The story of a band - Wild Youth

Bob-Dubery

Over the weekend I fell into a bout of nostalgia over SA music of the late 70s and 80s. This came from finally getting my vinyl copy of Goema by The Genuines transferred onto CD, and by a discussion with an FB friend.

I'm wary of nostalgia, but I do think the era we were discussing was a particularly good one for SA music. Sort of like the 60s in that so many previously unploughed fields were being dug up, but, as we used to joke in those days, a decade or so late in SA ("Ladies and Gentleman, we are about to land at Jan Smuts airport, Johannesburg. Please put your watches back ten years.")

During said discussion the name of Wild Youth came up. They were a punk band from Durban. It was easy to dismiss them as Sex Pistols clones, and that was a significant influence, but they were not just wannabes - or at least prime mover Johnny Teen was not.

So, fuelled by nostalgia I did some googling to see what Wild Youth had left for posterity and found a clip (well several, but they all seemed to be the same song) and a history of the band by Johnny Teen himself.

The history is at http://wikibin.org/articles/wild-youth.html. It's an interesting memo about being moved to form a band, getting the whole thing going, the choices you have to make, and how a band that is starting to get somewhere can rapidly fall apart.

I saw them live two or three times. It was easy to mistake them as a bunch of yobs looking to make a noise and alarm parents. I suppose it was easy to think of any punk band in that way. But I did meet Johnny Teen once and he was a much more rounded and more serious guy than you might think if all you knew of him was their raucous live act and some alarmist headlines in the newspapers. He was a nice guy, working hard at keeping a band vital and together.

A taste of the what Wild Youth were about

Wild Youth didn't get a record deal (or that's how I recall it). They did put out a self-financed seven single (for those of you going "huh", this was a small, seven inch, vinyl disc, played at 45rpm and usually with one track on each side). I bought that seven single. I wish I still had it. I wish I still had a lot of SA stuff I bought back then :'(

Psean

Interesting. Thanks for posting this? I heard about them a while ago in the trailer for Punk in Africa. I'd still like to see it. And hear more of these early local bands

Squonk

Good stuff, I saw them a couple of times in the late 70's. Extreme energy and the closest we had to the punk movement. Also saw Johnny in 'the Gay Marines' a couple of years later

Bob-Dubery

Squonk wrote Good stuff, I saw them a couple of times in the late 70's. Extreme energy and the closest we had to the punk movement. Also saw Johnny in 'the Gay Marines' a couple of years later

There was an interesting punkish scene centred around Springs. Johnny Teen mentions the Radio Rats who were the best known of those Springs bands (they got to number 2 on the Radio 5 hit parade with "ZX Dan"). That scene was informed by Punk, but they weren't British-style punk bands like the Pistols or Sham 69. So that would have included the Radio Rats, Corporal Punishment and Hogs Norton.