I’m sure it’d be cooler to say otherwise, to say I was a fan of the New York Dolls since the beginning, but the truth is I was a month old when their eponymous debut came out. And I didn’t know David Johansen at all, but I sure knew Buster Poindexter from all those videos on MTV and his role as the Ghost of Christmas Past in Scrooged. Eventually I did discover the band, but it was with their reunion album, the beautifully titled One Day It Will Please Us To Remember Even This. Backwards I travelled, finding their debut and carrying it with me for decades, bringing it out when I wanted something no other rock band was giving me, that bridge of classic Stones rock and roll swagger with the energy punk would bring in a few short years. And on the occasion of Johansen’s passing, I needed New York Dolls again.

The cliche of the brightest stars burning the quickest seems appropriate here: there’s something alchemical about the combination of Johansen, Johnny Thunders, Sylvain Sylvain, Killer Kane, and Jerry Nolan that made New York Dolls so vibrant and alive. On paper there’s nothing particularly innovative: it’s throwback rock and roll indebted to the 50s with the splash of glam and sleaze Bowie, Slade, Alice Cooper, and others were already embodying. But there is an almost unbridled looseness, a high partying, “I don’t give a f—” mentality that seeps through, especially in their live performances. Opener “Personality Crisis” is so rock and roll it’s the most rock and roll, Sylvain’s piano boogie and Thunders’s incredible guitar work lifting up Johansen’s vocal performance to slap you in the face.

“When I say I’m in love you best believe I’m in love, L-U-V” kicks off the equally rollicking “Looking For A Kiss” and it’s possible despite the band’s energy to dismiss them as another boogie rock glam band, except DAMN Thunders and his tasty playing. The man was an instant guitar hero, something that would come even harder to life when he went solo with The Heartbreakers. And that sense of “just another band” goes away with “Vietnamese Baby” which we can argue about the tastefulness of opening and closing with a gong, but that incredible sequence with Nolan’s snare mimicking helicopter blades is glorious, accentuated with Sylvain and Thunders scraping their guitars. It’s also a testament to the production courtesy of Todd Rundgren, who despite numerous conflicts with the band during the recording process churned out a masterful production job, with every instrument cleanly established in the sound stage, and not feeling sterile or canned.

Some quick, rambling thoughts on the tracks: really love the Who-inspried “Lonely Planet Boy” with Buddy Bowser’s sax peeking through the acoustic guitars. “Frankenstein” is what the name implies – a massive rock track, Johansen mixing his own lyrically poetry while simultaneously paying homage to his own pop influences like the Shangri-Las. Speaking of the Shangri-Las influence, love the harmony oooohs that go through “Trash” as well as the jangly guitars. Thunders becomes a god on the track’s second half. The almost imperceptible false start to the trilling guitar on “Bad Girl”. The mental connection in my head that both The Lurkers and New York Dolls have great covers of Bo Diddley’s “Pills”. How Kane’s bass sounds like a mugging locked in with Nolan’s drums on the opening to “Private World”.

It’s a deceptively long album for a swaggering rock album in 1973: 11 songs and around 42 minutes, definitely pushing the boundaries of what a vinyl record could support without distorting at the time. Over the years my attention to New York Dolls has wavered, focusing on Thunders guitar at one point, then wandering over to Rundgren’s production. But ultimately it always comes back to Johansen, who even here shows a deft touch with his lyrics and his howl. In between all the boy-girl lonely romance, there are hints of deeper, darker thoughts. I love the line in “Vietnamese Baby” “I gotta show you what I can do, but everything connects and that ain’t nowhere.”

RIP, David Johansen. And thank you for an album that never ages for me, despite how long it took me to find it.