Generation X: Live at Hatfield Polytechnic (1980) + Bonus!

We'll end our Generation X series with this final version of the band, usually referred to as Gen X, that includes Billy Idol and Tony James alongside James Stevenson from Chelsea and once-and-future Clashman Terry Chimes on drums. It's a dry-run for Billy's solo career, as the material is slower and slicker. It's clear Idol was trying to make from punk something stadium-friendly but as it turned out he would need flamboyant guitar hero Steve Stevens (and disco producer Keith Forsey) to find it ...but perhaps we'll discuss that on Sunday.

Live at Hatfield Polytechnic link is in the comments

And just for a bonus, here's
the band covering Black
Sabbath's "Paranoid" from a
sound check circa 1980.
(Thanks to our anonymous
commenter for this one.)

*

Support the men:

After Generation X, Billy Idol went solo Tony James formed Sigue Sigue Sputnik (and much later Carbon/Silicon with the Clash's Mick Jones) and Mark Laff And Bob Andrews formed the secretly-influential Empire.

Generation X: Live at the Roundhouse (1977)

While this bootleg recording, from a show an April '77 show opening up for John Cale, is pretty rough it's quite listenable as Billy is keeping his singing in tune and Bob '"Derwood" Andrews guitar ferocity is damn loud in the mix (bassist Tony James and original drummer John Towe are near inaudible). Plus there are a couple of never-recorded songs here like, "Prove It" and "About Love". Do not miss this contemporaneous review of the show.

Track listing:
1. Listen
2. Kleenex
3. Trying For Kicks
4. This Heat
5. Prove It
6. Above Love
7. Ready Steady Go
8. No No No
9. New Order
10. Too Personal
11. Day By Day
12. Your Generation
13. Youth Youth Youth
14. Ready Steady Go
15. Day By Day

(Thanks to Nemsworld for the image and the specifics)

Live at the Roundhouse link is in the comments - re-upped track 3 link is now there as well.

Generation X albums are still cheap at Amazon!

Generation X: Live at the Paris Theatre '78 & '81

While this pair of live BBC broadcasts from 1978 and 1980 is out-of-print in this version, a re-edited, shorter version was made available by Strange Fruit Records before it went under and MAY become available at Amazon.UK (possibly...). Thankfully, all the Generation X albums you NEED to own are also readily available there.

What makes this a fascinating document is the ability to show just how drastically the band changed from the obstreperous "Your Generation" to the onanistic "Dancing With Myself".


Live at the Paris Theater link is in the comments

Generation X albums are still cheap at Amazon!

Generation X: Chiswick Demos

For insight into why Generation X (more here) were regarded by some of their punk peers as phonies, contrast this February 1977 demo for indie label Chiswick with their major label debut on Chrysalis from March of '78. On these earlier, rougher versions Billy Idol sings "Kleenex" as an attack on the National Front and Northern Ireland sectarianism and on "Ready, Steady, Go" he tells us that he's NOT in love with Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Stones and rock n' roll in general. By the time of their debut album Billy would be professing his love for all things rock n' roll (and those same sixties icons - even if in the past tense) and "Kleenex" wouldn't be about anything at all.

Track List
1. Kleenex
2. Listen
3. Your Generation
4. Ready, Steady, Go
5. Save My Life

(Thanks to nemsworld for the images)

Chiswick Demos link is in the comments.

Speaking of comments, let us know what you think of these early Gen X works.


Generation X albums are still cheap at Amazon!

Generation X: Radio 1 Sessions

At the height of Billy Idol Mania (circa 1984) you could get all the Generation X L.P.'s for cheap. They'd all been re-released to capitalize on the dizzying ascent of Idol's (the Class 0f '77's Most Likely To Suc(k)ceed). I never hated those Idol hits, then or now, but it was the then-seemingly perverse fact that Billy the Idol had once been in a punk band that made me lie down the $5.99 to buy the first Gen X album, a mere six years after it's debut. Despite it's lack of currency, I ended up converting much of my high school to that album (via cassette tape). I suppose some of us enjoyed listening to an unpopular album by a a popular artist but also the fact was that if you'd grown up on old Glam Rock (i.e. Bowie, T. Rex and especially The Sweet) that first album made perfect sense.

This out-of-print odds n' sods collection of work the band did for the BBC won't convert the skeptical but it's a fascinating document that traces phase one of Idol's transformation from punk singer to pop star.

Radio 1 Sessions link is in the Comments.

Speaking of comments, Give us you take on the the man known as Billy Idol.


Generation X albums are still cheap at Amazon!

This one is for the 'mazin' Marky Dread - go check out his King Rocker Rocks On for way more Idol-ness.