Playlist: 10 best new wave singles of 1978

When John Lydon announced the break up of the Sex Pistols in January 1978, it may have given ammunition to all the naysayers who claimed that punk was just a passing trend, but in reality, punk rock, after giving the moribund music scene a much needed shot in the arm, was already evolving.

More and more it was being referred to as “New Wave”, a more palatable term to record companies and radio stations and a catch-all description that encompassed everyone from the original punk trailblazers like the Pistols, the Ramones and the Clash to acts that followed in their wake such as idiosyncratic art-rockers like Talking Heads and more pop-orientated acts such as Squeeze.

It was this rich diversity of styles that helped make new wave or post-punk as it was also known, so great, with much of the music to be found on small, independent labels challenging the power of the major record companies. As such, new wave helped immeasurably in the rise of indie music in the 1980s.

1978 was a great year for music in both singles and albums – the Stones even tapped into disco for “Miss You”, one of their greatest singles, but it’s the new kids on the block we’re interested in here. So without further ado, here are the 10 best new wave singles from 40 years ago.

10 Magazine – Shot by Both Sides
Howard Devoto formed Magazine after leaving the Buzzcocks in 1977 and in short order took a Pete Shelley guitar riff and produced the first classic post-punk single as Devoto, cast as the brooding outsider, challenged punk’s newly established hierarchy. Much of Magazine’s music was keyboard based but it is John McGeoch’s epic take on the Shelley riff that drives “Shot by Both Sides”. That, and Devoto’s stark lyrical imagery with the title coming from a phrase he had been carrying around in his head describing his apolitical stance. Magazine’s art-school sound drew comparisons with early Roxy Music and they briefly looked like the future of music but a sullen, catatonic performance of “Shot By Both Sides” on Top of the Pops by Devoto resulted in the single stalling at No 41. Despite three excellent albums, the band and Devoto never recovered their momentum and the man who was once hailed as “the Orson Welles of punk” withdrew from the music scene for many years. Magazine’s influence lived on however, with Simple Minds and Radiohead in particular owing a debt of gratitude.

9 Ian Dury and the Blockheads – What a Waste
Approaching his mid-thirties, Ian Dury had paid his dues in the pub circuit hinterland and on signing with the Stiff label found a like-minded record company that could do full justice to his brilliantly idiosyncratic mix of punk, disco grooves and music-hall cockney patter. Stand-alone single “What a Waste” found Dury in the middle of his creative peak, sandwiched between his breakthrough album New Boots and Panties and his near-million-selling No 1 single, “Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick”. “What a Waste” was Dury’s first hit 45, the previous year’s “Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll” having been predictably banned by the Beeb. Like Nick Drake’s “One of These Things First”, (although Drake’s song could also be about reincarnation), but light years removed in style and delivery, Dury documented all the jobs that he could have done and all the achievements within his grasp (“I could be the catalyst that sparks the revolution”) before settling for what he has, which to these ears seems pretty good indeed.

8 Siouxsie and the Banshees – Hong Kong Garden
A combination of record company apprehension and the band’s determination to make records on their own terms meant that Siouxsie and the Banshees, one of the most high profile of the first wave of punk rock groups, remained without a record deal until the summer of 1978 when Polydor finally released their debut single. Deceptively light and catchy with a twinkling xylophone adding to the oriental air, “Hong Kong Garden” contained a dark heart with Siouxsie basing the lyrics on memories of skinheads racially abusing staff at her local Chinese restaurant. A stand-alone single and bearing little resemblance to the uncompromising goth psychedelia that would soon follow on their seminal debut album The Scream, “Hong Kong Garden” raced up the chart, reaching No 7 and launching a great band’s career.

7 Talking Heads – Take Me to the River
An inspired, pounding cover of Al Green’s Southern Soul lynchpin that signposted the compulsively danceable direction the band would take on subsequent releases. Recognising the slow-burn quality of Green’s original, the band slowed “Take Me to the River” down even more but cast it very much in their own image with Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz, the best husband-and-wife rhythm section in the business, finding their tightest funk groove. There’s some marvellously off-kilter keyboard flourishes and David Byrne contributed one of his most unhinged vocals on a song that failed to chart in the UK but became a live tour de force for Talking Heads.

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6 Patti Smith Group – Because the Night
Signalling a seismic shift towards the mainstream by rock’s original punk princess, the anthemic “Because the Night” also did much to remind people of co-composer Bruce Springsteen who had been unable to release any material for three years due to legal restrictions. Springsteen had originally intended “Because the Night” for his comeback album Darkness on the Edge of Town but couldn’t really get a handle on the song and gave it to Smith (left) who retained the melody and chorus and added the verses which gave the song its lustful beauty. The resultant musical alchemy produced an instant classic which hit the No 5 spot in the UK and helped give birth to the power ballad.

5 Public Image Ltd – Public Image
Following the long goodbye and breakup of the Sex Pistols, John Lydon announced his re-emergence as a recording artist with a debut single from his new band that didn’t stray too far from the Pistols template, even going as far as aping Lydon’s iconic cackle from “Anarchy in the UK” on the intro. And “Public Image” does contain one of the great intros with the opening throb of Jah Wobble’s bass line leading into Lydon’s echoey “hello, hello”. (Lydon claimed he was merely checking that the microphone was turned on.) By the time Keith Levene’s whiplash guitar kicks in, you’re hooked as Lydon’s lyrics and typically Rottenesque delivery attempt to exorcise his Sex Pistols’ demons. The single came wrapped in a mock newspaper sleeve and to the casual observer, it all might have seemed so far, so Sex Pistols; but this top 10 single was unrepresentative of the modal mix of dub, reggae and noise rock that Lydon would pursue with varying degrees of success with PiL.

4 Elvis Costello and the Attractions – Radio Radio
In a serious case of biting the hand that feeds you, Costello turned his withering gaze on the medium of radio with a scathing attack on the commercialism and corruption of the airwaves. Predictably, it was misinterpreted by some who found the song’s tone celebratory rather than accusatory, but in the era of the iniquitous Radio 1 playlist, Paul Gambaccini for one, recognised the importance and searing honesty of Costello’s message, making “Radio Radio” his record of the week before the Beeb could ban it. Costello and the Attractions subsequently performed the single on Top of the Pops wherein the angry young man who was once described as “Dionne Warwick with fangs” spat his vitriol into the households of an unsuspecting nation.

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3 The Undertones – Teenage Kicks
Copies of the original picture sleeved EP containing “Teenage Kicks” on Belfast’s small indie label Good Vibrations now sell for £70, but “Teenage Kicks” itself only became a hit when the Undertones were subsequently signed to the Sire label and even then, despite the well-documented patronage of John Peel, it failed to breach the top 30. The record’s beloved status belies any middling commercial success, however. “Teenage Kicks” put the Undertones (left) on the map and four decades on, this joyous celebration of adolescent angst and romance hasn’t dated a bit. Pure pop heaven in just two and a half minutes.

2 The Buzzcocks – Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)

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One of the great singles bands of any era graced the charts with five absolute gems in 1978 alone, any of which could have found their way onto this playlist. “Ever Fallen in Love” finds the Buzzcocks at their most charming and accessible, a glorious slice of power pop demonstrating Pete Shelley’s effortless mastery of the three-minute bittersweet love song. Based on his own experience, Shelley was inspired to write “Ever Fallen in Love” by a line from Guys and Dolls and its breathless energy, glorious hooky melody and Shelley’s ingenious lyrics make unrequited love seem somehow attractive.

1 The Only Ones – Another Girl, Another Planet
This justly celebrated and hugely influential signature song from one of the great lost bands failed to trouble the charts in 1978. Since then, it has been lauded almost beyond saturation point but the hype is justified. With its thunderous rhythm section, soaring guitar solos and singer Peter Perrett’s languid drawl, “Another Girl, Another Planet” seamlessly welds the best of punk, power pop and psychedelia to create the perfect in-a-rush post-punk anthem. Perrett’s deliberately ambiguous lyrics led to the widely perceived assumption that the song was about drugs. According to Perrett, however, he was inspired by a girl he had met who looked like she had stepped out of a Fellini film, but was “a bit of a space cadet”. Sadly, drugs would soon claim Perrett for decades, but in one of the music scene’s more heartwarming codas, he re-emerged in 2017, drug free, with a terrific new album. “Another Girl, Another Planet” may not be, as some have claimed, the greatest single ever made, but has there been a better one since?