Song of the Day: “Rules and Regulations” [Live] by The Contractions
If you’ve read this site at any point over the last week and a half, you can probably guess that 1) I’m a record collector nerd, 2) I’m a middle-aged trans woman and 3) I’m drawn to punk and its many offshoots when the music’s made by women.
A few years back in Atlanta (2009, maybe?), I found a cheap copy of the then-unknown to me Contractions’ 1980 7-inch “Rules and Regulations” b/w “You Touched Me.” The usual drill followed: skim the a-side online if it’s on YouTube or elsewhere, question where these brilliant women have been my whole life and purchase a new treasure for my DJ sets (and at the time, my college radio show).
That version of “Rules and Regulations” is a punchy, fun tune that’s at the intersection of powerpop and new wave. And as the great ones tend to do, the trio of Mary Kelley (guitar), Kathy Peck (bass) and Debbie Hopkins (drums) knows how to incorporate arresting harmonies, regardless of a song’s means and message. (If women start a punk band together and there’s no arresting harmonies, what the fuck are they even doing?)
In March, a live 1980 compilation by the San Francisco punk legends got reissued with the addition of three studio-recorded rarities. The version of “Rules and Regulations” below mirrors my incredible discovery of yore’s same vibe but, naturally, with less polish and more raw emotion.
For whatever reason, I never dug deeper into The Contractions’ catalog. My loss (until now) because there’s songs that completely blow away “Rules and Regulations.” “Breaking Up is Not Hard to Do” sounds like the post-punk evolution of Penetration, while “Magazine Phobia” holds up against other socially-aware West Coast punk gems from the same time period (but with better musicianship than you’d get from many of the trio’s more lauded peers).
An informative interview with the band appears in Jen B. Larson’s book Hit Girls: Women of Punk in the USA- 1975-1983. Larson skillfully placed the trio in not just the lineage of women in punk but also the story of queer artists in the genre.