POP MUSIC : Singles That Really Made a Difference

Melody Maker has come up with the best new feature in the English pop weeklies’ fiercely competitive battle for readership and attention. Titled Rebellious Jukebox, the column asks stars of the day to comment on the records that changed their lives.

First up was Los Angeles’ own Inger Lorre, who offers 12 singles, from the Buzzcocks’ “Orgasm Addict” to Jane’s Addiction’s “Nothing’s Shocking.”

Here are the first two choices of the Nymphs’ lead singer:

1--Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody”--”I was at my grandparents’ when this came on the radio. I’d never heard anything like it. I thought, ‘What is this? Is it opera? Pop?’ I was shocked and turned on, and everyone was talking and I was behaving like this adamant spoiled brat. I said, ‘Shhh! This is important to me.’ It took me to a completely different head space. And it made me want to do music.”

2--The Sex Pistols’ “Bodies”--”My friend Brian and I were like the two weirdos at junior high, and . . . he asked me what . . . (I thought of punk rock) and I said, ‘What’s punk rock?’ . . .

“Then he put on this horrible noise and it almost made me want to vomit, and I was like, ‘. . . This sucks.’ But he kept playing it and by the end of the evening, I was like, ‘Can you put that Sex Pistols record on again?’ After that I wanted to be Sid Vicious. I cut off all my hair, wore safety pins everywhere and proceeded to become a juvenile delinquent. Then I threw away all my Queen records.”