Anyone wondering about the punk rock credentials of one Harley Francis Flanagan should consider this: on the day that the bassist and mainstay with the Cro-Mags turned 14, Joey Ramone sang him Happy Birthday. Even before that, the young New Yorker ran the city streets, taking in clubs from CBGB to Max’s Kansas City, fraternising with faces from the city’s punk and art scene such as Debbie Harry, Andy Warhol, and the young Beastie Boys. But the kid was trouble. Violent and mean, drunk and drugged, in 1981 Harley formed the Cro-Mags and helped to shape the sound of New York punk to come. Its name was hardcore, a reductive and souped-up piece of street thuggery that made the Ramones sound like Emerson, Lake & Palmer. In a tough city, its followers were the toughest of all; shows were...
