The Great 70’s Project: 1978

1977 saw a change on the UK music front as punk made a fairly grand entrance.  It wasn’t the giant new broom that revisionists will have you believe, as disco and pop still had a strong grip and the prog rock bands remained a fixture in the album charts.

Perhaps the greatest thing the punk movement brought was the idea that such energy could be used to create great three minute songs. In 1978, utilising the energies of punk and a firm grasp of radio friendly pop choruses, bands like Blondie and The Jam went from strength to strength.

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JET BLACK SEA – Absorption Lines

When a musician is both prolific and open to lots of influences, they’ll end up with lots of musical ideas that don’t quite fit their regular outlet. Such is the case for multi-instrumentalist Adrian Jones. Whilst working on the Nine Stones Close album ‘One Eye On The Sunrise’, he and studio engineer/multi-instrumentalist Michel Simons recorded various pieces of music of a more laid-back and ambient nature. Rather more rooted within electronica and the darker worlds of Massive Attack than rock, the musical ideas were eventually released as an album, ‘The Path of Least Existence‘ credited to Jet Black Sea in 2013. With Jones returning to Nine Stones Close almost immediately afterwards and their ‘Leaves‘ album featuring some very dark and anguished material, it seemed like Jet Black Sea was merely a temporary outlet. A brilliant outlet, but not necessarily an ongoing fixture in the 9SC family tree. However, three years after their first Sea voyage, Jones and Simons re-entered the studio.

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The Great 70’s Project: 1977

On December 1st 1976, UK TV history was made.  On Bill Grundy’s Today show, the Sex Pistols and a couple of their associated chums shocked a nation.  Their behavior was quickly seen as inappropriate for most of the 1970s public and by the time their interview concluded with Steve Jones calling Grundy “a fucking rotter”, things had moved from merely “inappropriate” to “causing outrage”.

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SALVATION JAYNE – Moves That Make The Record Skip EP

They’ve built a loyal following on the live circuit and have put in some hard yards at festivals. They can count ex-Clash drummer Nicky “Topper” Headon and sometime AC/DC tub-thumper Chris Slade among their fans. However, in the grand scheme of things, UK rockers Salvation Jayne aren’t so well known at the time of their EP release ‘Moves That Make The Record Skip’. This probably says something about the huge amount of music we now have at our disposal rather than the band’s actual talent, since had this EP been released back in the early 90s when The Black Crowes and Kiss of The Gypsy were making waves, you certainly would’ve heard Tommy Vance and Fluff Freeman talking about these guys on a Friday and Saturday night in radioland.

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