME at the beginning of February 1977.
At the time, it seemed Buzzcocks might be finished. But instead, Pete Shelley, Steve Diggle and John Maher quickly regrouped. Shelley took over Devoto's role as lead vocalist and Garth Davies came in on bass, allowing Diggle to switch to guitar. For the remainder of the 70s they became regular visitors to the charts, notching up three Top 30 bPs and classic punk-pop hits like "Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've)", which made No. 12 in 1978.
The new Devoto-less Buzzcocks debuted only six weeks after the departure of their original singer and co-songwriter, at Harlesden's Coliseum on 11th March, supporting the Clash. Devoto, of course, later formed Magazine, who first played live on October 2nd, 1977.
Buzzcocks had released their debut, the landmark EP "Spiral Scratch" in late January 1977, on their own New Hormones label. Press response was warm, with both Melody Maker and the NME giving favourable reviews. "Boredom" was an instant classic, and the initial pressing of 1000 sold out in under a week. "Spiral Scratch" went on to sell over 16,000 copies by the summer.
Devoto's Buzzcocks legacy was initially limited to the four tracks heard on "Spiral Scratch". Then the bootleg album "Time's Up" surfaced in May
1978 with 11 tracks recorded two months before the EP. "Time's Up" received its first official release in 1991, and has just been reissued by Mute as an enhanced edition, complete with live footage of Buzzcocks at Manchester's Lesser Free Trade Hall on 20th July 1976, plus illustrations from Devoto's archives.
Devoto was born Howard Trafford and attended Leeds Grammar School, where he began to realise his musical ambitions. "I was in a very silly band," he remem bers, "Richard Boon (later Buzzcocks' manager) was in it too. We were like a really bad Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band without any good jokes. I was playing piano in a 'I've just finished my piano lessons' way. That was 1972." His next musical venture took a different tack:
"Then I did a little bit with the gentleman who went on to become Richard Famous in the Poison Girls. We did a couple of gigs in folk clubs in Leeds, where I did actually sing. It was two acoustic guitars. Seeing Bowie with an acoustic guitar made me think there was something left in the instrument."
Bowie appeared to offer something more exciting than the mainstream. "All of Bowie's 70s albums were fantastic. I'd loved 'Hunky Dory'," enthuses Devoto. "I saw Bowie on tour just before Ziggy Stardust came out. He was OK, but a bit ordinary. I've never really enjoyed Bowie's gigs, I guess he's too controlled. I read a review at the time where he said, 'We're going to be like the Who, really rock on stage'. And that's what they were, but without the really wild stuff."
However, Devoto saw another band whose live performances matched the impact of their records. "I was really into Alice Cooper and the Detroit groups," he remembers. "I saw Alice Cooper's first UK gig at the Rainbow (in London). That was the best concert I'd ever been to." Devoto was also keen on the New York Dolls, although he didn't see them, as their 1972 live dates were cancelled following the death of drummer Billy Murcia.
After Alice Cooper, the Stooges provoked the greatest response. "I'd seen photos of Iggy in Zig Zag in 1971. I'd cut these out and kept them," recalls Devoto. "I got 'Raw Power' first, really because Bowie had connected with him. I thought it was OK, but not brilliant. I could hear there was something there but, boy, that production was hard to get past. Then I got the first album, which I'd picked up in a bargain bin. I was less impressed with that one."
"It was just a little bit too dumb for me, apart from 'I Wanna Be Your Dog'. 'No Fun' wasn't too bad. I got an import copy of 'Funhouse' in Manchester in early 1975, it was the one I got last. 'Funhouse' was a hugely important album. 'Funhouse' had it. It hit me at the right hormonal time." Devoto's enthusiasm wasn't confined to the Stooges. Bob Dylan's " 'Blood On The Tracks' (released February '75) was absolutely fantastic," he says.
While Devoto was immersing himself in music he was also plotting a course through the academic world. In Septem ber 1973 he began studying psychology at Bolton Institute of Technology. After what he describes as a disastrous first year, he switched to Humanities in autumn 1974 - a slightly more successful choice. "In August '75, I moved to Manchester from Bolton after the first semi-disastrous year," he recalls. The relocation was part of a concerted attempt to change to his life style. Devoto confesses to "second year blues on the course. I'd done very well in my course work and disastrously in exams. I was looking around - 'what am I going to do to make the second year more interesting ?' ".
Manchester's rock scene beckoned. "The New Manchester Review started and I began doing the pub rock listings. I used to phone round the pubs and compile it." Meeting Pete Shelley - then Peter McNeish - helped Devoto make his biggest break with the past.
At the beginning of the autumn term of 1975, Devoto placed an ad on the Bolton Institute's noticeboard. "I had an idea to form a band. I was fed up with the bands I was seeing at college and in Manchester," explains Devoto. "I thought I could do something more exciting. 'Funhouse' definitely had its place. I felt I had a not dissimilar vocal range (to Iggy), and singing along with the record was fairly satisfying." The Velvet Underground's "Sister Ray" was mentioned in the notice - a choice unusual enough to attract the attention of fellow student Pete Shelley.
The early, tentative, steps towards Buzzcocks were taken by Devoto and Shelley. "We did have a few half-baked rehearsals with a drummer, and we did try some Stooges songs, some of (Eno's) 'Taking Tiger Mountain', some early Stones' songs," recalls Devoto. The duo weren't certain of a direction until they saw the NME of 19th February 1976. Inside was the Sex Pistols' first press, Neil Spencer's seminal review of their Marquee show. "Pete read it," says Devoto, "We were in the refectory at B.I.T. It mentioned they played a Stooges song and said, 'We're not into music, we're into chaos'. At that point we'd been trying for three months, not really getting anywhere, still doing cover versions. Somebody lent me a car that weekend, that's when my life changed."
Devoto rang the NME to find out if the Pistols were playing, and was given Malcolm McLaren's number. Devoto, Shelley and Richard Boon - then at Reading University - went down to see the Pistols at High Wycombe College of Further Education that weekend (20th February). They must've been the first non-Londoners curious enough to check them out. Devoto was instantly won over by the Pistols and their followers: "The audience included the Bromley Contingent - Malcolm, Jordan, Nils Stevenson, Helen Wellington-Lloyd. In their own ways they almost looked more interesting than the band, except that Lydon was so charismatic. We thought they were great, the look, the attitude and the music. I was catching bits of John's lyrics; we secretly taped it."
McLaren said that the Pistols were appearing in Welwyn Garden City the following evening, so they went to that show, too. "After the second show I said to Malcolm, 'If we can fix it up, do you want to play at our college ?'," recalls Devoto. "When the student union wouldn't go for it, I found this little room above the Free Trade Hall. I made sure Malcolm paid in case they never turned up! Pete and I were out fly-posting. It seemed like every other week there was something about the Sex Pistols, and it just got bigger and bigger. Suddenly, I was involved in real way with this band that were in the music press."
The Sex Pistols had a profound influ ence: "We immediately changed our look. I started henna-ing my hair, ordered some blue striped jeans and had them taken in." Howard Trafford and Pete McNeish completed the transformation by assum ing new identities: Trafford became Howard Devoto - after a bus driver mentioned by a philosophy tutor - and McNeish became Pete Shelley, the name his mother had chosen should she have given birth to a girl. The Pistols also led indirectly to Devoto and Shelley finding a name for their band. After the NME review they had vainly searched the London listings magazine Time Out for information on Sex Pistols dates. There weren't any - but they did notice an article on the new TV show Rock Follies. A line from the programme was quoted: "It's the buzz, cock." Buzzcocks were born. Devoto and Shelley readied the newly- christened band for its debut at the Bolton Institute on 1st April. "It was the textile students do. I wore knee-length pink boots, my striped jeans, my brown leather jacket," remembers Devoto. "Garth (Davies) was on bass - he and Pete go back a long time. He turned up looking like a cabaret player, in a bow tie, white frilly shirt and a dark suit. We hadn't rehearsed with him at all. Only Pete and I had done anything together. The guy on drums was called Dennis. We had ten songs, most of which were cover versions. 'Diamond Dogs', Eno's 'The True Wheel', probably some Rolling Stones, (the Troggs') 'I Can't Control Myself and a couple of Pete's early songs, 'Get On Our Own' and 'No Reply'."
It was an inauspicious debut: "We started off and, immediately, 'Diamond Dogs' was half the speed it was supposed to be and we got the plug pulled. Was it embarrassing ? Absolutely, we would've been cringingly appalling. At the end of it, this Dennis raised one hand high and said, 'I'm at this level', and held the other hand low and said, 'you're at this level'."
Buzzcocks were aiming to be the sup port band for the Sex Pistols' Manchester debut, booked by Devoto for 4th June at the Lesser Free Trade Hall. Although it didn't work out - Garth Davies left and they hadn't found a drummer - the show wasn't a waste of time, as Devoto and Shelley met Steve Diggle there. "Malcolm was stood on the pavement hustling people in," explains Devoto. "Steve wasn't even coming to the gig. Malcolm conned him by saying the friend he was looking for was inside already." About 100 people turned out to witness the Sex Pistols at the 400-capacity venue - enough to warrant a return booking. "The Sex Pistols were quite chuffed by the response," recalls Devoto, "when they came back for their encore John Lydon was saying 'Where do you all come from ?' in quite a warm way. Immediately, they wanted to do it again."
Within a few days Devoto and Shelley began rehearsing with Diggle in, as Devoto puts it, "a combination of my bedroom and the basement of the derelict house I was living." Although Diggle was a guitarist, he became Buzzcocks' bassist. During mid- June they recruited drummer John Maher via an ad in the New Manchester Review.
With a proper line-up, Buzzcocks prepared for the Pistols return to The Lesser Free Trade Hall on 20th July. Devoto has fonder memories of this show than the April debut: "We were first on and we were well received. I can't remem ber if we forced an encore on everybody." Seen between Buzzcocks and the Pistols were Slaughter and the Dogs. "They were Bowie kids, all glammed-up. They were out of style, musically, and with their look," observes Devoto.
Three weeks later, Buzzcocks' next show was another less-than-satisfactory outing. On 12th August, they appeared at the Ranch Club, part of Foo Foo's Night Club - a drag venue. Devoto says the inspira tion was the Sex Pistols' gig at El Paradise (a Soho strip club). "I would guess 30 people turned up. We were playing on the floor, there was no stage, this guy walked over and between us. When we got to end of the third number he said, 'Are you the boss ? Foo Foo says you've got to stop'. we did." Devoto wasn't put off and booked another gig for 28th August at the Commercial Hotel, Stalybridge, as a warn up for Buzzcocks' London debut.
Buzzcocks first appeared in London at Islington's Screen on the Green cinema on 29th August - an all-night show billed as The Midnight Special. They were on first, followed by the Clash and the Sex Pistols. Devoto doesn't remember the show as a particular highlight: One did one's best and we did alright. We got reviewed as 'rougher than a bear's ass in Sounds. I remember the back of the hall after we'd come off, running into Malcolm and him saying 'Your songs, they've got real content haven't they ?'. Among those played that night was "Peking Hooligan", an unrecorded number.
Back in Manchester, it was another three weeks to Buzzcocks' next live outing, Devoto recalls: Deansgate's Holdsworth Hall on 20th September. "We booked the hall. Booking a PA was all we could afford. There was no bar, we had no lights." This time around, Eater, one of London's newest punk bands, came up to Manchester for their live debut. Devoto says, "we stupidly agreed to toss a coin for who would go on first or last, and we lost. So we ended playing support to Eater. They never came up with their half of the money for the PA." Devoto appeared with newly-bleached hair and leather trousers: "I wore nail varnish, we were getting a little glammy. Paul Morley said that sort of thing didn't suit us."
The next night, 21st September, Buzzcocks travelled down to London for their second show there - the second night of the 100 Club Punk Festival. After the experience with Eater, Buzzcocks chose to go on last. They weren't to know it wasn't the best choice. "We didn't know that whoever went on at 11 would get the main audience, then everybody would get the tube home. There were about 200 left, so that was a bit disappointing."
Buzzcocks' next show, on 8th October, was the polar opposite to the Punk Festi val - St Boniface's Church Youth Club in Salford. They used the church hall as a rehearsal space and played to an audience of pre-teen kids as a thank-you to the church. Devoto remembers breaking Steve Diggle's amplifier: "We used the bass amp to stop John's drums drifting. And it just decimated Steve's valve amp."
Ten days later, Buzzcocks entered the studio for the first time. The session - on 18th October at Stockport's Revolution Studios - although recorded simply to find out what Buzzcocks sounded like, found a wider audience as the "Time's Up" bootleg. "Lester Sands" and "Don't Mess Me 'Round" were unique to the session, as were two cover versions - Captain Beefheart's "I Love You, You Big Dummy" and the Troggs' lascivious "I Can't Control Myself".
The recording session wasn't envisaged as a method of securing a record contract: "We wanted to hear ourselves properly," explains Devoto. "We thought we sounded quite good given how quickly we did it. We didn't have multiple copies. We walked away with two quarter-inches and two cassettes. We hadn't got loads of cassette copies to send off to record companies. It was Pete's copy of the 'Time's Up' quarter- inch that he lent to somebody that turned into the bootleg."
By this time the Sex Pistols had signed to EMI and media interest in punk rock was increasing. Buzzcocks certainly felt removed from the London-based music business. "You had to be in London to see yourself in the music press. No record companies came up to Manchester. We weren't enterprising enough to get people up to see us," rues Devoto. "I don't think we felt we were getting anywhere."
During November and early December Buzzcocks put their energies into a series of live shows. On 8th November they were at the Band On The Wall. The 10th saw them at the Electric Circus, a heavy metal venue beginning its association with punk rock. London band Chelsea - then featuring future Generation X stalwarts Billy Idol and Tony James - were the support act. "I wasn't taken with them" says Devoto (see last month's RC for full Chelsea feature). Buzzcocks returned to the Electric Circus on 28th November with Slaughter and the Dogs as support. On 9th December, Devoto played his twelfth and final show with Buzzcocks at the Electric Circus, opening for the Sex Pistols on one of the few remaining dates of the Anarchy tour.
The next step was for Buzzcocks to release their own single. "Stiff Records had started," remembers Devoto. "I'd spoken to Dave Robinson to get a bit of advice about the business of making records. He wished us luck!". They stopped playing live: "We were concentrating on doing the record, we were borrowing money, we had to get our heads around cutting things." They found their producer, Martin Hannett, through Devofo's connection with the New Manchester Review: "He was part of Music Force, an agency in the same building as the New Manchester Review."
On 28th December, Buzzcocks booked into Indigo Studios. "Pete's dad came down, he'd lent us some money, and very wisely he was coming to check we all didn't just muck around. He reckoned that everything that Martin tried to do in there, the engineer turned the knob back". The three-hour session resulted in four tracks: "Breakdown," "Time's Up," "Boredom" and "Friend's Of Mine." On 3rd January, Buzzcocks returned to Indigo for a mixing session. Devoto was pleased with the results: "They sounded great to me in the control room when they'd been mixed." In a twist, which, if true, would make Buzzcocks even greater pioneers than they already were, the tape box records the date of mixing as January 3rd, 1976.
The release of "Spiral Scratch" - on 29th January 1977 - was a beginning and an end. "Making the record felt like, 'There we are, we've done it, we've got the record'," recalls Devoto. "It didn't feel like that much was happening. At that point, it felt like, 'If we're lucky, we'll get the money back'." Devoto's departure from Buzzcocks was announced on 2nd February. "Having buggered up one college course, I wanted to try not to bugger up another. I wasn't that wild on punk rock. There was a lot of negative energy, perhaps to its credit. I was uncomfortable, even disturbed, and somewhat scared by some of it. I didn't get my degree anyway."
Although Devoto had left Buzzcocks, it was an amicable spilt and their relation ship continued. "I stayed involved in Buzzcocks, organising gigs, some of the negotiating with United Artists." He travelled down to London to witness Buzzcocks' debut without him at Harlesden's Coliseum on 11th March. What was it like hearing Pete Shelley sing ? "It was quite strange at the time. I'm used to it now." Devoto joined Buzzcocks for their encore at the Band on the Wall on 2nd May and accompanied them to London's Vortex on 4th July.
Devoto continued to write with Shelley, and their joint credit appears on three post-"Spiral Scratch" period songs by Magazine and Buzzcocks. "Fast Cars," which appears on the Buzzcocks debut album, "Another Music In A Different Kitchen", released in March 1978, was co-written immediately after Devoto had left Buzzcocks. Magazine's. debut single, "Shot By Both Sides," was another joint composition. "It was a song that Pete played to me some time in '77," explains Devoto, "I just loved the main guitar riff, and he said, 'OK! I'll give it to you".
Magazine were just starting. "I took the riff and put my chords in for the verses - that was why it was 'Devoto, Shelley'." Buzzcocks eventually used the riff on "Lipstick," the to "Promises," released in November 1978. "The Light Pours Out Of Me" was another Shelley! Devoto song, heard on Magazine's debut album: "I had this phrase and Pete played the chords behind them, and I took that little bit to Magazine."
Magazine established themselves as a formidable counterpoint to the more unimaginative ruts that punk wore itself into. Despite Devoto's reservations Buzzcocks went from strength to strength after his departure. The original Buzzcocks were pioneers: they booked the Sex Pistols first dates beyond the Home Counties. The link with the London scene was maintained through appearances at the Pistols' Screen On The Green show and the 100 Club Punk Festival. By autumn 1976, Buzzcocks were sufficiently established to bring London, bands Chelsea and Eater to Manchester. But outside the confines of the punk scene Buzzcocks failed to thrive. Based in Manchester, they couldn't attract the interest of London-based record labels or music press, which led to the setting up of their own label and the release of "Spiral Scratch" without outside help. The combination of Buzzcocks' isolation and innovation make "Spiral Scratch" and "Time's Up" essential testaments to the vitality of the early punk scene.
Thanks to Mark Isted at Mute Records and to Howard Devoto for making time to look back. Background information was drawn from Tony McGartland's invaluable Buzzcocks: The Complete History (Inde pendent Music Press, ISBN 1-89-778305-1)
ShotByBothSides.com/mag_052k.htm
![[Magazine Logo]](/magazine.jpg)