Ragged GloryMAGAZINE – Shot By Both Sides [7″; Virgin Records, 1978] * * * * *
Aufrecht sterben. Dem falschen Leben die Stirn bieten. Sich nicht verbiegen lassen.
Der Text ist eine einzige Entlarvung der Scheinheiligkeit der vielseits idealisierten Mittelschicht, besser gesagt: der Mehrheitsgesellschaft, die sich (vordergründig) Individualismus, Freiheit und Gleichberechtigung auf ihre Fahnen geschrieben hat: …..
Simon Reynolds kommt in „Rip it up…“ zu einer Punk-immanenten Interpretation:
In „Shot by both Sides“ you also get a sense of Devoto recoiling from the rabble-rousing vulgarity that typified most punk gigs by the middle of 1977. The songs key lines are „I wormed my way into the heart of the crowd/I was shocked by what was allowed /I didn´t lose myself in the crowd“. Mob rule and mobilized mass movements alike can seem scary because of their de-indiviualizing effect. In this respect ,“Shot“ could also be seen as a riposte in advance to Sham 69´s If the kids are united“, a massive mid -1978 hit. ……..
Caught between this hooligan punk on one side and TRB-style dogmatism on the other, Devoto saw himself as the dissident aesthete „on the run to the outside of everything“.
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