Blank Generation is the first album by Richard Hell and the Voidoids, produced by Richard Gottehrer and released in 1977 on Sire Records.
The lyrics on the album, in keeping with the late 1970s punk style that Hell helped to create when he co-founded Television, are nihilistic but poetic.
The music is driven largely by Robert Quine's rapid, complex, angular guitar licks, in particular on the lead song "Love Comes in Spurts," in which Hell rages against the impermanence of love in the real world compared to the imagination of his youth:
- Cuz love comes in spurts
in dangerous flirts
and it murders your heart--
They didn't tell you that part.
Hell maintains that the title song is meant as a comment on "generation" songs, such as The Who's "My Generation", and that it was not really about being blank but about having a free choice as opposed to being labeled by others, in the sense of fill-in-the-blank. In a letter to The Wire magazine, Hell pointed out that there are other obvious resonances in the lyrics, such as in references to blank walls and vacant lots.citation needed
- it's fascinating to observe what the mirror does
but when I dine it's for the wall that I set a place
- ...
- To hold the TV to my lips the air so packed with cash
Then carry it up flights of stairs and drop it in the vacant lot
Not to mention in some rather stark nihilistic thoughts:
- I was sayin let me out of here before I was
even born--it's such a gamble when you get a face
(These lyrics are taken from the titles of two poems in Hell's satiric poetry collaboration with Tom Verlaine, Wanna Go Out? The book was written under the pseudonym of Theresa Stern, supposedly a half-Puerto Rican, half-Jewish former prostitute. The book was recently reissued in a French/English bilingual limited edition as On Decolle? Wanna Go Out?.)
Cover design
The original album sleeve feature a front cover photo of Hell in black jeans and shirtless, opening a frayed jacket to reveal the phrase, "YOU MAKE ME _______", written across his chest. The photo was taken by CBGB's unofficial photographer, Roberta Bayley. The back cover featured a posed photo of Hell and the Voidoids taken by Kate Simon.
1990 CD reissue
The 1990 CD reissue of Blank Generation differs in several ways from the original vinyl album. It includes two bonus tracks: a version of the pop standard, "All the Way", and an original, "I'm Your Man" (not the Leonard Cohen song of same name). Both are outtakes from the original album sessions. Also, "Down at the Rock & Roll Club" is a noticeably different take than that which was on the original LP; it features no drums during most of the verses. The CD album cover is also different than the original.
Track listing
All songs written by Richard Hell except as indicated.
Side one
- "Love Comes in Spurts"
- "Liars Beware" (Hell, Ivan Julian)
- "New Pleasure"
- "Betrayal Takes Two" (Hell, Julian)
- "Down at the Rock and Roll Club"
- "Who Says?"
Side two
- "Blank Generation"
- "Walking on the Water" (John Fogerty, Tom Fogerty)
- "The Plan"
- "Another World"
CD reissue bonus tracks
- "I'm Your Man"
- "All the Way" (Sammy Cahn, Jimmy Van Heusen)
Personnel
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