RIP Pete Shelley

[Belle Lettre]

Dreadful news

[Ghost of Harry Smith]

Very sad news, he seemed like such a gent. Saw them play a couple of years ago and they still looked like they were having a helluva good time onstage.

My Buzzcocks story is that I gave Pete and Steve a jar of magic mushrooms and some pot during their first tour of Australia in 1990. They gave me lots of merch and tickets to all the east coast shows I wanted, even though their actual experience wasn’t all that pleasant, as they overindulged. Much hotel-based paranoid merriment ensued. It was such a hilarious tour, they were a smart and funny bunch. Vale Pete.

[Minnie the Minx]

This is a cunt’s bag of shit, this

[Bent Fabric]

This is a cunt’s bag of shit, this

Seconded.

[Ranking Ted]

This is a cunt’s bag of shit, this

Seconded.

Indeed. What a legacy, those three minute blasts of bittersweet pop are perfection. RIP.

[toomanyhatz]

Thank you, Pete.

I remember in the early days of punk rock liking the idea that it was more direct and less oriented to musical excess, but that the main fallacy of it was trying to distance itself from the past. I think I knew instinctively that 'year zero' was a bullshit pose. I remember saying at the time that if bands were more willing to combine their anger and intensity with pop hooks and tight harmonies (don't want to put it in such blatant "more like the Beatles" terms, but that's almost certainly what I meant at the time), that then they'd really have something.

I only realized later that the Buzzcocks were already doing it. I can't think of another band that so neatly fit a picture in my head of the kind of band that 'should' exist. I don't listen to them as much as I used to - probably don't like them as much as I used to either - but I still hold them dear. They feel very personal to me, almost like I retroactively invented them.

[ChrisB]

Deeply saddened by the news. If any young aspiring musicians want to learn about how to write perfect pop songs, just listen to the Buzzcocks.

[Snarfyguy]

the Beatles

Funny you bring them up because the two times I saw him/them, that was the only reference point I could come up with to frame the sheer exuberance of the performance and my experience of it. I recall wiping away tears of JOY.

But now I'm wiping away tears of sorrow.

And AGAIN I'm reminded of John Lennon's line "Is it for her or myself that I cry?"

[fange]

Ahh fuck. I say this too often - much too young.

RIP Pete, and thank you.

[naughty boy]

They're a band we've always been very fond of, here. They often win polls - even when they're pitted against the likes of The Clash or The Pistols. It's always nice to see that. And to hear Shelley was a lovely fella. The older I get the more I treasure that sort of thing, and of course the sadder that makes this news.

I wonder how long it is since he was bashing away on stage....probably not long at all. Ah, life

[Minnie the Minx]

They were due to play a show on the 14th.

[Charlie O.]

To cop a move from hatz...

It may seem strange to call a band "brave" for writing songs about love and relationships... but it does seem like most if not all of the other British punk bands of that moment may have thought that that was a pretty boring or passe thing to do (the Slits and Raincoats are the only other bands I can think of that did this at all, and they didn't specialize in it to the extent that Buzzcocks did). And Shelley proved them wrong by writing a few dozen really fecking brilliant songs about love and relationships that were also fecking brilliant punk rock records.

I don't know if I could convince anyone that that makes them "important," but I kinda think maybe it does.

Just a few weeks ago I bought a book of Shelley's lyrics, because... well, I'd wanted one for thirty years, and now one was available! He really was a master. And the 'cocks' best records got me through a few tough times (and any number of good times, too).

One of the best songs ever written:





... and a personal "pet" fave - they threw it away on some NME freebie around the time they split up in '81, but I think it should have been their "last" 45 - it is a joyous thing, and not a bad epitaph (then or now):





Bless you and rest you, Pete.

[Minnie the Minx]

Two pages?
Come on you fucking cunts.

[Lord Rother]

Nice.

[Minnie the Minx]

Nice.

I don’t think in the history of BCB has anyone that I pay so little attention to, in the league of ‘Lord who?’ sort of thing, made such a stringent constant effort to alert me of his presence.

Ok. I see you. Hello.

What do you want?

I’m already married and I’m sure you have a lovely penis.

Anything else?

[Minnie the Minx]

Lets not do this on Pete’s thread actually. I’ll start a new one.

[clive gash]

For all the talk about perfect pop (and it is) there was always something hard about the ‘cocks.

[clive gash]

A heady whiff of otherness

[Deebank]

R6 was playing wall to wall 'cocks / Shelley earlier, as is fitting.

[Deebank]

Always loved this one:



Especially good over the opening sequence of 'so bad it's almost good' 80s teen movie The Party Animal.