1978 – The Year The UK Turned Day-Glo – Various Artists (Cherry Red)

About a year ago, Cherry Red launched the first in an ongoing chronology of punk rock, showing how it changed and mutated very quickly from its earliest roots. A wide-ranging compilation based on the year 1977, they brought together a wide selection of acts from pub rock to The Jam and Motorhead, such was the way that punk was in its infancy. They’ve managed to bring together a similar variety of acts and styles here with their look at 1978. Kicking off with one of that era’s biggest anthems, Sham 69’s Borstal Breakout, the three CD set quickly diversifies and sheds the stereotypical image that punk was all about three chords and attitude. There’s a fair amount of that in here, make no mistake, but you’ve also got strange tracks such as Gyro’s Central Detention Centre with its minimalist production, John Cooper Clarke’s Kung Fu International gives us punk poetry, cover versions of Who songs and a track from The Jam foreshadow the coming Mod revival, as do a few ‘protorevival’ tracks hidden away. Elsewhere the 2-Tone scene is warmed up for, with a couple of strange reggae-influenced numbers, while The Coventry Automatics display the earlier version of what was to become an anthem when they changed their name to The Specials, a somewhat different take on Concrete Jungle. Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias have their tongue firmly in their cheek with their dig at rock music, and Destination Venus from The Rezillos is a typical SF laden track from one of Scotland’s finest.

All that aside, the traditional version of punk is here in numbers. X-Ray Spex are (unsurprisingly) included, along with Menace, 999, The Automatics, Wreckless Eric, Public Image Ltd and many, many more long-forgotten artists and songs on this 79-track set. A worthy successor to the 1977 set, and a well-compiled overview of the year punk truly started to spread its wings.