(Top 50 Countdown!!!) 25. The Runaways - "Cherry Bomb"

 
Nothing says teen-dream rock-excess better than film of The Runaways, with an empty-eyed Cherie front-and-centre in a grotesque basque masquerade, on that first Japanese tour. (The key here is teen-dream; we’re not talking about Led Zeppelin and red snappers, which is more young-man-dream, or David Cassidy’s jeans, which is more safe-schoolgirl fantasy, right?) Cherie Currie, in that corset, singing “Cherry Bomb”, was ‘the first and last example of innocent debauchery in rock’n’roll’. (It is. Really. I remember being told these exact words.) Poor doomed Cherie and “Cherry Bomb” was where Kim Fowley’s commercial teen-'xploitation met the dark side: it quickly became a formula, but for that one brief moment it really was real. It was the second side of their “Live In Japan” album I remember most from Pooh Sticks days, and which probably had some kinda say in a couple of songs on “Multiple Orgasm” or something, but “Cherry Bomb” had it all in a classic two-and-a-half minute explosion. Sometimes, I really would’ve liked to have been Cherie Currie; other times, you know, it just didn’t look so much fun at all.

 "Think Bubble" is an album (LP only) of 1995 demos for an unreleased Pooh Sticks album. See 'About Me' for details.