CD: CDMRED515
RELEASED: 2012
LABEL: Cherry Red

1. Calling On Youth
2. Break Free
3. On The Edge
4. Hit And Run
5. Start Over
6. Weird
7. I'm Screwed Up
8. Walking Through A Storm
9. Terminal Case
   

While Adrian Borland’s magnificent post-punk outfit The Sound have earned a modicum of the critical re-appraisal their work deserves since his tragic death in 1999, his pre-Sound punk trio The Outsiders have generally only been mentioned in dispatches. Until now, their two long out-of-print albums ‘Calling On Youth’ and ‘Close Up’ have remained unreleased on CD and purely the preserve of enthusiastic bloggers and vinyl completists. The Outsiders, prodigiously gifted guitarist/ vocalist Borland and his two school friends Adrian ‘Jan’ Janes and Bob Lawrence had played together as Syndrome. Occupied with their studies, Syndrome played very few gigs, mostly writing and recording their ideas for songs directly onto cassettes at Adrian Borland’s family home. The boys called these recordings "albums", even though they had no means or intention of releasing them at the time. With the alienation of punk in the air, the fledgling band took on a far more appropriate name, The Outsiders. Despite appearing on the right bills, The Outsiders struggled to hook a recording contract in an atmosphere where most of the major labels were fearful of anything labelled ‘punk’ in the wake of The Sex Pistols’ sacking from EMI. The one label that thought seriously about taking a chance on the band was Virgin Records, but while two of the songs (‘Hit And Run’ and the title track) that would end up on ‘Calling On Youth’ were recorded in Islington’s Pathway Studios with Virgin footing the bill, the elusive deal never materialized in the end.

As a result, The Outsiders took an unprecedented step. While history has long recorded that the Buzzcocks’ ‘Spiral Scratch’ EP (New Hormones Records, January 1977) was the first ‘independently’ funded and released 7”EP, The Outsiders would make what has become regarded as the very first independently-released punk album in the shape of their debut ‘Calling On Youth’, released as RER001 on the Raw Edge imprint in May 1977. While Adrian Borland’s subsequent reputation as a first-rate singer/ songwriter speaks for itself, it’s important to set one myth relating to The Outsiders straight for once and for all here. With a few exceptions, drummer Adrian Janes was responsible for the majority of The Outsiders lyrics while Adrian Borland concentrated on the music. Over three decades later, the vitriol the media spat at The Outsiders seems staggeringly out of proportion, especially at a time when punk’s DIY approach was just getting into gear. At last, though, ‘Calling on Youth’ has another chance to be taken for what it is: a highly-promising debut album from three idealistic young lads, one of whom is still very much missed today.

* this title will be available in Feb 2012. If you choose to order now please be assured that we will send it as soon as possible!

Influences / Similar Artists:
Adrian Borland, The Sound, Honolulu Mountain Daffodils, White Rose Transmission, Second Layer