Patti Smith

• Born: December 30, 1946
• Place of Birth: Chicago, Illinois

AMERICAN PUNK-ROCK SINGER AND SONGWRITER

Smith brought an angry yet intellectual lyricism to early punk-rock music. Her raw, energetic stage performances transformed the standard punk-rock concert.

MEMBER OF The Patti Smith Group

The Life

Patricia Lee Smith was born in Chicago, Illinois, and her family moved to Woodbury, New Jersey, when she was young. Her working-class family lived modestly, and when Smith graduated from high school in 1964, she went to work in a factory. This stint was the inspiration for “Piss Factory,” the first of her poems that she set to music, which was released as a single B-side in 1974. Smith would later tell interviewers that she spent her teenage years listening to rock music, especially the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. She went to New York City whenever she could to attend concerts and to experience the East Village scene.

In 1967, Smith left Woodbury and moved to New York City. While working at the Gotham Book Mart, she met photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, with whom she would remain friends until his death in 1989. In 1969, Smith and her sister traveled to Paris, France. On her return, she moved into the Chelsea Hotel with Mapplethorpe, and she had a brief, heated romantic relationship with playwright Sam Shepard, appearing in his play Cowboy Mouth (1971). Concurrently, she wrote and read poetry, acted in other Off-Broadway productions, and wrote rock journalism for Creem magazine. Her first book of poetry, Seventh Heaven, was published in 1972 to acclaim from New York critics. Subsequent poetry collections include Witt (1973); The Night (1976), written with Tom Verlaine of the band Television; Babel (1978), which also features lyrics, prose, photographs, and drawings by Smith; and Auguries of Innocence (2005), the title of which is also the title of a poem by William Blake, one of Smith's major poetic influences. She subsequently edited and wrote the introduction for a collection of Blake's poems, published by Vintage Classics in 2007.

In 1974, Smith began playing rock music with fellow writer Lenny Kaye, Ivan Kral (guitar), Jay Dee Daugherty (drums), and Richard Sohl (piano). They released their first single, and soon after they signed a recording contract. The Patti Smith Group was an instant hit with rock critics and began a series of tours. During a show in Tampa, Florida, Smith fell fifteen feet off a stage while dancing and broke several vertebrae in her neck. She retired from touring for a while. During the hiatus, she met rock guitarist Fred “Sonic” Smith of the Detroit political rock band the MC5, and they married and had two children before he died in 1994. Smith released only one album during that time, Dream of Life. Her brother died not too long after her husband, sending her into a minor depression.

Smith and her children moved back to New York, where poet Allen Ginsberg and REM’s Michael Stipe persuaded her to return to music. In the spring of 1995, Smith toured with Bob Dylan. Smith and her band released several albums, and she toured with her band and appeared as an individual doing spoken word. In addition, Smith was actively involved in the Green Party campaign of Ralph Nader for US president in 2000 and 2004, and she appeared at numerous protests against the US war in Iraq.

In 2005, Smith was made a Commandeur of France's Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. Her memoir Just Kids (2010), about her relationship with Mapplethorpe, won the 2010 National Book Award for nonfiction. Also in 2010, she was included in Rolling Stone's list of the one hundred greatest artists, with a blurb written by Garbage frontwoman Shirley Manson. The following year, Smith won a Polar Music Prize, known in Sweden as the "Nobel Prize of music." In 2016, Smith attended the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony in Stockholm on behalf of famed musician Bob Dylan, who had won the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Smith released her book Year of the Monkey in 2019. In 2022, she was awarded an honorary doctorate from Columbia University. That same year, she was named an Officer of the French Legion of Honor.

The Music

Horses. Released in 1975. According to Rolling Stone, Horses is one of the fifty most influential albums in rock music. With Smith’s occasionally surreal lyrics and the primal rhythms of three-chord rock progressions, the songs on Horses release an energy much like that experienced by musicians and audiences alike in rock’s earlier days. There is nothing difficult about the music played here, but its impact is greater than its individual parts.

Radio Ethiopia. Released in 1976. Originally dismissed by many critics and fans of Smith’s first album, this work is full of loud guitar that ravages the listener’s ears. Lyrically, the stories inside the songs give voice to the anger and despair symptomatic of the punk movement.

Wave. Released in 1979. This album came out after Smith’s recovery from her fall in Tampa. Musically, the songs are a mix of hard rock and beat-heavy dance tunes. The lyrics reflect Smith’s ongoing interest in the dogma and nature of religion, especially Catholicism; her relationship with Fred Smith, her new lover; and her comments on US politics.

Gung Ho. Released in 2000. The third album released by Smith after her 1995 return to rock music is musically similar to the others in this period, with the exception of two tracks: “Libbie’s Song,” which is an old-timey ballad about the wife of General George Custer, who died at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, and “Gung Ho,” which is a tribute to the Vietnamese struggle for independence from France and the United States and a celebration of that struggle’s leader, Ho Chi Minh.

Banga. Released in 2012. Smith's eleventh studio album is named after the dog of Pontius Pilate in Mikhail Bulgakov's novel The Master and Margarita (1967). The album was met with overwhelmingly positive reviews; according to the website Metacritic, its review score of 81, based on reviews by thirty critics, indicates "universal acclaim."

Musical Legacy

Smith helped create a direction for the punk genre, and she is noted for her uncompromising pursuit of fame without losing her integrity, which made her an inspiration to other rock musicians. Smith was elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007, where she and her music stand with rock music’s most important and influential artists.

Principal Recordings

ALBUMS (with the Patti Smith Group): Horses, 1975; Radio Ethiopia, 1976; Easter, 1978; Wave, 1979; Dream of Life, 1988; Gone Again, 1996; Peace and Noise, 1997; Gung Ho, 2000; Trampin’, 2004; Twelve, 2007.

SINGLES (with the Patti Smith Group): “Because the Night,” 1978.

Bibliography

"Banga by Patti Smith." Metacritic, CBS Interactive, 12 Oct. 2012, www.metacritic.com/music/banga/patti-smith. Accessed 13 Oct. 2024.

Bockris, Victor, and Roberta Bayley. Patti Smith: An Unauthorized Biography. Simon & Schuster, 1999.

Reynolds, Simon. “Even as a Child, I Felt Like an Alien.” The Guardian, 22 May 2005, www.theguardian.com/music/2005/may/22/popandrock1. Accessed 13 Oct. 2024.

Smith, Greg. “‘And All the Sinners, Saints’: Patti Smith, Pioneer Musician and Poet.” The Midwest Quarterly, vol. 41, no. 2, 2000, pp. 173–90. Academic Search Complete, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=2739053&site=ehost-live. Accessed 13 Oct. 2024.

Smith, Patti. Patti Smith Complete, 1975–2006: Lyrics, Reflections & Notes for the Future. Rev. ed., Harper Perennial, 2006.

Thompson, Hannah. "'I Embraced France My Whole Life,': Patti Smith Receives French Award." The Connexion, 23 May 2022, www.connexionfrance.com/news/i-embraced-france-my-whole-life-patti-smith-receives-french-award/279572. Accessed 13 Oct. 2024.

Wendell, Eric. Patti Smith: America's Punk Rock Rhapsodist. Rowman & Littlefield, 2015.