The Only Ones

(Singolo, Columbia, 1978 – Inclusa nell’album “The Only Ones”, Columbia, 1978)

There are those who, to find America, had to travel thousands of miles, and those who instead found America right behind their own house. There are those who waited their whole life in vain for their moment to arrive, and those who went out and hunted that moment down before tomorrow, because today is already too late. There are those who, to be admitted into the exclusive club of rock greats, had to dream up unheard-of sounds – channeling them into unspeakably great records that marked whole eras – and those who instead barged straight into history, kicking the door down with a three-minute song and a couple of solos worth at least an eternity. If – as they say – life is a fork in the road, then the Only Ones chose the second path. Or rather, it was the second path that chose them, because a track with the intensity of "Another Girl, Another Planet" isn't written, it's lived. You don't go looking for it, you find it. Like God, love or death.

Not that the band formed by Peter Perrett in London in 1976 didn't release other memorable records. Quite the opposite: their three official albums – the 1978 self-titled debut, "Even Serpents Shine" the following year (their best) and "Baby's Got A Gun" from 1980 – are crucial titles for understanding punk's traumatic crossing into new wave, in which the band played a decisive role thanks to an uncommonly melodic streak, born of the most seductive power-pop, which led them to rethink punk from an angle that was at once feminine and – via Velvet Underground – decadent. And yet, in the collective imagination, it's often the gestures that remain rather than the projects, the fleeting moment rather than the finished work. It's true for Duchamp as it is for Roberto Baggio. It's true for the all-time greats of any art or discipline.

The Only Ones too were, in their own way, among the all-time greats, because their gesture – as fleeting and as immortal as all gestures are – transcends the concepts that bind every fan of rock, of records and of careers. No album or discography matters: once you've recorded a track of the calibre of "Another Girl, Another Planet", you've already done it all. As a rocker, and perhaps even as a man. Is there anything more genuinely heroic than the guitar solo that launches toward ineffable orbits the shuttle bound for the blood that Perrett's lovably sandpapered voice raves about? Is there anything more authentically epic than that crescendo of drums unleashing all the wild sensuality inherent in rock music? And where could you find an instrumental interlude more moving than the one that, halfway through the song, seems to transfigure the melody – as languid as it is biting – of the vocal? "Another Girl, Another Planet" is the erection of a man in love: animal charge rising from the heart's passionate beats.

This extraordinary track isn't about love, though. Or at least not only, since from the very first verse it teeters on the thin line of ambiguity: “I always flirt with death/ I look ill but I don’t  care about it/ I can face your threats/ and stand up straight and tall and shout about it” (“Amoreggio con la morte/ Sembro malato ma non me ne curo/ Posso fronteggiare le tue minacce e restare dritto in piedi e urlartelo”). No, these lines aren't about a girl, but about a drug entering the bloodstream (that's what the space shuttle floating through the veins is!), probably heroin (the clue is the line "You get under my skin"). And yet, every love is a drug, an astonishing substance capable of sharpening our sensibility, our perceptions, turning us into visionaries: out there is a girl ready to love us, an unexplored planet waiting for us. And what matters isn't so much getting there as believing in it. That's exactly where the difference between reality and magic lies.

As mentioned, the architects of this post-punk miracle were four London lads, set up in the classic four-piece configuration (Perrett on vocals and guitar, John Perry on the other guitar, Alan Mair on bass and Mike Kellie on drums), aided in the production booth first by John Burns and then by Robert Ash. Despite the song's short length and the instinctive drive of its sound, the recording sessions for "Another Girl, Another Planet" were actually quite elaborate. The band initially worked with a 16-track recorder; at a later stage the material was transferred onto a 24-track, which allowed them to add a few decisive details, such as the reverbs of the intro and the cameo of a virtually imperceptible Hammond organ. Once that process was complete, "Another Girl, Another Planet" had become, in Mair's own words, "pure rock'n'roll from the first note to the last".

Featured on the London band's debut album and also released as a single, the Only Ones' masterpiece never actually enjoyed the runaway success one might expect from a song that has rightfully - if belatedly - earned its place among the evergreens. The point is that it was anything but an instant classic. Digging through the charts of 1978, in fact, we find that the track stayed out of the Top 50 in every major English-speaking market, only reaching number 44 on the New Zealand chart three years later. So not many people caught on to the greatness of "Another Girl, Another Planet" at the time, but those who did carried real weight and played a leading role in rock history. Take, for instance, the never-praised-enough John Peel, who was among the song's earliest admirers, so much so that he included it in his "Festive Fifty", the BBC radio show that ran down the best fifty songs released over the calendar year.

The rest would be down to time, which is always generous to those who know how to wait. Starting in the mid-Eighties and continuing to this day, "Another Girl, Another Planet" has been paid tribute from every direction: from the immense Replacements, who performed the song with their inimitable streak of rock romanticism, to Blink 182, who reworked it true to their bluntly heavy-handed approach, all the way to the ramshackle, surprising acoustic version - somewhere between Brazilian saudade and Roky Erickson - given to it by Pete Doherty. Plenty of artists, in other words, have measured themselves against its elusive charm and penetrating vitality. Plenty of listeners, hearing it, have dreamed of other planets and impossible loves. Which, come to think of it, have always been within reach - right there, before our eyes - only we've run from them, preferring to fantasize about them rather than actually live them. As if it were the effect of some gentle drug.