It would be tough to name a punk band from the 1970s, still around now, who can kick on with as much cultural relevance as they once had. We may love Glen Matlock, but a Frank Turner-fronted Sex Pistols is hardly an encapsulation of the punk scene and lack of ethics which prevailed. But it’s not a parading of the punk scene corpse, either. Buzzcocks were a formidable band in their day. You need only look at their crucial debut album, Another Music in a Different Kitchen, as an example of that. But between the John Lydon-fronted Public Image Ltd. producing some lacklustre work and The Damned on their yearly retirement tour, the scene has taken a beating. They’re bloodied and bust open, but nobody has tried to deal a death blow to the genre’s old guard. Attitude Adjustment may just be the final haymaker needed to send the nostalgia trip into a permanent sleep.
We should not expect the highs of the heyday but bands like Pulp and The Bad Seeds prove that longevity, even with bouts of hibernation, is healthy for the songwriting process. Not for Buzzcocks, though, who fall into the same struggling category as The Stranglers and Squeeze for relying on their early hits as a blueprint for new material. Following in the footsteps of what has already been achieved is not a path to success, as Buzzcocks find across their latest offering, Attitude Adjustment. Dated work from a punk band who peaked in the 1970s? Shocker. Stock instrumental work and a vocal effort from frontman Steve Diggle that would feel a little underwhelming for a pub gig. At least there’s a chance of hearing Up the Junction as background noise from an overconfident frontman in the boozer. Here, soberly stuck with the modern vocal works of Diggle, is a tough listen. Opener Queen of the Scene desperately wants to be a roaring start to match the starting pistol rush, but it falls flat.
Strained by repetition is what Attitude Adjustment fails to deal with. Seeing Daylight follows the tried and ultimately dull road of repeating the song’s title. They push it to the point of taking the piss with this one. Diggle fails to add any extra emotional vigour or instrumental strength to the repetition, which is meant to conjure some connection to a listener through willpower alone. Nostalgia will play its part, but only in forgiving a few of the songs found throughout. A similar guitar riff opens much of the material on Attitude Adjustment, and the plodding, simple message found at the heart of every track is hard to muster much interest in. Lazily written material that’s a low bar for even the most washed-up of old punk bands. Getting old is not an excuse to lose a step, just look at the octogenarians who are still as strong on stage, if not stronger than ever. Buzzcocks are far from that, and some of the reasons why are out of their hands.
But what they build here, between the snooze-inducing repetition of Poetic Machine Gun or the underwhelming storytelling of Tear of a Golden Girl, crumbles immediately. You’d be hard-pressed to pick much out of this consistently dribbling album. Jesus at the Wheel is a particularly dull moment, but it at least captures your attention again, mostly because of how low the bar of quality is set by it. Strumming for the sake of it, instrumentally inoffensive and the antithesis of what a punk band should do. It’s hard to kick against the powers that be when the people who once lit your fire have already been thrown into it. But modern times are worse, and there’s much to be infuriated by, but the nostalgia pack of punk rockers has no interest in that, either. They’re keen, as Buzzcocks are across Attitude Adjustment, to coast along on the memory of being an active force of change, rather than maintaining themselves as such. A special note for Just A Dream I Followed, which both sounds like a botched cover of Bob Dylan’s It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding) and a flagship example of how punk is, for the generation that started it, just a cynical cash cow, rather than an active force for change.
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