Johnny Thunders After The Dolls: 1977-1987 CD

CD Tracks: Chinese Rocks, Pirate Love, London Boys, Short Lives - (Johnny's remix), Baby Talk, One Track Mind, I Was Born To Cry - (with Patti Palladin), Too Much Junkie Business, Goin' Steady, Little Bit Of Whore, Uptown To Harlem - (with Patti Palladin), Born To Lose, Cool Operator, M.I.A., Get Off The Phone, Treat Her Right - (with Patti Palladin), Blame It On Mom, I Only Wrote This Song For You, Endless Party. Bonus DVD includes Marky Ramone talking about the Ramones and the NY Dolls, Johnny Thinders video and more.

Personnel: Johnny Thunders; Patti Palladin.
Covering some of the output of ex-New York Doll, Heartbreaker, junkie, and rock & roll casualty Johnny Thunders in the 10 years after 1977's punk rock explosion, this best-of includes much of his best work with the Heartbreakers as well as solo material recorded in the late 1980s with his wife, Patti Paladin. In addition to well-known songs like "Chinese Rocks," "Born to Lose," and "London Boys," there are remarkable covers of Dion's "I Was Born to Cry" and the extrovert New Orleanian Roy Head's "Treat Her Right." As always with Thunders' material, the listener is left wondering whether his talent emerged because of his drug addiction or in spite of it.
The title After the Dolls: 1977-1987 implies some grand overview of that time period, but the subtitle, "Track and Jungle Records Studio Sessions," really gets to the heart of the matter. Johnny Thunders didn't get into the studio as often as one might think, and recorded for one label after the other, so the options get pared down rather quickly. In fact, After the Dolls: 1977-1987 culls tracks from just three albums: L.A.M.F., Que Sera Sera, and Copycats. There are only three tracks from Copycats and six from Que Sera Sera, so more than half of this compilation comes from L.A.M.F.. Granted, these are among his better releases in a sea of mediocre ones, but since L.A.M.F. and So Alone are the only truly vital and essential Thunders studio albums, there seems little sense in duplicating so much of the L.A.M.F. album. The bonus material is a bit suspect, too: it's footage of Marky Ramone talking about the Ramones, the New York Dolls, and Johnny Thunders. Ramone was a part of the Noo Yawk scene before he joined the Ramones, and even auditioned for the Dolls following Billy Murcia's death, but isn't the title of this set "After the Dolls"? His comments are interesting, but a bit of a stretch for a Johnny Thunders/post-Dolls comp. And while the material on here is among Thunders' best, it's hard to recommend it over L.A.M.F. itself, and the equally important So Alone. After that, Live at Max's Kansas City and D.T.K. -- Live at the Speakeasy are probably next in line, leaving little reason to pick up this compilation unless L.A.M.F. goes out of print or you really need to hear Marky Ramone's recollections. ~ Sean Westergaard