One of the most infamous faces of punk rock’s Mount Rushmore – alongside Sex Pistols, The Damned and The Clash – The Stranglers always stuck out from the rest. For a start they were older than everyone else. Stranglers singer/guitarist Hugh Cornwell turned 28 in 1977 – year zero for punk. Pistols singer Johnny Rotten and Damned singer Dave Vanian both turned 21. Stranglers drummer Jet Black (real name Brian Duffy) was touching 40 at the time. Sadly we lost him in late 2022.
But it wasn’t just their age differences. It was their baaad attitude. Johnny Pistol may have invented the spiky punk hairdo, waddled around in bondage trousers and stuck safety pins in his ears, but that frightened only housewives.
