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Runaways
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The Runaways was a teenage, American all-girl rock band that performed in the 1970s. The band is best known for the songs "Cherry Bomb," "Queens of Noise," "Neon Angels (On the Road to Ruin)" and "Born to Be Bad." "Cherry Bomb" appeared on the movie soundtracks for Dawn, Portrait of a Teenage Runaway, RV and Dazed and Confused. The band toured through America and Japan... visiting the UK, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany. The career of the band was short (1975-1979), successful, and tempestuous.
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THE first noteworthy public appearance for The Runaways was opening for The Tubes at The Golden West Ballroom in Southern California. At a subsequent performance at the Starwood in L.A. such lumimaries as Led Zeppelin, ELO, The Ohio Players and many others saw the group for the first time. All walked away realizing they had seen and heard something special.
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Dismissed during their existence as a crass marketing gimmick, the Runaways have grown in stature over the years as the first all-female band to make a substantial impression on the public by playing loud, straight-up, guitar-driven rock & roll. Since all of the members were teenagers (some of whom were still learning to play their instruments when they passed their auditions), their music was frequently raw and amateurish, but it neatly combined American heavy metal (think Aerosmith and Kiss) with the newly emerging sound of punk rock. In the media, the Runaways were victims of their own hype, supplied by maverick promoter/manager Kim Fowley. Fowley's insistence on a sleazy jailbait image for the group made it easy for the press to dismiss them as nothing but a tasteless adolescent fantasy -- an impression bolstered at the time by the admittedly erratic quality of their music. But in the end, the Runaways' sound and attitude proved crucially important in paving the way for female artists to crank up the volume on their guitars and rock as hard as the boys; plus, they produced one undeniably classic single in the rebel-girl manifesto "Cherry Bomb."
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Starting as a power trio with bassist Micki (Michael) Steele, The Runaways began the party and club circuit around Los Angeles. Eventually they added 16-year-old lead guitarist Lita Ford to the fray and lead singer Cherie Currie. Bassist Micki Steele left the group, later resurfacing in the hugely successful Bangles. After some trial and error Jackie Fox (who had originally auditioned for the lead guitar spot) was added on bass and the line up was complete.
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The genesis of the Runaways can be traced to a 1975 Alice Cooper party at which Fowley met teenage lyricist Kari Krome. Fowley was impressed with Krome's streetwise perspective and set about putting together a band. Krome's friend, guitarist Joan Jett (born Joan Larkin), had been putting together a band with drummer Sandy West (born Sandy Pesavento), and Fowley quickly had a trio on his hands. However, it soon became apparent that Krome was not much of a singer, and she was replaced by vocalist Michael "Micki" Steele (born Sue Thomas), who ... began learning the bass. As a trio, this lineup recorded a demo titled Born to Be Bad in late 1975; shortly thereafter, guitarist Lita Ford successfully auditioned through a trade-paper ad, and Steele left the group (she would later join the Bangles). Cherie Currie became the new lead vocalist, and after an extremely brief stint with a bass player known only as Peggy (which lasted just a few weeks), the band settled on Jackie Fox (born Jacqueline Fuchs), who switched to bass from guitar in order to join the band.
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Though the Runaways biography were initially assembled by rock impresario Kim Fowley, the group quickly took on a life of its own, owing to the strong musical personalities of its members (which included Joan Jett, Lita Ford, and Cherie Currie). The unpretentious, glam-influenced brand of hard rock they introduced in the mid 1970s was an influence on both punk and heavy metal. Though the group crashed and burned without becoming commercially successful, it provided a springboard for the solo careers of Jett, Ford, and Currie, and in 2004, abiding interest in the * resulted in the biopic EDGEPLAY.
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Runaways