You Were So Young

The Cigarettes were a London new wave band who released one album and a handful of singles in the late 1970s and early 1980s before dissolving. Power and Glory (1979) is a minor gem of the post-punk era — energetic, melodic, characteristic of the DinDisc roster that also included OMD and Magazine.

You Were So Young is the kind of track that rewards the collector's instinct: immediate, brisk, built on a guitar figure that catches the ear, gone before it overstays its welcome. The band had the skills to sustain a longer career; the timing and luck weren't there.

The DinDisc label — Virgin's imprint for new wave acts — released a remarkable sequence of records in this period. The Cigarettes are one of the more obscure names on that roster, which is unfair.