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| - John Genzale was born in Queens, NY, where he first lived in East Elmhurst and then Jackson Heights. His first musical performance was in the winter of 1967 with The Reign. Shortly thereafter, he played with "Johnny and the Jaywalkers," under the name Johnny Volume, at Quintano's School for Young Professionals, around the corner from Carnegie Hall, on 58th Street near 7th Avenue.
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| abstract
| - John Genzale was born in Queens, NY, where he first lived in East Elmhurst and then Jackson Heights. His first musical performance was in the winter of 1967 with The Reign. Shortly thereafter, he played with "Johnny and the Jaywalkers," under the name Johnny Volume, at Quintano's School for Young Professionals, around the corner from Carnegie Hall, on 58th Street near 7th Avenue. In 1968 he began going to the Fillmore East and Bethesda Fountain in Central Park on weekends. His older sister, Mariann, started styling his hair like Keith Richards. In late 1969 he got a job as a sales clerk at D'Naz leather shop, on Bleecker Street in the West Village. He and his girlfriend, Janis Cafasso, went to see the Stones at Madison Square Garden in November 1969, and they appear in the Maysles film, Gimme Shelter. In the summer of 1970 he went to England for the Isle of Wight Festival. In London he hung out at the Speakeasy Club and updated his wardrobe on the King's Road. Toward the end of 1970 he started hanging out at Nobodys, a club also on Bleecker Street in the West Village. It was near there that he met future Dolls Arthur Kane and Rick Rivets. He joined their band "Actress" which, after firing Rivets and adding David Johansen, Sylvain Sylvain and Billy Murcia, became the New York Dolls. At this time John Genzale renamed himself Johnny Thunders, after the DC comic book figure. Dolls bass guitarist, Arthur Kane, later wrote about Johnny Thunder's guitar sound, as he described arriving outside the rehearsal studio where they were meeting to jam together for the first time: "I heard someone playing a guitar riff that I myself didn't know how to play. It was raunchy, nasty, rough, raw, and untamed. I thought it was truly inspired..." Adding, "His sound was rich and fat and beautiful, like a voice." The New York Dolls were signed to Mercury Records, with the help of A & R man, Paul Nelson. Thunders recorded two albums with the band, New York Dolls and Too Much Too Soon. They were managed by Marty Thau, and booked by Leber & Krebs. Subsequently they worked with Malcolm McLaren for several months, later becoming a prototype for the Sex Pistols. In 1975 Thunders and Nolan left the band, though Johansen and Sylvain continued playing, along with Peter Jordon, Tony Machine (an ex-assistant agent at Leber & Krebs) and Chris Robison, as the New York Dolls, until late 1977. Their early recordings are still in print and continue to influence young musicians.
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