Analysis: Patti Smith's defiant and non-conformist work has always had a strong influence on Ireland's punk, rock and underground scenes
Few music subcultures can boast that they included a female poet in their vanguard. Yet Patti Smith was one of the most important aspects of the punk movement of 1976-77. Her presence encouraged a fragility that was absent from most of the all-male groups in the early London and New York scenes. She served as a counterweight to what could have become a very macho cul de sac.
Phil Chevron from The Radiators and The Pogues spoke passionately about the dangers of punk becoming a self-obsessed, aggressive cult. In one of the final interviews before his death, he reflected on the life-long influence of a small number of the early artists from the punk scene. Patti Smith was the first name he mentioned: "the people who made an impression in the first instance tend to be the ones who still do."
Chevron was a scholar of German Pre-War cabaret musical theatre. And that genre's unpretentious, bare, bawdy, fearless, dirty-fingernailed gutter poetry points at a useful context for understanding Smith's early work.
The small punk scene in Dublin of 1976 to 1978 certainly owes her a debt. Her work served as a counterpoint to some of the nihilism and violent outbursts that devastated that scene. Even then, her legacy could guide 'street fighting men’ into ideas of being more sensitive and complex artists.
This can be seen in the work of John Stanley, the Dublin multi-media artist known as Stano. The vicious, angry and exciting, red and black musical palette of his work with The Threat had evolved into haunting, fragile emotional soundscapes by 1982 when he released his debut single Room. It’s not surprising that he is remembered by those in the scene as one of the first people to buy and share Smith’s records.
Patti Smith performing Gloria for Rockpalast TV in Germany in April 1979
That’s not the only valuable role that Smith has played in Irish rock. Her cover of Gloria, on the first side of Horses, pulled its writer, Van Morrison, into the avant-garde underground rock conversation. He wrote the song as a teenager and twitchy tension of the song suited Smith’s debut album, which turns 50 this year.
It was always a garage rock song but, in Smith’s hands, the garage became dirtier and the rock became more turbo-charged and ragged. She had injected a ferocious power into the song and her version made a good song timeless.
Smith was present in the grooves of the record that introduced the Boomtown Rats to the record buying public. Her presence gave credibility to the hastily assembled but highly influential compilation album, New Wave. Some of that rubbed off on the Rats and helped to set up their debut single as a bone fide new wave contender. The record included the Ramones and Talking Heads as well as the dreadful Skyhooks.
But that didn’t mean that Smith was universally embraced by the Irish rock fraternity. Smith’s Piss Factory was on the first side and didn’t escape the attention of the Evening Herald's music critic. He introduced Smith to the Irish music fans as the American "rock-poet", with one of her rambling, neurotic, resentful and not particularly good bits of "poetry".
Smith made her Irish debut in 1978 when she did a poetry reading at Dublin's Project Arts Centre during a two week New Wave Festival. The bands who played the festival included Revolver, The Vipers, Sacre Bleu and U2. But, again, not everyone in Ireland was kind to her. As Ireland’s great rock writer, Bill Graham, recounted, she was heckled by an audience member who harangued her about giving her daughter up for adoption. It was a cruel public gesture during a poetry reading, but Dublin gigs at that time could often have a nasty undercurrent.
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From RTÉ Radio 1's Arena, Donal Dineen on the life and work of Patti Smith
Smith has had meaningful live collaborations with U2. A spirited performance of Because the Night at a 2010 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame event features both of the song’s writers, Smith and Bruce Springsteen with U2. The Dublin band used Smith’s uplifting People Have the Power as the entrance song on their iNNOCENCE + eXPERIENCE tour. In a poignant moment after the 2015 terrorist attacks on Paris, Smith joined the band onstage in the city for a rousing rendition of that song.
Horses occupies a distinctive place in rock music history. It’s an album that needs to be listened to, not talked about. It’s definitely not easy listening. Like the stark black and white cover photograph by Robert Mapplethorpe, it’s a defiant, non-conformist collection with jagged little shards of amateurism and defiance.
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If, like the best Pre-War German cabaret music, this was the art of the anarchist or the fever dreams of the idealist, it’s no surprise that Dunstan Bruce from Chumbawamba named Smith’s August 1978 gig in Newcastle's City Hall as the most influential gig of his life. He wrote a lengthy piece in the Punks Listen publication from the Hope Collective to raise funds for the Red Cross Ukraine Crisis Appeal.
Here’s a snippet that sums up what Smith represents to many people who were touched by her music:
"she is five foot six going on seven foot tall
she is joey ramone
she is punching above her weight effortlessly
she is shamanic street preacher
she is bitch, whore, mother, lover
she’s calling the shots
i am completely smitten
and that’s when i fell in love"
Patti Smith plays Dublin's 3arena on Monday next, October 6th
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Dr Michael Mary Murphy is a lecturer in the Department of Humanities + Arts Management, Entrepreneurship at the Institute of Art, Design + Technology Dún Laoghaire.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
