Gloria

by Patti Smith

Gloria cover art

A radical, punk-rock deconstruction of the classic Van Morrison garage-rock standard. Smith opens the track with the famously sacrilegious spoken-word line, 'Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine', before slowly building the arrangement into a frantic, chaotic three-chord climax. It formally introduced the downtown New York punk scene to the broader musical consciousness.

Genres

  • Punk Rock
  • Proto-Punk

Tracklist

  1. Gloria (In Excelsis Deo)
  2. Gloria (Version)
  3. My Generation