''The Dictators Go Girl Crazy!'' is the debut

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records co ...

by American punk rock band

The Dictators The Dictators are an American punk rock band formed in New York City in 1973. Critic John Dougan said that they were "one of the finest and most influential proto-punk bands to walk the earth." Origins The band was formed in 1972 by Andy "Adn ...

. It was released in March 1975 and is considered one of the first examples of punk rock.

Response

Critical reception

''The Dictators Go Girl Crazy!'' has been well-received critically and is considered a precursor to punk rock. In its retrospective review,

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

notes that while the album was confusing to audiences at the time of its release, it became inspirational for dozens of groups to follow. ''

Trouser Press ''Trouser Press'' was a rock and roll magazine started in New York in 1974 as a mimeographed fanzine by editor/publisher Ira Robbins, fellow fan of the Who Dave Schulps and Karen Rose under the name "Trans-Oceanic Trouser Press" (a reference ...

'' enthused that the band deserves "scads of credit" for "blazing a long trail, melding the essentials of junk culture... with loud/hard/fast rock'n'roll and thus creating an archetype". According to a 2001 article in ''

The Village Voice ''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newspaper, alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf (publisher), Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, th ...

'', the album's "blueprint for bad taste, humor, and defiance" has been replicated in the work of such bands as the Ramones and Beastie Boys. ''Trouser Press'' lauded the album as a "wickedly funny, brilliantly played and hopelessly naïve masterpiece of self-indulgent smartass rock'n'roll". ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cu ...

'' wrote: "''Go Girl Crazy''s junk-generation culture and smart-aleck sensibility did provide an essential blueprint for '70s punk. With its TV references and homely vocals, this ground-breaking and long-unavailable album continues to inspire underground groups everywhere." Canadian journalist

Martin Popoff Martin Popoff (born April 28, 1963) is a Canadian music journalist, critic and author. He is mainly known for writing about the genre of heavy metal music. The senior editor and co-founder of ''Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles'', he has additionall ...

enjoyed the album and considered the Dictators "more obviously comedians than musicians", "with a sense of self-deprecating humor poking sticks at the seriousness of heavy metal". Dave Marsh was less enthusiastic though, describing the record as a "banal collection of recycled '

Pipeline Pipeline may refer to: Electronics, computers and computing * Pipeline (computing), a chain of data-processing stages or a CPU optimization found on ** Instruction pipelining, a technique for implementing instruction-level parallelism within a s ...

' instrumentals coupled with a vocalist who sounds, yes, precisely like a yowling wrestler on Saturday afternoon TV" in ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first known for its ...

'', and giving the album zero stars in ''

The Rolling Stone Record Guide ''The Rolling Stone Album Guide'', previously known as ''The Rolling Stone Record Guide'', is a book that contains professional music reviews written and edited by staff members from ''Rolling Stone'' magazine. Its first edition was published in 1 ...

.''

Influence

In addition to this early punk rock influencing the style to come, the album was also one of two factors influencing the creation of ''

Punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

'' magazine by

John Holmstrom John Holmstrom (born 1954) is an American underground cartoonist and writer. He is best known for illustrating the covers of the Ramones albums '' Rocket to Russia'' and '' Road to Ruin'', as well as his characters Bosko and Joe (published in S ...

and music journalist

Legs McNeil Roderick Edward "Legs" McNeil (born January 27, 1956, in Cheshire, Connecticut, United States) is an American music journalist. He is one of the three original founders of the seminal ''Punk'' magazine that gave the movement its name; as well as b ...

. In ''Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk'', McNeil said that the album so resonated with him and his friends that they started the magazine strictly so they could "hang out with the Dictators".

Track listing

Personnel

; The Dictators * Andy Shernoff – lead and backing vocals, bass guitar * Ross "The Boss" Funichello –

lead guitar Lead guitar (also known as solo guitar) is a musical part for a guitar in which the guitarist plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs and chords within a song structure. The lead is the featu ...

, backing vocals *

Scott Kempner Scott "Top Ten" Kempner (born February 6, 1954, Bronx, New York, US) is the American rhythm guitarist with The Dictators since they formed in 1974 (only leaving the band for a few years starting in 2002). He is also a founding member of The Del- ...

– rhythm guitar * Stu Boy King – drums,

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Ex ...

;Additional musicians *

Handsome Dick Manitoba Richard "Handsome Dick" Manitoba (born Richard Blum; January 29, 1954) is an American punk rock singer and radio personality, best known as the original lead singer of New York City-based band The Dictators and the reunion singer of MC5. Bac ...

– lead vocals track 1, shared with Shernoff tracks: 2, 5 & 7 (Credited solely as "Secret Weapon") *

Allen Lanier Allen Glover Lanier (; June 25, 1946 – August 14, 2013) was an American musician who played keyboards and rhythm guitar. He was an original member of Blue Öyster Cult. Lanier wrote several songs for Blue Öyster Cult albums, including "T ...

(credited as Alan Glover) – keyboards on "Teengenerate" and "Cars and Girls" ; Production * Murray Krugman,

Sandy Pearlman Samuel Clarke "Sandy" Pearlman (August 5, 1943 – July 26, 2016) was an American music producer, artist manager, music journalist and critic, professor, poet, songwriter, and record company executive. He was best known for founding, writing for, ...

– producers * Tim Geelan, Lou Waxman –

engineers Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, analyze, build and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while considering the ...

* Ed Sprigg – mixing at the Record Plant, New York City and

Kiel Auditorium Kiel Auditorium was an indoor arena located in St. Louis, Missouri. It was the home of the St. Louis University basketball team and hosted the NBA's St. Louis Hawks, from 1955 to 1968. The site was home to Charles H. Turpin's Booker T. W ...

, St. Louis * Howie Lindeman, Robert "Corky" Stasiak – tape operators *

Greg Calbi Gregory Calbi (born April 3, 1949) is an American mastering engineer at Sterling Sound, New Jersey. Biography Greg Calbi was born on April 3, 1949, in Yonkers, New York, and raised in Bayside, Queens, New York. He graduated in 1966 from Bishop ...

– mastering at The Cutting Room, New York City *

David Gahr David Gahr (September 18, 1922 – May 25, 2008) was an American photographer. He was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, to Russian immigrant parents. He enlisted in the US Army the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor and served in the infantry in Eu ...

– front cover photography * Borneo Jimmy - "inspiration"

References

External links

* {{Authority control The Dictators albums 1975 debut albums Epic Records albums Albums produced by Murray Krugman Albums produced by Sandy Pearlman Au Go Go Records albums