The Albums of 1975: Patti Smith: Horses

 Release Date: November 10, 1975

Personnel: Patti Smith (vocals); Jay Dee Daugherty (drums); Lenny Kaye (lead guitar); Ivan Krai (guitar, bass); Richard Sohl (piano)

Produced by John Cale

Side One: Gloria: In Excelsis Duo; Redondo Beach; Birdland; Free Money

Side Two: Kimberly; Break It Up; Land: Horses/Land of a Thousand Dances/ La Mer(de); Elegie

Alongside Bruce Springsteen's Born to Run, Patti Smith's Horses embraced rock as an artform of liberation. Smith's poetic lyrics, expressions of pure emotion set to surreal imagery are the hallmarks of her debut album. The influences are manifold drawing from the vibrancy of early rock and roll, the uncompromising mid-60s Dylan, surreal poetry, Gothic literature, and the free stylings of the Beats. The songs are personal and universal, laying the foundation for punk and New Wave. 

"Gloria: In Excelsis Duo" opens the record with a slow burn build, a track that no less attempts to expand and redefine the possibilities of rock and roll. The song is all energy and defiance, joyfully seducing the song's subject, infusing it all with poetic lyrics and impassioned delivery. 

'Redondo Beach" tells of an impassioned fight between female lovers that leads to a suicide, based on a poem Smith write in the early 1970s. Infused with a reggae arrangement, Smith's vocal evokes edgy emotions amidst shock. 'Birdland" is a spoken word track, dealing with transcendence, grief, and intense perception, the birth of a poet. "Free Money" was reportedly autobiographical, about Smith's childhood and poverty, finding hope in dreams and imagination. 

"Kimberly" pays tribute to Smith's younger sister, also with allusions to motherhood and creation. Accompanied by Lenny Kaye's melodic guitar, Smith's vocal once again aims for transcendence and achieves it. "Break it Up" was written as an ode to Jim Morrison , the sense of loss, the idea of a poetic soulmate, and the burden of living up to fallen idols. In some ways the most traditional of "rock" songs on the record. The medley "Land: Horses/Land of a Thousand Dances/La Mer(de)" alludes to Smith's relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe with allusions to surrealist poetry. By turns sinister and adrenaline fueled, another synching of rock and roll with underground art. "Elegie" ends the record on a note of loneliness, haunted by memories of friends and times long gone.

Horses stands alongside Born to Run, as albums from 1975 by the generation raised on rock and roll. Now in adulthood, they are pushing the boundaries and expanding the art form. If Springsteen was synthesizing different eras of rock, Smith was merging the music with poetry and transgressive art.