Together just two years in their initial incarnation, the Rezillos’ hook-happy elixir of punk, pop, glam, golden oldies, and sci-fi has burrowed its way toward legendary status on the strength of songs like “Top of the Pops” and “(My Baby Does) Good Sculptures.” The Edinburgh group’s sole studio LP, 1978’s Can’t Stand the Rezillos, remains one of the all-time great debuts. Adopting their moniker from a bastardized cafe name in a comic book, the band had formed two years earlier.
“Punk hadn’t arrived then,” says vocalist Eugene Reynolds. “But after a while, there came ‘punk’ bands, mostly copycat, with a few notable exceptions, influenced by what was coming from London.
“As far as the punk scene went, we thought, ‘Oh, maybe that’s what we are?’ We concocted our own brand of music and attitude, which just happened to coincide with the zeitgeist.”
Being enrolled at the Edinburgh College of Art, the Rezillos were as meticulous about creating their Carnaby Street-by-way-of-Jupiter aesthetic as they were about writing good songs.
“I think that being from the art school environment, it meant that we didn’t see a band as just being about the music alone,” says guitarist Jo Callis. “To us, image and attitude were equally important.”
Pressure to follow up on their finely honed debut factored into the Rezillos’ 1978 split.
“We didn’t realize fully at the time what we were doing by breaking up,” says Reynolds. “We should have just taken a break and come back together again six months later.”
Instead, Reynolds and vocalist Fay Fife started the similarly themed Revillos, while Callis joined the Human League and co-wrote “Don’t You Want Me.” Almost 27 years after disbanding, the Rezillos are playing their first U.S. dates aside from a 1977 CBGB gig. They’re also set to release a radio session compendium tentatively titled The Rezillos Radio Times.
“It will consist of numbers old, new, borrowed, and blue,” jokes Callis, “but that don’t mean we’re all goin’, steady or nuthin’!”
This article appears in March 18 • 2005.
