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When Eater first emerged onto the nascent UK punk scene towards the end of 1976, they weren’t simply younger, louder and snottier than the rest of the bands breaking through at that time, but more so than most of their audience as well.  Frontman Andy Blade was just 15 at the time, drummer Dee Generate was 13.  The first time I saw them, I’d just turned 17. The little rotters made me feel ancient.

Punk was already being described as the sound of disaffected youth; Eater were that same disaffection personified.  Who better, then, to deliver the ultimate soundtrack to all that was happening all around them?

“The tracks on Duplication are essentially my favourite songs out of the seminal punk classics,” explains Blade, “before punk rock became somewhat homogenized as a formula. Whilst it is a covers album  – it is not just a covers album. 

“There is a difference because I was ‘there’ with my band during the explosive year of 1977 –  these songs mean something to me in a visceral sense. There’s a spirit to the tracks that seems to come alive as we rehearsed them. Most importantly, however, Duplication was great fun to create and I think, as a result, it is – I hope – great fun to listen to.”

It is. Ten songs make up the album, and to call it punk rock’s greatest hits is almost an understatement.  We are locked wholly into 1976-1977, with The Ramones’“Beat On The Brat” and the Damned’s “New Rose” both hearkening back to that earlier year.   “New Rose,” in fact, was the first British punk single ever released!  And Eater’s own debut, “Outside View” – also included here, was the third.

From thereon, The Buzzcocks, Generation X, the Saints, the Clash, Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers and the Only Ones flash past, but Blade cautions the listener not to expect simple note-perfect renditions of these doughty old warriors.

“A lot of thought and a lot of love went into this album from choosing the songs, recording them, to deciding on a sleeve. The thing about Duplication is that we are not really trying to duplicate anything. In a way we’re taking the piss out of this nostalgia fetish.

“All the songs are quite faithful to the originals, but I do tend to ‘own’ songs when I sing them, so I have taken some liberties.”

This is especially apparent on the band’s latest single, an an incendiary take on what is probably the most “punk” song of them all, The Sex Pistols’ “God Save The Queen”… released to coincide with Her Majesty’s silver jubilee, and accompanied by several tidal waves of media condemnation, not to mention physical attacks on the band members and a blanket broadcasting ban. Some retailers refused to stock the record, others omitted its name from the Top 30 chart. Has any piece of plastic ever caused so much fuss?

Eater shared producers with the Pistols for a time – Dave Goodman, who handled their early singles and debut album, also oversaw three of the Pistols’ demo sessions, including their very first, in July 1976, and the January 1977 session which brought the band their second record deal (after they were sacked by EMI) with A&M Records.  (Who also sacked them, but that’s another story.)

And Eater got to hear all the demos, including “God Save The Queen” – although, at that time, it was still called “No Future.”

Blade expalins, “. My only problem with the song was the first bridge – ‘don’t be told what you want’ etc. It didn’t scan and, to my mind, it made Johnny Rotten sound like an old time British comedian called Norman Wisdom. Uncool. 

“But the second bridge – ‘when there’s no future how can there be sin, we’re the flowers in the dustbin’ was genius, and I always wondered why they didn’t just use the second bridge twice, like first time round and second time. So when we came to record it, I knew what I had to do – terribly sorry about that,  Rotten/Jones/Matlock/Cook!”

It’s unlikely the song’s progenitors will be offended.  Sex Pistols covers might be ten-a-penny, but how many (don’t even try to answer this) simply Xerox the original, with the only the occasional misheard lyric to distinguish them?  

Eater retain the energy, the scorn and the anger that fueled the now-nearly half-century old original.  But they add that same indefinable spark of – yes, youth, volume and rage – that was always the hallmark of Eater in their prime, but which a mere handful others of their contemporaries seem able to recapture.

To paraphrase an old song about Star Trek…”It’s punk, Jim.  But not as we’ve heard it for a very long time.”

SINGLE: https://orcd.co/eater_godsavethequeen
CD/VINYL: https://cleorecs.com/search?q=eater+duplication
DIGITAL: https://orcd.co/eater_duplication

Track listing

1. Breakdown
2. Your Generation
3. Beat On The Brat
4. Outside View
5. I’m Stranded
6. God Save The Queen
7. White Riot
8. Chinese Rocks
9. New Rose
10. Another Girl, Another Planet