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Article: True Godfathers of Punk: Part 7 - The Runaways
One of the things that music writers have said about Punk was that it created new opportunities for women. That's true if you're talking about the rock and roll industry, which has always been notoriously sexist. Other genres were more integrated in terms of the sexes. You were always more likely to see female singers in the Top 40, Motown, or classical music.
The perceived scarcity of women in rock and roll may have been a matter of perception or due to the fact that only the most successful ones got coverage. Starting in the 60s when counterculture "rock journalism" began, there wasn't a lot of publications with the kind of circulation that could make or break an artist. That changed later on.
One of the things I noticed when playing at the Mabuhay Gardens in San Francisco in '77 was that most of the top bands, which included The Nuns, Avengers, Mutants, UXA and Mary Monday had female lead singers or musicians. The presence of so many female Punk rockers was a revelation. A lot of my previous experience with music was with 60s and 70s rock, which was clearly a Frat Club that generally viewed women as photographers, loyal mates or groupies. Seeing such an integrated scene changed a lot of my (and many others) perceptions about rock and roll.
Another thing about punk rockers, and I know this is an oversimplification, was that once you got past their press release behavior, they were an intelligent group who were considerably less sexist than the previous generations of musicians.
Keep in mind that I'm saying "less sexist," and not that the Punks were totally in tune with their inner femme.
There was one band that doesn't get mentioned as often as, say Blondie or Patti Smith but whose debut album came out only a couple of months after the first Ramones album. They played with Punk bands at CBGB's and produced two musical stars and one film actress. The band was The Runaways, an all-female band put together in 1975 by rock empresario Kim Fowley. His intent wasn't to form a punk band per se but a group that could achieve mainstream rock and roll success. It just happened that their image encompassed punk, glam rock, and a kinkier view of things.
The group of young women who formed the definitive version of the Runaways was very talented. One of the members, Joan Jett, became a star in the punk and hard rock scene. The guitarist, Lita Ford, has had a successful career in hard rock/metal, and the lead singer, Cherie Curry, enjoyed later success in films.
Their best album (in my opinion) is still their first in 1976 as it contains their best known song, "Cherry Bomb," and had a fresh and punky attitude that fit in well in the early Punk scene. Their later albums, like "Queens of Noise" featured more sophisticated production values and their definitive album is probably the "Live In Japan" set, but to this listener, their debut is the one that'll be cited when writers talk about the earliest Punk albums.
One other achievement; they were an all female rock and roll band that lasted long enough to record four studio albums (and a live set), all of which are available on streaming sites.
Actually, just being an all-female rock band in 1976 was a rarity.
The Runaways didn't achieve the success that Kim Fowley was hoping for but they were a talented and influential band. One can't always measure the success of groups in terms of record sales; a lot of commercially successful groups from the '60s and '70s are basically footnotes in terms of musical history, while others like the Ramones are considered classic almost fifty years later.
The Runaways may not have become huge stars, but they were an important and seminal band who did their part to help break the glass ceiling for women in rock and roll.
- Al Handa
11/30/2024
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