Record of the Day: Pink Fairies ‘I Wish I Was a Girl’

In the early 1970’s, London’s Pink Fairies shocked audiences with their incendiary, full-on assault, capturing the essence of rock n’ roll in its purest form.

If you’re of a similar vintage to myself, you may have discovered Pink Fairies via the Rollins Band cover of Do It, a proto-punk anthem originally appearing on the band’s 1971 debut album Never Neverland. Too young to have witnessed Pink Fairies in their heyday, many of us had to settle with reading the liner notes on Rollins Band’s Do It album, and like the music geeks we are, set about trying to locate a copy of the original. My search took five months; eventually I had to order a copy from a Tower Records mailing list, and boy, it was worth the wait. Y’see, kids, back in the dark old days of 1991, the internet didn’t exist. Punks were forced to search far and wide for bands they hadn’t even heard of through public radio broadcasts, older kids at the skate park, and a sweet little fanzine called Maximum Rock n’ Roll. Couple that mission with the fact that some of us lived in Australia, a desert nation that only got electricity in 1989, the finding slightly more obscure sounds could sometimes take months.

In 2024, the name Pink Fairies conjures up images of pride parade debauchery, rainbow flags, and drag queens reading porn to minors. But back in the early 1970’s, when men were still men, when you heard the name Pink Fairies, especially if you lived in London, you would run to the nearest sticky carpet venue to get your eardrums blasted out by the notorious pub rockers.

Forming from the ashes of Mick Farren’s Deviants, Pink Fairies (Paul Rudolph guitar and vocals, Duncan Sanderson bass, and Russell Hunter drums) blasted onto the UK pub rock scene in 1969, and by the time the 1970’s rolled around, had replaced Hunter with former Pretty Things drummer, Twink. By 1973, after having dumped Rudolph for mainstay singer Larry Wallis, and Twink being replaced by original drummer Russell Hunter, the band had released their third album Kings of Oblivion, a stomping recording that’s arguably one of the greatest albums of the 1970s. Whilst the entire album is all killer, no filler, the standout track for me is track two, side A, I Wish I Was a Girl.

Coming in at just over nine minutes, and with an opening line of “All the boys come out to see me”, the track mixes elements of rock, glam, and homoeroticism, and informs the cadence of punk rock which came to fruition some two years later. Pink Fairies pre-dated punk, whatever that is, beating Motörhead to the loud n’ heavy punch, and blowing fellow Ladbroke Grove contemporaries Hawkwind to sonic smithereens.

Full of brat, snarl, and snot, and injected with a series of searing lead breaks that perhaps draws influence the James Williamson playbook, I Wish I Was a Girl acts as the beacon for all that is pure about rock n’ roll — misunderstood lyrics, a cracking intro, a high-in-the-mix melodic bass, an ambitious, faux psychedelic bridge, and an epic outro that makes Pink Floyd sound like a pile of puke.

Lead vocalist, songwriter, guitarist, and early Motörhead member Larry Wallis, even felt the need to clarify the lyrical meaning, words often mistaken for being an ode to gay men. In a 1987 interview he stated:

“Well, everybody thought I was saying, “I’m a homosexual. I’m a girl trapped in this man’s body.” Well I wasn’t. I was just saying, “I wish I was a girl ’cause they get it so easy. Any girl can go home with a chap seven nights a week if she wants. That’s why I wished I was a girl.”

I could’ve sworn he was singing about trannies, but hey, who cares? The guy did write the quintessential rock song. Whatever Wallis means, I believe that this song, played at full decibel, will see all the women in close proximity ripping off their panties. After all, isn’t that what rock n’ roll is all about?