#70's mod

Long Tall Shorty - “1970s Boy” 100% British Mod Song recorded in 1979. Compilation released in 1998. Mod Revival / Punk Rock

Before breaking down this song, let’s explain what mod and mod revival are and were. Mod was a working class youth subculture in Britain, beginning in the late 50s and ending in the late 60s. Mods were originally what would be described today as hipsters, taking a keen interest in modern jazz, watching foreign films, focused on fashion, riding Vespas, and all night drug-infested dance parties. They’ve been said to be an extension of beatnik culture.

The movement started in coffee bars, which at the time were known for playing jazz and blues. Coffee bars stayed open later than pubs and had jukeboxes, so they would naturally become the destination for mods to party in to the wee hours. In the mid-60s, rock and power pop began to take hold in Britain and bands like The Who started to adopt a mod look. Mod then spread to the US along with Beatlemania.

Mod revival began in the late 70s and was way more focused on music. Bands that were raised on the power pop / mod rock sound focused on mixing new wave and punk with the sound of mod originalists like The Who and The Kinks. The band The Jam would famously fuse 60s R&B with a Who-type sound. In 1979, the rock opera film Quadrophenia was released, loosely based on The Who’s 1973 album of the same name, in which the original mod subculture was featured. It was The Jam and Quadrophenia film that launched mod revival, a subculture that would last until the mid-80s.

Long Tall Shorty were one of the mod revival scene’s first bands, and they didn’t just attract the mod crowd. Their sound had quite a bit of punk flair to it. Riots seemed to break out at whatever venue they played. Long Tall Shorty formed in London 1978 as The Indicators. Singer Jimmy Pursey of British punk band Sham 69 had just started a label under Polydor and put two of his signings on tour. One of the bands dropped out and were replaced by Long Tall Shorty. Pursey attended one of those gigs and then invited the band to record some demos. By August of 1979, they released their first single, By Your Love / 1970s Boy on Warner. But Warner, for whatever reason, shelved the single only a few days after its release and it’s believed only about 200 to 250 copies of the single were sold, making it quite a collector’s item for mod revivalists. 

However, this isn’t the version of “1970s Boy” that appeared on that single. This, I assume, is the demo. Its production value definitely isn’t as good, but the sound is much rawer and grittier. It’s a cathartic mod anthem, one of those cultural identity-defining tracks. Recorded at the end of the decade, the song is a retrospective look at the listlessness that British mods and punks endured as they came of age in the 1970s. Working class existence is shit and there didn’t appear to be any way out. 

Clocking in at less than two minutes, Long Tall Shorty pull off a sweet, raucous headbanger here. After noodling around with some chords and feedback, guitarist (and vocalist) Tony Perfect launches into his noisy and scratchy chords. The song then takes off with Mark Reynolds mashing his drums and Jimmy Grant plucking a heavy bass rhythm. 

Following a catchy, sort of 60s pop-inspired chorus, in which Perfect opts for more of a jangly guitar sound, the band reaches peak 70s punkiness. Perfect sings the line, “We’re running wi-i-i-ild,” and follows with a simple and defiant, low to high punk chord progression, an oft-used sound found in so many great early punk songs. Accentuating that chord progression are Grant’s bass plucks, which follow the same formula as Perfect’s guitar, and Reynolds slamming his kick drum and then bashing his cymbals.