Full length album of legendary 70s pre-punk band from Cleveland!

“Post-punk before punk ever happened “, that’s what Rolling Stone called The Styrenes. For once, they were right. But that only scratches the surface of their unique and uncom- promising vision as The Styrenes – whose members have also been in the equally leg- endary electric eels and Mirrors – play music that ranges from punk to jazz, pop and avant-garde, all on evidence in this full-length vinyl compilation of their early material! In a recent interview, Marotta recalled what led him to form the Styrenes …..

“I was playing guitar in the Electric Eels and keyboards in Mirrors in 1974,” he told Athens, Ga. rock writer Gordon Lamb. “It was challenging and fun and frustrating and all the things bands are. But neither band was exactly what I had in mind, and both bands were led by strong personalities—Jamie in Mirrors and John in the Eels. I wanted to call the shots, so I needed to have my own band.”

Klimek and Marotta formed the nucleus of the new ensemble, releasing their first single— Marotta’s cheerfully fiendish hate song “Drano in your Veins” originally written for the Electric Eels in 1973—under the name Poli Styrene Jass Band. They also performed and recorded as the Styrene Band and the Styrene-Money Band, with sidemen including Jim Jones, Anton Fier and Michael Antle, before settling on the Styrenes name. The band is often lumped in with other Cleveland-area groups, but existed there for only about five years before Marotta and Klimek decamped for New York in search of greater musical opportunities. And although their original recordings, like those of Mirrors and the Electric Eels, have been saddled with the “proto-punk” moniker, the Styrenes’ music from their earliest singles has stoutly defied easy labels