’21st Century Woman’ is a blast of heat on your ears. Grimy, gorgeous, and amp-destroying, Liverpool duo Generation take the best of their punk and glam-rock influences and rail against conventional life and relationships.
Taken from their debut mini-album Suicidal Champagne, the track and accompanying music video recreate the surge of energy that comes from live performance, combined with a spitting and entrancing vocal that recalls Johnny Rotten or Pete Shelley at their peak. The driving, frenetic guitars and drums heighten the sense of stress and tension, coupled with abandon found in the lyrics. The song combines a takedown and wide-eyed admiration of the ‘fancy free’ girls with a ‘law degree’ that find themselves in the gig world, and at times echoes the charismatic but chaotic sensuality of T-Rex’s ‘20th Century Boy’, which must’ve been an inspiration for the title.
The band has said that the video: “Is not an artistic extension of ourselves or the song, but an extension of our personalities and our offbeat humour we do so enjoy. It is basically a massive piss take out of ourselves and the industry.”
This is brilliantly done, with frontman Dean Carne shown as a massive primadonna and brother/co-conspirator James Carne as his frustrated handler, presented with wit and style. This too makes you miss the live music experience, as the brothers throw themselves into their performance with fantastic energy. They’re down on my future gig list, that’s for certain.
’21st Century Woman’ is a fun, sexy, stylish, carefully crafted and gig-perfect track. They have taken a speedball of punk, glam and garage, and come up with a ‘glitterball-punk’ style that is entirely their own and fresh. More please, guys.
Words by Issy Flower
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