New York Dolls

Sylvain Sylvain and Billy Murcia, who went to junior high school and high school together, started playing in a band called “the Pox” in 1968. After the frontman quit, Murcia and Sylvain started a clothing business across the street from a doll repair shop called the New York Doll Hospital. Sylvain claimed that shop inspired the name for their future band. In 1970 they formed a band again and they recruited Thunders to join on bass, though Sylvain ended up teaching him to play guitar. They called themselves the "Dolls." When Sylvain left the band to spend a few months in London, Thunders and Murcia went their separate ways.

Thunders was eventually recruited by Kane and Rivets who had been playing together in the Bronx. At Thunders' suggestion, Murcia replaced the original drummer. Thunders played lead guitar and sang for the band known as Actress. An October 1971 rehearsal tape recorded by Rivets was released as Dawn of the Dolls. When Thunders decided he no longer wanted to be the front man, Johansen joined the band.

Initially, the group was composed of singer David Johansen, guitarists Johnny Thunders and Rick Rivets (who was replaced by Sylvain Sylvain after a few months), bass guitarist Arthur "Killer" Kane and drummer Billy Murcia. The original lineup's first performance was on Christmas Eve 1971 at a homeless shelter, the Endicott Hotel.

The band was influenced by vintage rhythm and blues, the early Rolling Stones, classic American girl group songs, and anarchic post-psychedelic bands such as the MC5 and the Stooges, as well as then-current glam rockers such as Marc Bolan. They did it their own way, creating something which critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote "doesn't really sound like anything that came before it. It's hard rock with a self-conscious wit, a celebration of camp and kitsch that retains a menacing, malevolent edge."[1]. Despite their impeccable rock/punk/glam credentials, the band's sound was also formed by blues and soul influences, as evidenced by Johansen`s bluesy harmonica and their choice of cover versions - their two Mercury albums contain their covers of songs originally performed by Bo Diddley, The Drells, Sonny Boy Williamson, The Coasters and the Jay Hawks (though in the case of The Jay Hawks` song Stranded in the Jungle, the Dolls may have been more familiar with a cover version by The Cadets). The CD Private World : The Complete Early Studio Demos 1972/3 includes their versions of songs by Otis Redding, Gary US Bonds, Chuck Berry, The Shangri-Las and Muddy Waters. The jazz music influence was particularly important for Johansen, whose subsequent career included work with jazz man Big Jay McNeely and blues man Hubert Sumlin.

As a frontman, Johansen's aggression, wit and energy made up for what was a slightly one-dimensional singing voice, while Thunders's lead playing was compared to the slashing of a knife-fight. Their repertoire was mostly written by Johansen (he used the name David Jo Hansen at the time) and Thunders and occasionally by Johansen and Sylvain. The songs were a series of vignettes about life in the New York underground. After getting a manager and attracting some music industry interest, the band got a break when Rod Stewart invited them to open for him at a London (then glam rock's capital city) concert. Shortly thereafter, Murcia died of accidental drowning, at age 21, after he passed out from drugs and alcohol.

Once back in New York, the Dolls auditioned drummers, including Marc Bell (who would go on to play with Richard Hell and Ramones under the stage name "Marky Ramone") and Jerry Nolan, a friend of the band. They selected Nolan, and after US Mercury Records' A&R man Paul Nelson signed them, they began sessions for their debut album. New York Dolls was produced by former Nazz guitarist Todd Rundgren. In an interview in Creem magazine, Rundgren says he barely touched the recording; everybody was debating how to do the mix. Sales were sluggish, especially in the glam-resistant middle US, and Stereo Review magazine reviewer in 1973 compared the Dolls' guitar playing to the sound of lawnmowers.

The Dolls still polarised America's mass rock audience (a Creem magazine poll landed them wins as the best and the worst new group of 1973), but at the 'large capacity club' level, they toured the US to some satisfaction. The Dolls also toured Europe, and whilst appearing on UK TV, host Bob Harris of the BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test famously derided the group as "mock rock," comparing them unfavorably with the Rolling Stones in the same way The Monkees had been with the Beatles, as their unoriginal, upstart clones. Though Harris and much of the 'old guard' of rock journalists and critics were unimpressed, young rock fans throughout the UK disagreed, and the New York Dolls' straightforward music and outrageous attitude were later cited as key influences on punk rock.

For their next album the quintet opted for producer George Morton, whose productions for the Shangri-Las and other girl groups in the mid-1960s had been among the band's favorites, for 1974's Too Much Too Soon. Mercury dropped the Dolls not long after the second album. In 1975, foundering in drug abuse and interpersonal spats as the opportunities dried up, the band briefly allowed Malcolm McLaren to help them out, though he never actually managed them. The kind of provocative stunts McLaren later made work for the Sex Pistols blew up in the Dolls' faces. Dressing the band in red leather for performances with a Soviet flag backdrop was no substitute for the original sex-drugs outrage of glam rock. Many consider McLaren responsible for the Dolls' ultimate demise.

The McLaren-era Dolls were captured in a live set released by Fan Club records in 1986, Red Patent Leather. Production is credited to Sylvain Sylvain, with former manager Marty Thau credited as executive producer. In addition to the expected line-up of Johansen/Sylvain/Thunders/Nolan/Kane, Kane's replacement Peter Jordan is credited with "second bass." The set is notable for a number of songs which were presumably intended for the third album, some of which were later revisited by Johansen and Sylvain in their solo careers.

New York Dolls – Cause I Sez So (2009)

01 – New York Dolls – Cause I Sez So
02 – New York Dolls – Muddy Bones
03 – New York Dolls – Better Than You
04 – New York Dolls – Lonely So Long
05 – New York Dolls – My World
06 – New York Dolls – This Is Ridiculous
07 – New York Dolls – Temptation To Exist
08 – New York Dolls – Making Rain
09 – New York Dolls – Drowning
10 – New York Dolls – Nobody Got No Bizness
11 – New York Dolls – Trash
12 – New York Dolls – Exorcism Of Despair
http://uploadspace.eu/lsnbfpr9rgn4/NwYrkDlls_CsISzSo_BB.zip.html

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