“Gloria” by Patti Smith 
(Words/Music: Van Morrison, Patti Smith, Album: Horses, Arista 1975)
 
In the mid-70s, an interesting phenomenon was happening in New York at 315 Bowery at a place called Country Bluegrass Blues and Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers - otherwise known as CBGB’s. That interesting thing involved people from the neighborhood and local colleges (like NYU and Columbia) getting together to play music. Some of these people included Richard Hell (and his band Television and later the Voivods), Debbie Harry (Blondie), Talking Heads, and the Ramones.

Then there was a fierce female poet from New Jersey named Patti Smith. Combining drama, poetry, and some intensely raw music, Smith grasped everyone’s attention with her songs and, with her introductory lines to the Them song “Gloria” - “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine,” she all but announced the birth of punk rock. Gone were the niceties of previous resistances - this was an all out rebellion and everyone was a potential target: government, religion, media, celebrity. No longer would these outcasts from the American Dream attempt to rise out of the filth of the cities - instead they would revel in it and celebrate it. It became a badge of honor to look beaten down, filthy, and out of place. One’s very existence became a reminder to the establishment that things were NOT alright. In the vanguard was Patti Smith.

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