New York Dolls TShirTS,

New York Dolls PosTerS

The New York Dolls are a rock band formed in New York City in 1971. In 2004 the band reformed with three of their original members, two of whom, David Johansen and Sylvain Sylvain, continue on today and released a new album in 2006.

The New York Dolls found little commercial success during their existence, but the New York Dolls prefigured much of what was to come in the punk rock era and even later; The New York Dolls' over-the-top crossdressing influenced the look of many new wave and sleaze rock groups, and their shambling, sloppy but highly energetic playing style set the tone for many later rock and roll bands.
Initially, The New York Dolls was comprised of singer David Johansen, guitarists Johnny Thunders and Rick Rivets (who was replaced by Sylvain Sylvain after a few months), bass guitarist Arthur "Killer" Kane and drummer Billy Murcia. The original The New York Dolls lineup's first performance was on Christmas Eve 1971 at a homeless shelter, the infamous Endicott Hotel.

The New York Dolls got their big break when Rod Stewart invited them to open for him at a London concert. Shortly thereafter, Murcia died of accidental suffocation (after he passed out from drugs and alcohol, groupies put him in a cold bath and forced coffee down his throat). He was succeeded by Jerry Nolan, a friend of The New York Dolls's, though future Richard Hell and Ramones drummer Marc Bell (Marky Ramone) later claimed he auditioned to take Murcia's place: "Only two people showed up to audition, me and Jerry. They gave it to him because I was doing all the fancy fills."

The New York Dolls was influenced by vintage rhythm and blues, the early Rolling Stones, classic American girl group songs, and anarchic post-psychedelic bands such as the MC5 and the Stooges, as well as then-current glam rockers such as Marc Bolan. They did it their own way, creating something which critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote "doesn't really sound like anything that came before it. It's hard rock with a self-conscious wit, a celebration of camp and kitsch that retains a menacing, malevolent edge."

Johansen's energy made up for what was a weak singing voice; Thunders's fuzzy guitar sound became a near-instant New York Dolls trademark, as did Sylvain's minimalistic rhythm guitar, Arthur's bouncing basslines and Nolan's tom tom-heavy drumming style. Sartorially, The New York Dolls looked like a Halloween party gang of transvestites who had broken into the Rolling Stones' and Marc Bolan's wardrobe trunks and made it even more androgynously exaggerated - best described by journalist Alan Parker as "still shocking today... devastating then." Musically, their repertoire - mostly written by Johansen (he spelled his name JoHansen at the time) and Thunders, occasionally by Johansen and Sylvain - was a series of unapologetically high-energy, demimonde expressions of the seamy New York underground from which they emerged, particularly through their legendary shows at the Mercer Arts Center. Songs like "Personality Crisis," "Trash," "Frankenstein," and "Jet Boy" were seminal squalls of guitar abuse, making up in attitude what they lacked in musical ability. But for all their squall The New York Dolls didn't entirely lack for subtlety; "Subway Train," for one, was as striking a piece of songwriting and even musicianship as the band could execute.

Those and six others (including a speedballing cover of Bo Diddley's "Pills") turned up on their eponymous debut album, 1973's New York Dolls, on the Mercury label. It was produced by Todd Rundgren, who some critics think laid too dense a hand on The New York Dolls'  raw thrust, while others think he gave them precisely the guidance they needed to let the best of their singular snarl step forth. In an interview in Creem Magazine, Rundgren says he barely touched the recording, everybody was screaming "turn me up", and when it came time for him to leave with the tape to bring it upstate to his studio in Bearsville, NY for mastering, Johnny Thunders stopped him and said "that tape stays with us, you fiddled around with the knobs enough". The album received mostly positive reviews, but sales were sluggish. In any case, a Stereo Review magazine reviewer in 1973 compared The New York Dolls' guitar playing to lawnmowers!

The New York Dolls toured Europe, and host Bob Harris of the BBC's Old Grey Whistle Test famously derided the group as "mock rock" and compared them to The Monkees. Though Harris was unimpressed, young rock fans throughout the UK disagreed, and the New York Dolls' straightforward music and outrageous attitude were later cited as key influences on punk rock.

For their next album The New York Dolls opted for producer George (Shadow) Morton, whose productions for the Shangri-Las and other girl groups in the mid-1960s had been among the band's favourites. Far from the atmospherics he lent those mini-epics, Morton gave The New York Dolls a leaner sound for 1974's Too Much Too Soon. The New York Dolls'  songwriting seemed to falter somewhat while their covers of vintage R&B flashed some of the original energy, particularly their cover of Archie Bell and the Drells's "(There's Gonna Be A) Showdown." Critics applauded, mostly, but the public was even less impressed than they'd been with the first album (a Creem magazine poll landed The New York Dolls wins as the best and the worst new group of 1973).

Mercury dropped The New York Dolls not long afterward, and The New York Dolls recruited British clothier and would-be impresario Malcolm McLaren as their new manager. The kind of provocative stunts he later made work for the Sex Pistols blew up in The New York Dolls' faces, especially his dressing the band in red leather for performances before a Soviet flag, which alienated record labels that might have pondered taking a chance on The New York Dolls after Mercury let them go. Except for a few brief periods, the two New York Dolls lbums - considered incontestable classics of raw, protopunk, anything-goes rock and roll - have never been out of print.

Thunders and Nolan left The New York Dolls in 1975 while on tour in Florida either due to a dispute with Johansen or their inability to “score” heroin in the “Sunshine State” depending on whom you believe. They soon formed The Heartbreakers with bassist Richard Hell who had left Television the same week. After a few shows they added guitarist Walter Lure and few month later replaced Hell with Billy Rath. They participated in the “Anarchy Tour” with their heirs the Sex Pistols in England in 1976, while the other Dolls recruited replacements (most notably including Blackie Lawless a childhood friend of Kane's who replaced Thunders for the remainder of the Florida tour) and continued until 1977. The Heartbreakers recorded one British-only studio album and a few odds-and-ends live sets (including a memorable set from a Max's Kansas City show) before splintering into an on-and-off concern. Thunders continued to tour and record throughout the 80's, releasing one well-regarded solo album (So Alone, an import-only album, on which Sex Pistols Steve Jones and Paul Cook played as well) and several thrown-together sets of covers and a few originals. However, he never really got out of the grip of drugs, and died in New Orleans in 1991, of an alleged heroin and methadone overdose, although there are signs that he may have been murdered over a drug-related dispute, and that the police didn't properly investigate what appeared to just be the death of another junkie. It has also come to light that he suffered from leukemia

from Wikipedia licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.

New York Dolls (Lipstick) T-Shirt

New York Dolls - Rock-n-Roll Logo TshirT