The Boys - First Two Albums Reissued

Back when I was a kid, all of 14 years old (such a long time ago now...1977) one of my favourite bands at the time was The Boys. I was fortunate enough to see them a few times back in the early days at The Marquee and The Greyhound in Croydon. They are still on the go today and hopefully will be releasing a brand new album sometime this year.

They begun life in 1976 playing their debut show at the famous Hope and Anchor in Islington after being put together by Casino Steel and Matt Dangerfield. In early 1977 they signed a deal with Nems Records and thus began the journey of producing a great body of work that down through the years seems to have survived to this day.

They released a couple of great singles, the first, released in April 1977, being 'I Don't Care' backed by 'Soda Pressing'.

Later in the summer of 1977 they released their 2nd single, that brought them a whole heap of praise from the music press and John Peel liked them it and them so much he brought them in for a studio session. The Peel Session broadcast in August 1977 included six songs:

    Sick On You

    The 1st Time

    Cop Cars

    Box Number

    Living In The City

    Rock Relic

'First Time' was backed by 'Turning Grey' and 'Watcha GonnaDo'. The single, which surely had "hit record" written all over was stopped in it's tracks due to the death of Elvis (Nems were distributed by RCA who turned their focus to making sure there were enough of Presley's records in the shops and thus scuppered the rise of The Boys!).

Their debut album would also be late appearing in the shops, again due to issues with Nems. But when it arrived, boy what a great album it was loaded with fantastic power-punk tunes.

Now it's been reissued with a bonus disc of demos and b-sides and other rarities. 

Track listing for both albums.

And the bonus discs

 

Also reissued is their second album (released in 1978) 'Alternative Chartbusters' which includes probably one of the best singles ever in 'Brickfield Nights' backed by 'Teacher's Pet'.

They would also do another session for Peel that was broadcast on the 2nd May 1978 and it included four songs:

    T.C.P.

    Brickfield Nights

    Classified Suzy

    Boys

Click Here to Listen to the Peel Session.

Both albums are available from Amazon or checkout Full Details at The Boys Website and click on Fire Reissues.

Also checkout an Interview with Matt Dangerfield that he did with Uber Rock