Social Distortion

Three decades in, Social Distortion are worshipped as game-changing punk patriarchs, but fire-breathing frontman Mike Ness was still in his teens when the band unleashed the hardcore roar of early singles like “1945,” a Hiroshima story with nearly as intense an impact as its subject. A few years down the road, Ness had lived hard and rough enough to not only identify with kindred spirits like Johnny Cash, but also to cover the Man In Black’s “Ring of Fire” and forge a fierce union between punk and country. From there, it was a natural step towards tunes like “Ball and Chain,” where Ness applied his own hard-won life lessons to country’s sin-and-salvation themes, while keeping his Doc Martens-clad foot to the pedal of a powerful, punky drive. And when he channeled those memories of misfortune into the riff-chomping, hook-heavy hit “Bad Luck,” Social D became SoCal punk ambassadors to the whole world.

Social Distortion bare their bad-boy souls in Next Steps.

Countless rockers affect a bad-boy persona — Social Distortion was always the real deal. They weren’t just the guys that mothers warned their daughters about; they were the reason mothers kept the closest police station on speed-dial. At the center of it all, Mike Ness was a rough-and-tumble rebel with a cause, a man on a mission to tell how he survived everything the streets threw at him and emerged bloodied but unbowed. It’s all laid out on the lacerating live version of “Story of My Life,” an autobiographical “outlaw love song” about embracing rock ’n’ roll when the rest of the world turns its back on you. The rockabilly-tinged stomp “99 to Life” envisions what could easily have happened if Ness hadn’t had his guitar to turn to. Thirty years down the road, an older, wiser man with a “tattooed heart” takes a long look back at all the miles, misadventures, and miracles he’s seen along the way, with the Rolling Stones-move-to-Orange County swagger of “California (Hustle and Flow).”

Mike Ness busts out on his own and digs into his country roots, in Deep Cuts.

One of the things that’s always made Social Distortion more than just another punk band is the way they fused the battering-ram force of hardcore with the lonesome twang of country and the rough-edged rebel yell of rockabilly. Not only did that rootsy feel seep deep into the Social D sound, but it abounds in the solo output of main man Mike Ness. His ragged-but-right voice fits like a black leather motorcycle glove on his heart-hammering version of “Let the Jukebox Keep On Playing,” a honky-tonkin’ classic by rockabilly pioneer Carl Perkins. The dark mood and driving riffs of rock ’n’ roll queen Wanda Jackson’s 1961 slammer “Funnel of Love” provide plenty of drama for Ness to sink his teeth into. And left to his own devices, he takes the already-countrified Social Distortion hit “Ball and Chain” and puts it on a steel-guitar-toting train headed straight for Nashville.

No other punk band personifies the true, transcendent power of rock like Social Distortion. Beneath those tattoos, blackout shades, and black leather jackets are the loudly beating hearts of a band of true believers — rock ’n’ roll lifers who’ve seen first-hand how three chords and a never-say-die spirit can win out over the toughest of times. After three decades, torchbearer Mike Ness may be the last man standing from the band's first lineup, but Social D haven’t just survived — they’ve triumphed, becoming worldwide punk icons whose legend looms larger now than ever. And they did it by following their own rules: Ness never asked why a punk band couldn’t play country and rockabilly; he simply proved they could, breaking out to bigger and bigger audiences all the while. He may have been “Born to Lose,” but Social Distortion messed with destiny and bent it to their will — hear how they did it, with their most crucial cuts collected right here.