Widely considered to be the best album of Dury's career,[1][2] it is also his biggest selling, having been certified platinum status in the UK for 300,000 sales.
Dury and Jankel recorded demo tapes of many of the songs in April 1977, joined in the session by Nugent, at Alvic Studios, Wimbledon (run by two musicians, Al James and Vic Sweeney).
The studio engineer at Alvic told Dury about a rhythm section who were acting as session musicians to earn extra money; bassist Norman Watt-Roy and drummer Hugh "Charley" Charles.
Dury's management company Blackhill – who would also manage the Clash – owned a 50 per cent share in the studio (along with the group Manfred Mann), and put up the £4,000 to pay for the group to record the album in 'dead time' (that is, when the studio was empty – usually late at night).
Jenner was one of the two partners in Blackhill Management, and had been producing since the late 1960s, having worked with Kevin Ayers and David Bedford among others.
Latham later recalled that Jenner's technical input on the album had been minimal and that he had more of an overseeing role: "Peter would sit there rolling joints all day and I'd do all the bloody work, but in fairness I also have to say that he taught me an awful lot.
"[4]"Blockheads" They've got womanly breasts under pale mauve vests Shoes like dead pigs' noses Cornflake packet jacket, catalogue trousers A mouth what never closes
Rotary accessory watches Hire-purchase signet rings A beauty to the bully boys No lonely vestige clings Davey Payne and Ed Speight of Dury's old band Kilburn and the High Roads were invited to fill out the sound of the album.
Geoff Castle, who played Moog synthesizer on "Wake Up and Make Love with Me" and "Blockheads", was a friend of Speight's who was asked in to help out.
Stiff already had Elvis Costello and the Damned on their books, and would go on to score hits not only with Dury, but with Madness, the Pogues, Kirsty MacColl and others.
The photograph for the album's cover was taken by Chris Gabrin outside Axfords underwear and lingerie shop at 306 Vauxhall Bridge Road, Westminster, close to Victoria Station.
appears on the back cover below the track listing: this was apparently the reaction of the Blockheads upon hearing the first playback of the finished record.
Allan Jones in Melody Maker described the album as "a tense, harrowing account of urban degradation, that conveys with more vocal, musical and lyrical vehemence than any so-called 'new wave/punk' combo has yet been able to muster, the desperation and squalor of the social conditions (and the effects of those conditions upon individual personalities) it so provocatively illustrates.
"[19] In Sounds Vivien Goldman gave the record a five-star rating, saying, "Lawless brats from council flats have finally found a voice that speaks from, of and about the people.
A voice that combines passion with the vernacular 'she got into a mess with the NHS' – sage street advice, plus cinematic observation, plus humour.
"[16] Record Mirror's Tim Lott observed that "if you can grapple with the sheer unorthodoxy of it it's easy to fall in love with for its quaintness, its limerick simplicity ...
It's a curiosity piece and a pop album and a good joke and sometimes a bad pun and a shot of Bohemian romantics and a load of crap and totally fascinating.
"[14] Roy Carr in the NME said: .. it's impossible to bag Ian Dury, except to say that he has taken the essence of the Cockney music hall and utilised rock as a contemporary means of expression.
This is mixed, with no nonsense and no frills, with a set of powerful, forthright and honest lyrics that will send self-consciously daring punks scurrying back to the safety of their dole queue clichés.
The tribute songs – straight and never mawkish – are to Gene Vincent and to Dury's father, and equally honest are the demented, stream of consciousness tirades.
"[18] Rolling Stone said, "A provocative combination of Toulouse-Lautrec and Chas Bukowski, Dury punks out in a laughingly distasteful way even as he sits on a cushion of personal warmth, feigning indifference.
AllMusic said Ian Dury's primary appeal lies in his lyrics, which are remarkably clever sketches of British life delivered with a wry wit.
Since Dury's accent is thick and his language dense with local slang, much of these pleasures aren't discernible to casual listeners, leaving the music to stand on its own merits.
remains the creative yardstick he [Dury] can never quite measure up to",[12] while in 2012 BBC Music stated, "Dury's work quickly mellowed (well, relatively), but the combination of cheeky ire, libertarianism and jazzed-up music hall punk on New Boots... was defiant, original and, 35 years later, stands as a mighty missing link between the Kinks and Blur.
"a calling card that dabbled in jazz, music hall, retro rock'n'roll and Kinks-ian character studies.
[Dury] could have been dismissed as a Dickensian cartoon, were it not for the eloquence of his lyrics, his sly humour and the formidable musical range of his partner Chaz Jankel, whose playful arrangements brought depth and ballast to the odd-looking bloke at the mic."
[17] Record Collector's Daryl Easlea described the 40th anniversary edition as "a joy to behold" and that New Boots and Panties!!
Punk's DIY ethos and rejection of conventional pop star glamour enabled Ian Dury rather than dictated to him.
Since then all CD re-issues have added the bonus tracks "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll", its B-side "Razzle in My Pocket", "You're More Than Fair" a re-recording of an old Kilburn & The Highroads song originally released on the B-side of the "Sweet Gene Vincent" single, and a live version of "England's Glory" by Ian Dury & The Kilburns (the final phase of Kilburn & The Highroads) that was originally released on a rare re-pressing of "Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll", given away free by the New Musical Express.
Edsel's 2-Disc re-issue included a bonus disc of additional demos and recordings by Ian Dury and The Kilburns, including songs that would later appear on his albums Do It Yourself (1979) and Apples (1989) and an old Kilburn & The Highroads song "I Made Mary Cry" that would be continued with by Dury as late as 1978, with a live version appearing on his Straight From The Desk live album, released in 2001.