It's been two months since NPR printed the following:
Once she started to work with Laguna, Jett's audience grew. With the help of Laguna, Jett formed another band, The Blackhearts. In 1982, the band recorded a cover of the Arrows' song "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" which catapulted to the top of the charts. That year, the song peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and stayed there for seven weeks. And yet, the band still couldn't get a record deal. So instead, the band members would print out album copies and sell them out of the trunk of their cars after gigs.
It was wrong then and remains wrong.
Joan Jett had a record label. It's a lie to pretend otherwise. JOAN JETT was released in 1980 and self-distributed. Then Neil Bogart signed Joan to BOARDWALK RECORDS and re-released the album as BAD REPUTATION on January 23, 1981. "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" was not on that album. It was the title track of the album released November 18, 1981 by BOARDWALK RECORDS. The single was released January 19, 1982.
Can you follow the above because NPR cannot.
The self-distributed album was 1980's JOAN JETT. That year, Neil Bogart signed Jett to his label and, in January of 1981, re-released JOAN JETT as BAD REPUTATION. At the end of that year, BOARDWALK RECORDS released the follow up BAD REPUTATION and, early the following year, they released "I Love Rock 'n' Roll."
NPR can't get anything right.
And they should be especially embarrassed because there's no way in hell that, in 1982, a song with no label behind it could top the charts for a week -- let alone seven.