Stray Cat Strut—The Stray Cats
#365Songs: June 22
1981 was a confusing year to begin coming into your own as a music listener. It was a great time for original music, but the range was almost overwhelming. And everything felt so oddly forward-facing. It was a very progressive time.
From Rush’s Moving Pictures, Brian Eno’s My Life in the Bush of Ghosts and The Cure’s Faith to U2’s October, Elvis Costello’s Trust, and Siouxsie & The Banshees Juju, it was clear there were changes afoot.
Ghost In The Machine. Computer World. Pirates. Abacab. Nightclubbing. Dare!. Damaged. Controversy. The Flowers of Romance. Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret. Diary of a Madman.
Remarkable albums, remarkable times.
Synthesizers and drum machines were coming in. There was new wave. There was goth. There was post-punk. Joy Division ended and New Order began. Yes broke up and Adam and the Ants debuted. Bob Marley died and Duran Duran got banned. Iron Maiden fired Paul Di’Anno and then hired Bruce Dickinson. Fear destroyed Saturday Night Live and the cops tried to destroy Wendy O. Williams.
Into all this change came three young lads with pompadours calling themselves The Stray Cats.
No drum machines. No synthesizers. No controversies. Nothing progressive, depressive, or digressive.
The Stray Cats were straight up retro, and I loved it.
I grew up on a steady diet of fifties music. Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, Gene Vincent, Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard.
So many incredible guitar players. Not just Chuck Berry, but also Scotty Moore and Cliff Gallup.
You have to remember that in 1981, Eddie Van Halen absolutely ruled the roost. Everyone was into tapping and Floyd Rose whammy bars and classical scales.
And here came a trio with a big ol’ hollow-body Gretsch at the front, outfitted with a Bigsby. That’s it.
And Brian Setzer had chops, and he had TONE.
That first solo burst that happens at the opening of “Stray Cat Strut” was a revelation. It sounded like Cliff Gallup and Django Reinhardt had a baby. It was rockabilly and gypsy. It swung and it was nasty but it was sweet and it bopped and it was just so damn vibey
And as stylish as it all was, the playing was oh so legit. The chords bit and the solos slunk and the melodies told a story and the groove put your feet in motion, and it took all of 3 minutes and 18 seconds and suddenly there was a revival afoot and the world had a new guitar hero in town, and he didn’t need a wall of Marshalls and he didn’t need a stage floor full of petals and he didn’t need to tap and and he didn’t need to dive bomb and he just played beautiful chords and solos on a beautiful guitar, and we just ate it up.
“Stray Cat Strut” didn’t exactly have nine lives, but it certainly had more than one. It was released in the UK in 1981 and became a minor hit. Then it was released in the US in 1982 and it didn’t become a hit. But then “Rock this Town” became a hit, and “Stray Cat Strut” found new life on MTV. And in 1983, it hit #3 on the Billboard charts, and it became a certified global hit. The Stray Cats had made it.
It’s been over 40 years since the guitar solo from “Stray Cat Strut” first landed in our ears. Since then, there’s been a lot of debate about guitar solos and which are the greatest of them all.
Check any list of the greatest guitar solos and you’ll mostly see the same culprits. Mostly they’re either from the blues-rock 60s and early 70s (Stairway to Heaven, Crossroads, All Along the Watchtower) or from the heavy metal 80’s (Eruption, Crazy Train, Sweet Child o’ Mine). What you don’t see a lot of are rockabilly, country, blues, or folk guitarists. Every once in a while, one kind of slips in. Think Chuck Berry on “Johnny B. Goode,” B.B. King on “The Thrill is Gone,” John Fogerty on “Heard it Through the Grapevine,” Stevie Ray Vaughan on “Pride and Joy,” or Mark Knopfler on “Sultans of Swing.”
For my money, “Stray Cut Strut” belongs right at the top. For every one of those 3 minutes and 18 seconds, the guitar parts are perfection. The opening burst is iconic, both solos are 8-bar rock and roll masterpieces, and the outro is an act of rock and roll benediction, ending on one of the greatest diminished chords ever committed to tape.
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