New York Dolls

The New York Dolls brought glam's theatricality to the Lower East Side, trading British polish for a raw, confrontational sound built on Johnny Thunders' Gibson SG through a cranked Marshall. Sylvain Sylvain's Fender Stratocaster provided a thinner, scrapier counterpoint, and the two guitars together created a loose, overdriven wall that was as much proto-punk as glam. Their refusal to clean up their tone or tighten their arrangements made the Dolls the missing link between Bolan's shimmer and the Ramones' blitz.