But as Doherty’s voice begins to overtake Barât’s on later Libertines cuts, the band they most resemble are the Only Ones, an oft-forgotten late-’70s British outfit who made the transition from pub rock to post-punk without ever really delivering a full-on politicized punk salvo. Led by singer/guitarist Peter Perrett, the Only Ones scored one UK hit with “Another Girl, Another Planet,” and even that never really made it across the Atlantic to the US, though the Replacements were known to cover it regularly throughout the ’80s. In 2004 it was the Libertines’ turn to cover the tune, which they did live with the help of Perrett and his two sons. Jamie Perrett and Peter Perrett Jr. have both gone on to play with Doherty as members of Babyshambles.

And the similarities between Doherty and Perrett run deeper still. The material on Shotter’s Nation is written from the perspective of a wry, witty, literate fuck-up — a pretty accurate description of the persona Perrett cultivated in the Only Ones. “It’s not easy getting out of bed/It’s too easy getting out of my head,” Doherty rasps on the disc opening track, the loose, swinging “Carry On Up the Morning.” Doherty plays the role of the cynical romantic as keenly as Perrett ever did, and he has the same way of delivering a cutting lyric with playful insouciance. “There she goes, a little pain,” he mocks in the jazzy “There She Goes.” “Oh, make no mistake, she sheds her skin like a snake/On the dirty road to fame.”

So far, however, Doherty has kept his career on track in a way that Perrett never could. It’s Doherty, not Barât, who’s held on to the cult and the legacy of the Libertines. In fact, there’s a new Babyshambles DVD, Up the Shambles: Live in Manchester (Eagle Vision), that finds Doherty in fine form in 2004, performing Libertines hits like “Don’t Look Back into the Sun” and “Time for Heroes” along with newer material. If the goal of the DVD is to prove that, in spite of all the trouble he’s been in, Doherty’s still capable of leading his own band, then it does the job.