Barracudas

Born out of the punk explosion taking place during the late '70s in England, the Barracudas defied the prevailing ethos of the time to reach back to the groovy 1960s for inspiration. Early singles and half of their debut album, 1981's Drop Out with the Barracudas, merged good-time surf music with raucous garage rock good enough to fit on a Pebbles compilation. The other half of the album leaned in the direction of jangling folk-rock with songs that dealt honestly with the less-than-thrilling present. This was the direction further albums took, especially two cut in the early '80s with former Flamin' Groovies singer Chris Wilson on board. The band split in 1984 but re-formed a few years later for live shows and the occasional album, including 2005's self-titled effort, which featured Wilson as a guest. Their energetic and artful take on classic guitar rock not only stands the test of time, but as the 2023 reissue of Drop Out makes clear, the group created at least one classic moment of their own. The seeds of the Barracudas were sown in 1977 when Canadian teenager and punk fan Jeremy Gluck traveled to London to check out the scene. While he was there, he met fellow punk rock enthusiast and guitarist Robin Wills and they hit it off. Gluck returned to Canada and soon realized he wanted to go back to London and sing in Wills' new band. The pair teamed up with bassist Mike Sarna and a drummer named Mike to form R.A.F. The letters stood for "Rock and Fun" and the band's repertoire consisted of '60s garage rock covers and scruffy self-penned punk songs. They changed their name to the Barracudas before too long and went through some lineup shifts before first finding like-minded bassist American expat David Buckley, then hooking up with drummer Nick Turner. The band rehearsed in a basement of a squat throughout 1977 before recording a demo in early 1979. By then, they had settled on a sound that combined surf music with garage rock, delivered with a punk attitude and a twist of humor. The combo released a single "I Want My Woody Back"/"Subway Surfing'" that hit the indie charts and became a favorite spin of legendary DJ John Peel, which created enough interest in the group that they made the cover of Sounds magazine. Along with playing a steady flow of gigs, the group returned to the studio in November to cut a demo that drew interest from a number of labels, including RAK and Sire. The band chose EMI because of their status as a major label and the size of the advance. They immediately bought new gear and booked studio time with producer Kenny Laguna, who was hot thanks to his work with Joan Jett at the time. The band cut a single, "Summer Fun," and it sold enough copies to ensure that the band would have the opportunity to record a full album. They decamped to Rockfield Studios and got down to work. The songs ended up being split between the kind of fun, nostalgic rockers they had been writing and darker folk-rock songs that reflected the actual state of the world they were living in, instead of the fantasy world they initially set out to create. Drop Out with the Barracudas was released in early 1981 and sold respectably, but after their A&R person left and their demos for the second record fell on deaf ears, they were dropped. Undaunted, they continued to tour and recorded a batch of new songs, working on some of them with Eric Debris of the band Metal Urbain as producer. Though the songs were the equal of anything they had done so far, the band weren't able to procure a new deal. After releasing a song "Watching the World Go By" on the 1981 compilation of new psychedelic bands titled A Splash of Colour: New Psychedelia in Britain from 1980 to 1985, they split up, with Turner going on to join the Lords of the New Church. Wills and Gluck decided to form a new version of the band, bringing in guitarist/vocalist Chris Wilson, who had previously fronted one of the pair's favorite groups the Flamin' Groovies. They also added bassist Jim Dickson of Australian band the Passengers and keyboardist Paul Gage, while leaving behind the surf/garage angle in favor of an aggressive yet melodic form of jangle pop that relied heavily on vocal harmonies and 12-string guitar. This incarnation of the band recorded two very Flamin' Groovies-inspired albums, 1983's Mean Time and 1984's Endeavour to Persevere, for the French label Closer before running out of steam. The band went their separate ways soon after the release; Gluck began a solo career and Wills formed Fortunate Sons. Interest in the Barracudas' work never faded completely thanks to a series of reissues, live recordings, and rarities collections that regularly found their way to record store shelves. Gluck and Wills reunited in 1989 for occasional live shows and released a reliably jangling album, Wait for Everything, for the Shake label in 1992. After a gap spent working on their own non-Barracudas projects, the band reconvened in 2003 and released a self-titled record in 2005, which featured the return of Chris Wilson. Mixed in with the reunions and new records were quite a few collections, including Voxx's 1999 set of rarities titled Through the Mysts of Time and Lemon's reissues of Mean Time and Endeavour in 2009. The band remained a going concern on a low level, playing a few live shows a year to the faithful. In 2023, Lemon issued a deluxe edition of Drop Out with the Barracudas that featured two extra discs of demos, rehearsal tapes, and early singles.
© Tim Sendra /TiVo