The Saints: All Times Through Paradise : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Proof that great punk-rock minds think alike: The Ramones' debut album was barely out of the can here when The Saints recorded their nuclear debut, (I'm) Stranded -- 3:27 of death-race rhythm, Ed Kuepper's firewall guitar and singer Chris Bailey's wolf-boy bawl -- half a world away, in Brisbane, Australia, in June 1976. The song became an international sensation, scoring "Single of the Week" in the British weekly Sounds before the Sex Pistols were even on wax. The Saints' flameout was just as dramatic: a major-label deal, three albums, a barrage of blazing singles and splitsville, all before the end of 1978. This four-CD study of the Saints' first lifetime (Bailey carried the name on his own in the 1980s) is a deluxe tribute to the band's mighty thrash and progressive daring: the full-bore thrills of '77's (I'm) Stranded ; the horn-section artillery and Sixties-soul moves on 1978's Eternally Yours and Prehistoric Sounds. Warning: The disc and a half of live Saints will leave you covered in burn marks. The fuck-it-all tear through "Nights in Venice" from the band's last Aussie show, in April '77 -- Bailey fighting to be heard over Kuepper's iron-curtain guitar -- is the sound of a band spinning out of control on its way to legend.