#2 — THE SEX PISTOLS
Though they may have only produced one album and four singles during their career, London’s Sex Pistols proved to be the most influential band in British Punk Rock hands down. And though they had a reputation at the time for being lacking as musicians from a technical standpoint, decades of hindsight showcase just how solid the band was at its peak in the years 1977 and ’78.
Johnny Rotten in particular proved to be an insightful lyricist who was years ahead of his time. “God Save The Queen” and “Anarchy in the UK” skewered social conformity and deference to the Crown at a time when a large portion of the population was unemployed and living in poverty. And “Bodies,” one of his most incisive songs, remains to this day the most blistering anti-abortion anthem ever recorded. Rotten left the band in 1978 after a disasterous tour of the United States, and though the band continued to perform with Sid Vicious (the only member of the band who truly couldn’t play his own instrument), the band’s best work was recorded prior to Rotten’s exodus. And their album, Never Mind The Bullocks, Here Come The Sex Pistols, remains the seminal album of Punk Rock fury to come out of the era.
Finally: The greatest punk rock band of all time…
Categories: Music, PJ Lifestyle Columns
Tags: Punk Rock, Radio Birdman, The Clash, The Damned, The Ramones, The Sex Pistols
Punk rock was more about attitude than music. The music amplified the attitude. I’ll give you half-marks for including the Ramones as PR’ers, leather jackets aside, but The Clash? Never. Innovative, but mainstream. Punk’s off-spring, Seatle Grunge, reversed the flow. Music more than attitude. Out of the thousands of noise machines generating crap under the guise of Punk, you did pick a couple that gave the genre some legitimacy. Taste, as they say, is in the ear of the beholder. Like Rap, Punk never did much for me mentally, spiritually or emotionally. Overall, it sucked big time.
The Clash is one of the most overrated bands of its era. Their music is a droning array of uninspired arrangements that relies on a cool factor for survival.
GTFO. Get out of the cupboard, you boys and girls. She ain’t never coming back. Cut off his ears and chop off his head. Anything I want, he gives it but not for free. You been drinking brew for breakfast. My seniorita’s rose was nipped in the bud. THAT’S…MONTGOMERY CLIFT HONEY!! I wasn’t born so much as I fell out. In these days of evil presidentes. WHEN THEY KICK AT YOUR FRONT DOOR, HOW YOU GONNA COME? WITH YOUR HANDS ON YOUR HEAD OR ON THE TRIGGER OF YOUR GUN? You western man you’re free with your seed. One was lickin’ ‘em dry with a bloody great spliff. I’ve been beat up I’ve been thrown out But I’m not down. An’ I’m so pilled up that I rattle. You lie, steal, cheat and deceit. Every cheap hood st rikes a bargain with the world. What the barrel can’t snort it can splatter on the floor. He only wanted more time away from the darkest door.
Listen to the album “super black market clash,” then try and look me in the eye while saying that again. You won’t be able to.
Gotta agree about the Clash. Mainstream attempt at co-opting punk. Dead Kennedys and Black Flag were much more authentic.
I’d disagree regarding The Clash; I think the music itself was pretty dam good. I don’t understand the sort of negative proof asserted that because they were popular they weren’t good. However, I have heard of late that they were indeed a deliberately made group, not their own creation — for what that might matter.
Touching on a couple others – never cared for the Sex Pistols. Just too much of the spoiled brat ethos. They remind me of Occupiers now. Ramones – good stuff, like them more now than I did then. Old gag — for years, there was an ongoing debate over who were the ugliest rockers, Rolling Stones or Aerosmith. Then the Ramones turned up and set a whole new standard.
Not terribly familiar with the others -but I wonder where are The Misfits???
I never thought of The Clash as a punk band even though that’s where they’re usually pigeonholed. It was just good music. As commercial as it was, it was still very anti-authority (Guns of Brixton, Career Opportunities, etc).
The Misfits? They just released a new CD called The Devils Rain.
Of course the Clash refined the punk sound and took it to a higher plane. Simply because they became more commercial than their predecessors is not enough reason to deny them their credentials. Also, the Clash were the band U2 always wanted to be, which scores a lot of points in my book.
As you point out in your ontogenous sketch, Punk Rock evolved into Nihilist anti-West, anti civilization genres which completed our destruction.
Thanks.
O butshill, they said the same thing about Benny Goodman.
Angry young men have always been the best songwriters (women as well, but to a lesser degree). Musically talented angry youngsters have been driving sounds for decades. If you actually listen to the lyrics, you can discern an anguished plea for classical liberalism/small l libertarianism/Teddy style conservatism. Dead Kennedys, one of my favorite punk bands, superficially railed against Reagen and the right, but their key theme was against an overbearing government.
Generally, punk bands (and many other ‘styles’) are misguided in their targets, but spot on regarding their ire. Governments, unacknowledged love, and vile ex-girlfriends have inspired thousands of really good songs.
But after all those years of railing on corporate America, capitalism, etc….it was all about the money for old Jello wasn’t it?
Jello was at his best when he was being funny and snide and singing about things he really understood. Once he took up the mantle of ‘Elder Politipunk Statesman’, I just couldn’t bear to listen to him any more. Worse still the ‘deeply intellectual’ punks who hung on his every word.
All that politics leeched the fun out of everything.
Love Radio Birdman. I used to be able to find their record everywhere for a dollar. I just saw the new vinyl reissue for $25. I sure wish I would kept all my old records.
As a former (or hibernating?) punk rock journalist, I never really expected to see a column like this on the pjmedia site! Having interviewed members from each of the five bands (save Radio Birdman), I’m pretty sure only Johnny Ramone would not have thrown a nutty at being promoted by a conservative news site! Great work, Jonathan!
I had to give the Ramones some props when Tom Waits covered one of their songs.
<<>>
He was only returning the favor when they covered one of his.
But Johnny Rotten makes the best butter commercials now…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mSE-Iy_tFY
He just really doesn’t give a ***t anymore does he….that was awesome.
The Sex Pistol were Malcolm Mcclaren’s creation and hardly “punk” at all. They were more a successful marketing ploy. John Lydon does not even hate the Queen in fact. The funny thing about Lydon is that I have never interviewed him (being a metal journo) but he interviewed me at a conference in California. The Clash, the Ramones and The Damned are all good hard rock bands whether you call them punk or not.
They are not good hard rock bands. Compare the innovative yet simple arrangements, virtuosity and raw power of something like Grand Funk Live to your line up of punk and they come off as second rate.
June my dear its ironic that mention Grand Funk Railroad. Critics basically said the same thing about them when they first hit scence that they later said about about punk rock. Look it up!
Look what up. Grand Funk was utterly obscure when they first came out and they grew by word of mouth. The public didn’t get on board til their 3rd album. Grand Funk, with only 3 members, had by necessity, simple arrangements but which were so fundamentally creative that there is no question of comparing their raw originality and power with any punk band that ever existed.
No punk band was ever that capable on bass, drum kit and guitar as were the 3 members of Grand Funk and able to express that power onto large stadium crowds.
Call ‘em whatever you want, they wrote some damn good songs….even though they were basic.
Meh. The punk stuff was fun when I was in college, but for the most part has lost its luster.
IMO, the first and best punk band is The Who.
Hope I die before I get old.
Yep, proto punk.
The Clash, pshaw. But all were energetic and fun to listen to when I was a lad and into my early 20s. Their standard cynicism, “progressivism,” and such were fairly easily ignored. But I do have to give the Dead Kennedys a huzzah for “California Über Alles” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UW8UlY8eXCk), in which they describe California turning into a hippie police state. I can’t yet say it was prophetic, but give ‘em a few more years.
@Comrade_T, you beat me to the punch re: the Dead Kennedys: when I was doodling the lyrics of “California Uber Alles” on my PeeChee in the 10th grade, I had no idea the song would maintain its relevancy 25+ years later (who knew?). Contrary to popular opinion, these bands weren’t necessarily comprised of slack-jawed troglodytes…some of these guys actually had a brain and something to say.
California Uber Alles may have been about a Jerry Brown-led police state (prescient I must say), but let’s not go going Jello Biafra too many props. A good deal of DK lyrics seethed with venom for Reagan, Schlafly, Thatcher, Falwell and the like too.
Jello’s a leftist’s leftist and a real creep to boot…I mean he picked Mumia Abu-Jamal as VP for his 2000 Green Party presidential race (for which he came in second to Nader).
That said, the Dead Kennedys did shred and still place high in my rotation. Sometimes you just need to block out a band’s political bent.
Great choices. I know because I was there at the time. It also Amazes me by judging from the some of the comments proably from “woodstock” era baby boomers who hated this music when it first come out, how they still hold contempt for this music. I thinks its time they get over it.
The contempt is not for “this music” but for musical innovation versus lack of innovation. Punk did not advance music, it advanced attitude, fashion, etc.
As for “getting over it,” look at the musical legacy of the two eras and you’ll see the verdict is in, America got over punk which has disappeared without a trace, liked only by the generation at which it was aimed, kinda like Penelope Pitstop.
Woodstock era music is appreciated and copied generation after generation.
Ah, June, no, a knock-off version of “Punk” is still alive and well, followed by the College age kids.
Of course the thing is, they weren’t there, they don’t understand what it was, and their version seems to be almost exclusively the Cali Punk style – lots of screaming with nasty/satanic overtones.
You know, it’s a good thing the original movement died out quickly. It got tired really fast.
June,
Spot-on. The quality, and therefore the continuing popularity of woodstock era music is simply not represented in the Punk scene…C.S.N. vocal arrangements, amazing layered guitars, it was the craft of musical experts
Punk (although I do enjoy it for what it is) is all speed and immaturity, like a teenager furiously whacking off. Most punk bands were “stripped down” to their essentials because thats all they could DO…
Put it this way..I was in a few H.S. garage bands in my teen years, a decade after Woodstock…we played stuff like The Ramones because we COULD…We didnt play stuff like Zeppelin because WE COULDNT.
For better or for worse punk didn’t disappear without a trace. It had and still has enormous influence, considering its descendants aren’t only the 80s’ post-punk and synthpop, but also most alternative rock generes, of which grunge had become the dominant genre of the 90s and others are quite prominent today. Also its attitude and philosophy had a lot of cultural influence outside the music scene.
Though I have to agree about the musical innovation versus relative lack of innovation. And I’m not a “Woodstock era baby boomer”. I was a teenager in the 80s and was exposed to many of the popular styles from the 80s, 70s and 60s at the same time, as well as to classical, some electronic and some world music, so nostalgia or being used to a certain style of music didn’t play a part in my choices. I just find most of the punk-rock I’ve heard musically boring, though some of the lyrics are great. I agree that in terms of musical innovation and creativity the 60s and 70s were the golden age.
The reason many people resent punk so much is that it was positioned as both the opposition and inheritor or replacement for everything that came before it, including classic rock, progressive rock, metal and hard rock (all compactly discarded as “the excesses of 70s mainstream rock”, though in the case of this article the author used quotes to make it neutral, a factual description of a popular punk era meme rather than his own opinion), and therefore punk is blamed for the untimely demise (untimely to the fans) of most of these genres, and their replacement with junk pop with relatively little musical value on one hand, and with nihilistic decadence on the other. Though in reality it wasn’t so much punk as the radio stations that moved into the format of serial short and catchy pop hits, foolish “music critics” and the economic recession at the time that made the record companies prefer simple and cheaper to produce music because their sales have dropped.
It was also a simple change of fads and fashions which happens every decade, except it wasn’t so simple since one can see an obvious process of evolution of rock music from the 50s rock & roll, through the 60s innovations and expansions, until the art rock and progressive rock of the mid 70s, and then punk-rock drops on this process like an axe, a metaphorical guillotine, and pretty much reverts things to the 50s and early 60s, albeit with a more sinister approach. And from this point rock music started evolving in a new direction people like me don’t like so much. So many people feel they and their culture were robbed by pank and are bitter about it.
Robbie Robertson said, “the punks brought something to the party”. Good enough for me. Bob Dylan followed the Clash assidiously. Good enough for me. Neil Young worked with Devo and was Johnny Rotten’s “favorite hippie”. Good enough for me. Those who say it advanced “attitude and fashion” have never watched Led Zeppelin’s “The Song Remains the Same” and marvelled at how much time Roger Plant’s trouser armadillo is in your face.
The punks brought melody, passion and thunder back to pop and rock when all the white boy blues wanna bes had turned it into self-inflated sludge with 10-minute solos and ridiculous songs about mean mistreatin’ women or being “On the Threshold of a Dream”.
Get a clue.
I think their claim wasn’t that punk advanced fashion and attitude while the classic genres didn’t, but that punk advanced only attitude and fashion while the classic genres advanced music first. They basically claim punk didn’t have any musical value to speak of. So if you intend to counter their claim you need to show how punk advanced music and not how bands like Zeppelin advanced also fashion, nobody claimed didn’t advance also fashion.
And it isn’t true that “punk brought melody, passion and thunder back to pop and rock” – there were lots of melody, passion and thunder before punk. What punk brought back was simple melodies, simple 4/4 rhythms, short songs that don’t require a lot of investment to get into, and mostly simple and direct lyrics. It brought back simplicity, that’s all. For you it might have been an improvement. For people who like complexity and virtuosity it was a disaster. I love the long solos, the more abstract instrumentals, and lyrics that stimulate my imagination, and I also don’t mind listening to 30 minute peices if they have the content to support it. By your standards there shouldn’t be classical music either because it has long solos and often complex subjects, which by your standards makes it “self-inflated” (another parroted punk era meme) and generally worthless.
I say yes to everything you wrote. Nice to see someone who can parse English and also think and put things in context.
Um…no.
“As for “getting over it,” look at the musical legacy of the two eras and you’ll see the verdict is in, America got over punk which has disappeared without a trace, liked only by the generation at which it was aimed, kinda like Penelope Pitstop.”
That’s not true. Just because you don’t hear it on the radio doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist – Ramones started in ’76, right? Youth Brigade and minor threat etc started in the early 80′s. Rancid and the like started in the early nineties. The local scene in Dallas is not nearly as strong as it used to be, but new bands still crop up…the Double-Ugly, Von Ehrics and Spector 45 come to mind.
So yeah, what you said, not true. Heck it seems to have survived in a more vital form than that sclerotic 60′s-70′s stuff.
All things being equal, you’re still on the wrong side of this argument. 60s rock originally couldn’t get played on Top 40, shown on TV. It was played on underground radio and passed by word of mouth.
The songs were considered too long and too, let’s say “boisterous,” in terms of their lyrics.
“Lola” by The Kinks originally was not played on Top 40 but introduced on underground FM radio stations before it crossed over and became a mainstream hit. There are many more examples.
So, having said that, the 60s music crossed up and entered the mainstream consciousness while punk simply never really went anywhere in comparison. Both started on the wrong side of the tracks; one stayed and one came over from sheer creativity and virtuosity.
The punk ‘spirit’ flourished in a time when norms (in music and culture) were still quite conservative. It was fun then to muss up your hair and bang out some chords and call it a band, and it was rather unusual, so you could get some attention. Not so much nowadays.
Oh June! Please DO get over it!
“IMO, the first and best punk band is The Who.”
I agree, not a one of the bands mentioned in this article is in the same league with The Who, The Kinks, or The Troggs.
You are talking pre-punk with The Who et al. Those groups rose in the “Mods v. Rockers” era of the early & mid 1960s.
I loved the punk rock scene, even though it got old quickly, but I loved the sex pistols and the Clash….saw the Clash in 1982 at a concert in Williamsburg…damn good show…also agree about the violent femmes………
It did indeed burn out fast…
When people used to wear a straight razor blade as jewelry, it was the real deal.
By 1980, they were selling jewelry at THE MALL shaped like straight razorblades.
Then it was dead and gone.
Where’s the Dead Kennedys.
I don’t know what the Clash is doing on this list. Is London Calling really punk?
Where’s the Dead Milkmen?
“F&%k you mommy” music. The epitome of rock, adolescent whining with little skill and talent.
If you listen to the lyrics of today’s music, however massive it may sometimes sound, it’s exactly the same. The lyrics then were fun in the context of inspired but grossly un-polished music. In today’s realm of endless production options via ProTools et al, it comes off sounding quite silly.
Punk rock music was a sort of neighborhood ‘folk music’ of it’s time. There was and remains a lot of inspired creativity in those early bands.
All of those bands wished they rocked as hard as the MC5. Terrible politics, but great music.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYeHLyYif5I
I agree. If I could go back in time to see a MC5/Stooges gig! Although I applaud Mr. Sanders’ list, I must comment.
Radio Birdman – Not even on the radar
The Damned – OK for Brits
The Clash – See above
Sex Pistols – See above, but they were put together like the Monkees were. And I have a goldfish that we named Sid Fishus, so I can say that.
The Ramones – The Ramones should always be mentioned in the same breath as baseball, mom, and apple pie. If you can’t at least tap your foot when a Ramones song comes on, I’m not sure I’d want to hang out with you.
Bands that should be on this list instead:
Iggy and the Stooges
MC5
New York Dolls
Early Who
And then we can talk about the Dead Kennedys, but then we’re on the border of hardcore music, and that’s got a whole other list… don’t even get me started on Bad Brains, Minor Threat, Misfits, 7 Seconds, Naked Raygun, Descendents…etc etc etc.
Funny you should mention Naked Raygun. My guitar playing 15 year old son just discovered them hiding in my collection along with the Sex Pistols. Its cool to hear that stuff again.
I found Minor Threat and that whole second wave of hardcore boring beyond words. I remember people at a party clustering around a turntable raving about how great it was, but I just couldn’t get over the fact that there was no humor or fun in it. It was always trying to be so desperately serious.
For the LA punk scene, I enjoyed the first ep and singles from Black Flag (pre-Henry), the Adolescents (Amoeba!), T.S.O.L. (brain dead lyrics but a great sound) and of course the ‘Fresh Fruit’ from the DK’s. Oh, and how could I forget the Dickies? Fun personified!
In the “True Testimonial” documentary, one gets the sense that the leftist political leanings were mostly glommed on via their relationship with John Sinclair, and were mostly a distraction anyway. But yes, the MC5 simultaneously invented and rendered obsolete the next 30 years in aggressive roots-oriented music.
Ronnie,
To me, that quote sums up the punk scene completely.
Longtime Cult fan here. (Oh right, they were “New Wave”. Whatever.)
Sorry, but I’m more into the pre-punk “excesses” (you shouldn’t have mentioned this word, now look what you’ve done), one of the catchwords invented by ideologically hostile music critics to describe progressive rock. I think this is probably the most thoroughly violent, yet remarkably intelligent, piece I’ve ever heard in popular music (though it’s not an original, and yet utterly original), and certainly more avant-garde and aggressive than any punk rock I’ve ever heard, which is even more impressive considering it was released in 1973. It’s also an unrecognized predecessor of both industrial music and avant-garde progressive rock. The album cover, part of which you can see in the video, is a dark dystopic image of our industrial society. Yet the “music critics” proclaimed this band and album “commercial” (just because it miraculously sold), which is clearly insane. I listen today to avant-garde crossovers just to try and recapture the thrill this band gave me. Indeed excesses – of talent, passion, intelligence and imagination.
As for punk – I think the conflict between punk rock and progressive rock was largely manufactured, for both commercial reasons (by the likes of Malcolm McLaren) and ideological reasons (by misguided socialist music critics such as Lester Bangs). Both genres are anti-pop, each in its own way, and could attack it from different directions. But music-wise the only punk or punk-related music I really liked were some songs of Bauhaus, most notably this premeditated criminal dissonance and that paranoid dark beauty. Today Bauhaus are considered “the godfhaters of gothyc rock” (that later evolved into somewhat lighter post-punk “gothyc” bands like The Cure and Soft Cell), but back in the late 70s and early 80s they were widely considered punk. They certainly didn’t have what we consider now as the distinct punk sound, and conspicuously lacked the high speed and “fresh youth” quality. They were darker, more experimental, and used synths in many of their songs, but were calssified as punk back then because they were part of the scene, had obvious similarities with punk, and the label for their sub-genre wasn’t yet invented. I was introduced to them at the same time as to more “conventional” punk rock bands, which ruined punk-rock for me forever since Bauhaus made all the others sound so bland in comparison, and “old”, like distorted American 50s rock & roll on steroids. Mix Gene Vincent’s attitude and arrangement with an Eddie Cochran riff and voila – the Sex Pistols’ “God Save the Queen”. Not to mention the Ramones’ “Blitzkrieg Bop”.
But then punk’s importance was more social and political than musical (though it’s extremely influential).
Punk rock was born in the UK. It arose out of the atrocious post-WWII economic conditions that continued to afflict the British working class even in the 1970s. It is a music of sheer youthful rage and despair expressed in ungodly, unsophisticated noise and battering-ram vocals/lyrics. To me, American punk has never been anything more than a simple teenage angst thing. American youth could copy the style, but they did not have to live through the conditions. So American punk has always been, to me, purely derivative and entirely egotistical. As for the music itself, punk makes my head ache. All pain, no virtuosity. To the American music scene’s credit, it took the suicidal misery and hopelessness of British punk and combined it with some of the best ballad lyricism in all of Rock — see, for instance, STP’s “Sour Girl” or Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun” — to me, rock ballads don’t get any better than those, and several other grunge tunes as well. And yet grunge also had all the angst and explosive guitar/drum energy of British, and American, punk. So, to me (again), punks is historically significant and compelling, but it just doesn’t make me want to bounce and air-guitar like Nirvana (et al.) does.
Doc, STP’s ‘Sour Girl’ and Soundgarden’s, ‘Black Hole..’ is filler tunes from forgettable albums (sure Soudngarden’s ‘Swan Song’ album was popular but it was Top 40 gobbily-gook when compared to their freshman/sophomore efforts) by 2 bands that peaked LONG before and were only fulfilling their, ‘Obligation to complete so many albums as per requests by recording company..’.
As for ‘rock ballads’ – 1985-1991 had to be the WORST period for rock music. That scene was a freakin’ joke.
There is little/nothing worse than some ‘rocker’ pining, whining over some woman in neon spandex and high tops.
Rock ballads/hair metal inundated everything. Ozzy & Lita Ford, Firehouse, Poison, Def Leppard (sure their 1st album was respectable. But after their guitarist checked out their sound was dreadful. The stupid mullets, every other song lyric/title was ‘rock’ – puhlease) Saigon Kick, Bonham, Ugly Kid Joe.. are you joking?
It was not ‘Nirvana’ who awoken the musical beast but The Pixies, Alice in Chains, Pantera, RHCP, The Screaming Trees Mark Lanegan, Soundgarden (Louder Than Love and Badmotorfinger album’s run circles around the incoherent loser Kurt Cobain) etc., Though the radio DJ’s and MTv was still playing ballads for some god awful reason.
Nirvana was but the result of a good marketing record company and too many other better bands who’d put out more respectable material prior to the ‘Nevermind’ hoopla and the ballads had to go way of the dodo.
Unfortunately with the advent of reality t.v. the aforementioned a sshats have returned.
Why even here in Asia I saw at a t.v. in the mall Def Leppard playing with Taylor Swift (though I was told that show’s from a few years back.. ‘rock’ band my a ss!). Pathetic.
I never understood the affection for The Pixies. Their arrangements are as boring as Springsteen’s. I can barely tell one song from another.
Sorry for my ‘tad’ tardy response.
I like the ‘Pixies sound’ because many bands were influenced and incorporated that sound and type of lyrics to their style.
The same can be said of the Violent Femmes (‘You cannot *uck with..’). Vocally speaking.. sure the aforementioned groups are weak. But the combination of the music and garbled lyrics.. it hit home for a youth-teenager like myself who’d grown up and couldn’t stand hair metal from the late 80′s-early 90′s.
I would listen to The Smiths, Psychedelic Furs any day of the week rather than the shite coming out at that time in the ‘rock scene’.
Punk music has been stagnant, in a mausoleum so to speak since ~ mid 80′s. There are a few bands (NZ’s ‘The Bleeders’ is a pretty decent modern punk band) that fit the punk mold, but there are so many poseur bands like, ‘Rise Against’ that are total garbage.
Loved punk in 1976-77. Didnt last long, but it couldn’t really. I agree with parts of many comments here. The Who were the first punk band. The Sex Pistols were Malcolm Mclarens creation…kind of comparable to the Monkees. They all had terrible politics. “London Calling” wasn’t a punk album at all (though I find it hard to believe anyone would say the two prior albums weren’t). But it was one of the best pop/rock albums of all time.
Someone commented that punk didn’t advance the music. I agree with that too. It didn’t advance. In a couple of years, it rolled it back to something more vital and exciting than anything we’d had for the last decade anyway. In 1975, music was Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles, Rod Stewart (loved him with the Faces), and Emerson, Lake and Palmer. With the punks, suddenly it seemed like the birth of rock and roll again. The music sounded like Duane Eddy, Buddy Holly and Bo Diddley, only with lots more amps, an attitude, and a cynical sense of humor. Punk was doomed to self- destruct, but all trends are. This just happened very fast. By 1977-78 it was over, but the main thing is it blew a big hole open for a lot of other bands to fill. Punk made the space for REM, U2, Talking Heads, Elvis Costello, Nirvana, etc.
If you can’t tell, I loved that music and that time.
So we agree on the facts, but not on the adjectives.
“Someone commented that punk didn’t advance the music. I agree with that too. It didn’t advance. In a couple of years, it rolled it back…”
Agreed.
“The music sounded like Duane Eddy, Buddy Holly and Bo Diddley, only with lots more amps, an attitude, and a cynical sense of humor.”
Agreed.
Disagree it was more exciting. It was to you, no doubt, but to me it was the end. I love Bo Diddley and Buddy Holly, I love many musicians of the 50s and early 60s American rock & roll scene, but this music belongs in the 50s and early 60s. I listen or dance to good ol’ rocknroll, but punk doesn’t sound like the rebirth of it, but like a self-aware bleak and sarcastic retro (rocknroll was a mostly happy music, even the sad songs were not so bleak). Like they were too embarrassed to become straight imitations of Eddie Cochran, so they gave it a new angle and sold it as new music. No doubt there were many people who were relieved when rock went back to its simplest form, but there are also many people who were very disappointed.
To me Keith Emerson of Emerson, Lake & Palmer is an exciting musician, or at least was in the late 60s and early 70s. I didn’t know him back then – his career started before I was born – but I tracked it down. His music fascinated me so that I also listened to many of his favorite musicians and influences, as well as musicians that were influenced by him (the most famous example is probably Jordan Rudess from Dream Theater). U2, on the other hand, is to me as boring as can be, and I didn’t like Nirvana. So we have a fundamental disagreement about what is vital and exciting.
Guess who my favorite punk band is?
Speaking of American punks, what about Fear or Patti Smith?
And where was Iggy Pop on the list, anyway?
The Damned are alive and kicking, and just finished a 35th Anniversary tour of the United States. T’was a rollicking good show here in Seattle.
With one exception, all of those bands represent what I hate about punk – the self importance, the ego, the pretension. The Clash were basically the Green Day of the 70s – taking punk and commercializing the heck out of it, while the Sex Pistols were basically the Monkees of punk, being essentially a manufactured band.
Only the Ramones on that list didn’t take themselves too seriously or try to be commercial products first.
That second Radio Birdman song is a Stooges cover. The Stooges and the MC5? Not Punk. ‘Proto Punk,’ if you have to give them a classification. Bad Brains and the Dead Kennedys? Also not Punk. ‘Post Punk,’ and you can keep all of that junk.
The Ramones weren’t Punk Rock either – at least not at first. Hilly Crystal from CBGB got it right, when he called the music played by bands like the Ramones, and the Dead Boys, ‘Street Music.’
British Punk? That’s it’s own thing – sure, every ‘Punk’ band includes a grin and a sneer – but British ‘Punks’ were extreme poseurs by comparison. Nothing wrong with that – but it is what it is. There’s more authenticity to a Ramones song every day of the week.
Now go watch some Dead Boys: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1Tb3DT-mjA#t=0m51s
The Minutemen wrote brilliant music, with fairly intelligent lyrics – This Ain’t No Picnic… The Dead Kennedys’ music seems to hold up pretty well too… Police Truck, Let’s Lynch the Landlord and Holiday in Cambodia all hold up pretty well. The Ramones and The Cramps were both just good, longstanding rock bands, that happened to play some seminal punk.
‘London Calling’ wasn’t punk, but still one of the greatest albums ever. Only the first two Clash albums (Self-titled and ‘Give `em Enough Rope’) could probably be categorized as punk. They were able to quickly and readily grow out of their early punk sound and were more than willing to experiment with different musics.
And considering the untold number of bands they inspired to follow in their footsteps, they can’t be discounted as the greatest punk band ever.
There’s a world of difference between US, UK and Aussie punk, so it’s really a matter of taste which you prefer. And just like the intra-party squabbles in the Republican primaries for conservative “purity” it’s all a battle of “authenticity” when it comes to punk.
You had to be there. No, wait–I was there. Didn’t impress me all that much then, less so now. If it isn’t the music you grew up with, it isn’t much more than crap for the most part. Sorry.
The mention of “London Calling” was unfortunate, but in 1977-78, the Clash was the greatest band in the world next to Little Feat. “I’m So Bored With the USA,” “Career Opportunities” and “Garageland” were pinnacles of the punk ethos.
Yes! That first album was an earth-shaker. Between that and The Ramones, a lot of kids who might never have done so said to themselves, “I could do this!”
That’s what I’ve always loved about punk. What you lack in skill and equipment you can make up for with creativity and spirit. I remember my friends in The Freeze tooling around and playing ‘shows’ with a nameless pawn shop guitar plugged into an old stereo amp leading out to an exposed speaker, and Clif singing without any mic or amp at all! The songs were snide and humorous afairs about their friends and such and it was a blast. They grew from that into a staple of the early Boston punk scene.
Very nice! I discovered Radio Birdman rather late but they are my favorite on your list. Too bad Orange County, CA. never gets any respect from journalist. Hardcore was invented here by the Middle Class from Fullerton and we had great bands like the Adolescents and The Crowd. Those bands along with China White, T.S.O.L. and many others brought kids out of the suburbs and into the clubs.
All crap for those who follow what they see or saw as ‘cool’. Utter garbage for people who couldn’t tell flat from sharp.
NO, no. … punk still sucks
No, really, I listened to as much as I could.
Punk is still a pretentious crapfest masquerading as “alternative”
remember alternative music is an alternative to good music.
And as such it, by definition sucks.
Punk sucks or it wouldn’t BE punk
Somebody previously said that punk has disappeared without a trace? Really? I would admit that in recent years good punk rock is harder to come by, but there are certainly bands out there that produce what could at least be described as legitimate successors to the first generation – in fact, many of the bands i will cite were around at the very beginning (Bad religion, The Adolescents, social distortion, agnostic front, 7 seconds, etc.) If anything, I would argue that punk rock has found a permanent place in modern music, not just through its influence, but through its ethic. And this list is good, but I would have voted for the dead Kennedy’s as well as CRASS – the most brittle band of the first generation of punk rock. The latter had just as much to do with shaping the extremely political side of punk as the clash, even though they were much more of an underground band.
What are you talking about? How can one be a musical successor to a sub-genre of rock that had no musical signature, no overarching musical philosophy or form? Its disdain for conspicuous artistry matched the era’s conceptual fine art disdain for craftsmanship as “too obvious” but what it was was a lack of talent, skill, discipline and musical education. That type of disdain is a negative space not a creative one.
To be a successor to punk is what sound? Green Day’s generic guitar riffs and pretending at some weird generic punk accent?
To be a successor to punk is attitude, sneers, fashion, faux anger, faux disdain. Punk is not a musical genre but the equivalent of the Beatles hair dos and pointed shoes but without the skill.
The birthplace of punk–CBGBs 1977, yes, the Ramones, but also Stiv Bators & Cheta Chrome of The Dead Boys. I know, I was there.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1Tb3DT-mjA
No Pogues? They sure changed *my* mind about punk rock.
The Ramones were the best and most honest of bands. They didn’t try to be something they weren’t, and they did it well. Here are my favoriet Ramones tunes.
http://goodboysnation.com/2011/01/08/remembering-the-ramones/
Enjoy!
A graying punk rock kid, the biggest attraction to the movement was its anarchic freedom. Despite still loving the music, I now realize it was a movement of crushing conformity. Everyone dressed the same. I would get abused for for my lack of spiked hair and leather. It’s no surprise that so many aging punks are now for state control.
Most movements, as well as every fad, have their own fashion dictates that make everyone look the same, because the fashion reflects the ethics of the movement. Punk’s fashion was a visual reflection of its anti-establishment ethos. So was the hippy fashion in a different way.
What I really hate about punk is all those rules and prohobitions – ideally a song must be no longer than 2 minutes, 3 is acceptable, any more than this is forbidden; it should have up to 3 chords, 4 might be acceptable on certain conditions, any more than this is forbidden; ideally a song must have no solos, a solo of up to 30 seconds might be acceptable on certain conditions, any more than this is forbidden; a song must have a structure of verse-chorus or only verse, any freer structure is forbbiden; if you’re a skillful player you must hide it since showing skill is musical masturbation, which is a grave sin and thus forbidden, etc. Punk’s anarchic freedom does come from the original rocknroll, but all those prohibitions remind me more of the Catholic church.
It’s true: punk’s sound was severely constricted allowing for no expansiveness. The fashion was also as severely restricted as a marine uniform. Even Doris Day didn’t have the same doo forever so who is conformist and who is not is an interesting question.
The 60s philosophy embraced a great deal under a very large umbrella of innovation and progressive evolution of music. They had everything from “Days of Future Past” to King Crimson to Grand Funk to Edgar Winter jazz and blues.
In this sense, this very encompassing music was jazzier than jazz.
Having grown up in Sydney in the late 70s, I can second the Radio Birdman listing. Of interest to North Americans, their two guitarists were a Canadian and an American, of whom there were precious few of either in Sydney at that time.
For completion, check out the other major pioneering Oz punk act of the era, The Saints, whose ‘(I’m) Stranded’ album is a classic.
I was one of the original “Punk Rockers”…
This does nothing for me.
“You kids! Get off my lawn!”
Circle Jerks
Fear
Agent Orange
West coast for punk rock
East coast for hardcore
The Sex Pistols? Bull.
The Clash? Bull.
Johnny Rotten stole Gary Holtons stage persona.
They play The Clash on the Muzak at the grocery store. Really, they do.
Lost in the Supermarket?
I have to disagree with those who say Punk was all marketing and did not advance music at all. On the contrary, it tore down the arena and prog rock of the 70s (for good or ill) and gave birth to New Wave (also for good or ill).
My favorite band of those listed is the Sex Pistols. There is more to their songs, both musically and lyrically, than people give them credit for. I hate to say it, but if they had never installed Vicious in the band, they may have lasted for a few more albums.
I have never thought of The Clash as legitimate punk. They were too commercial. As for the Ramones, I have always had a hard time taking them seriously. Their music just isn’t that good, and they remind me of the hippie bands on the Flintstones. The Ramones were all gimmic, and I never understood people’s admiration for them. “Rock and Roll High School?” Give me a break.
I have no problem with the other bands on the list, though. There is some good music there.
“I have to disagree with those who say Punk was all marketing and did not advance music at all. On the contrary, it tore down… prog rock…”
That was not an advance, but a retreat.
Brown nosers, all of them. The seminal ironic influence of the Velvet Underground on postmodern popular culture, zzzz … Robert Christgau can sit shivah, I saw through them four decades ago.
WHAT!? Not even a mention of The Queen Haters!? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swE0lMOwxaw
The Clash was the best of them all. An excellent rock’n'roll band called a sell-out etc. by the likes of those above for actually being … an excellent rock’n'roll band. In fact, Joe Strummer kicked Mick Jones out of the band for acting like a rock star or some such nonsense. Apparently because he could play lead guitar and cared that they become an excellent rock’n'roll band.
Sex Pistols.. seriously? IMO it sounds like the author of this story is a ‘Top 40′ punk. Knowing, let alone understanding little of punk music and its origins, evolvement. Sex Pistols, a bunch of poser wannabe arseholes! Heck you should have mentioned Green Day in the same sentence as a ‘modern punk band’. Gimme a break.
As for ‘The Damned’, meh. Pop and later SERIOUS, nonsensical pop.
Radio Birdman is great, hands down though another Aussie band, The Saints had an AWESOME albeit unreleased and hard to find B-Sides from their debut ’76 album. Their following 2 albums are very respectable as well.
Bad Religion? Granted EVERY album sounds the same (the lyrics differ yes, though the beats are ~the same) but the albums are always great.
Dead Kennedys – goes without saying made the penultimate punk album of all-time. Yet no mention?
Suicidal Tendencies (Rocky George in his Pittsburgh Pirates hat!)? 7 Seconds (You can STILL see these guys touring in smaller venues up and down the CA coast)?
What about Agnostic Front or Gang of Four? Surely they’ve contributed far more than the Sex Pistols?
Early years AFI, Minor Threat?
Iggy Pop & The Stooges?
As well as The Vandals (still around), Pennywise (STILL putting out respectable jams), Danzig-led Misfits and Black Flag (mentioned by others), Rancid (still going strong)..?
Sure, The Clash is a respectable group and the writing was great (Guns of Brixton, White Riot are TIGHT songs) but ‘punk’, come on.
The big innovation of punk was the ability to sing a song without a single word being understood. You could say any damn thing with the assurance that it couldn’t be separated from the cacaphony of guitars and drums that were supposed to be background. Lydon’s “God Save The Queen” was an exception to an obvious rule; scream it and slur it and you didn’t have to justify it.
Perhaps my favorite Lydon’s line is “Don’t know what I want, but I know how to get it” from Anarchy In The UK. He was mocking his own generation for its unfocused aimless rage or some such. That line never lost its relevance.
Untalented refugees from Occupy Wall Street, every last one of them.
The very first rehearsal of the terrible garage band I joined in high school sounded exactly like that.
But we got better.
So if I hate punk rock, then the bands that will change my mind about that are… the bands… that play punk rock?
Huh?
skill = excess, and success = selling out. It occurs to me that anytime people that can’t are jealous of people that can they start screaming about how it all needs to be torn down. The observation was made above that punks played the Ramones because they could, and didn’t play Zepellin because they couldn’t. That really says it all. #OWS
I always have that sinister conspiracy theory in the back of my mind that the derision of skill was merely a competetion tactic. From the late 60s until the mid seventies rock musicians reached a level of virtuosity unparalleled in Western popular music (unless you consider jazz popular music, but most don’t anymore). Musical intelligence and technical skill were always part of the criteria by which music and musicians were judged – it has been like that for millennia in every culture. And contrary to a popular myth, skill and virtuosity were highly appreciated also in rocknroll (Elvis Presley’s famous quote that if he could play like Jerry Lee Lewis he would have quit singing is enough to illustrate it, though there are plenty of other examples). But as long as these were part of the criteria punk musicians couldn’t have succeeded because they couldn’t compete in terms of skill. No punk guitarist could compete with the likes of Jimmy Page, David Gilmour and the rest of the greats. So the only way for them to make a breakthrough was to turn skill and virtuosity into a liability and a disadvantage by giving them bad reputation. From then on skill would be a trait of the spoiled decadent and evil privileged upper class (as the socialist ideologues turned punk vs. the rest into class warfare), inauthentic, musical masturbation, self indulgence, and pomposity. This way skill was eliminated as a criterion by which musicians are judeged since skill had become a bad thing, and that opened the way for musicians with inferior skill to make it to the top.
The tragic part of it was not the birth of punk – I don’t deride punk-rock as much as some others here. The tragedy was that many great musicians were defamed, rebuked, and discarded with disdain. Rejected to the sidelines, they could not make a living anymore from the art they were passionate about and dedicated much of their lives to improve at. Some of them had to quit music as a profession, because they were too skilled musicians to be considered good mucisians under the new absurd regime.
Wouldn’t rap be the ultimate result of derision of skill? The Sex Pistols or Ramones cannot hold a candle to Yes or Rush when it comes to musical ability, but they are like Mozart and Beethoven compared to Eminem or Puff Daddy.
And it’s not just music. I give you Jackson Pollack (among other abstractists), whose paitings cannot be distinguished from those painted by a monkey squirting tubes of paint on a canvass at random.
Very good points.
Absolutely, hands-down no contest a competition tactic. One I’ve employed many times!
“It’s not fair,” I like to say to my wife at concerts. “He knows what he’s doing.”
Still, and more seriously, a lot of the truly great bands have come from a more ‘art school’ (Beatles, The Who) background than a real musical background (Steely Dan?). The winners manage to fill in the gaps in time (in either direction, skill or inspiration) OR present an image or spectacle so striking (theater) that their other shortcomings can be ignored.
What stupid rubbish. “Punk rock” was an elevation of people who could not play or sing, *precisely on that premise*.
To hell with punk rock and everyone who loves it. To *hell* with Kurt Cobain, and all his spawn.
Right back at ya!!!
I can’t bellieve it… Only one mention of the Saints in these comments, and ZERO mentions of Wire? Listen to Wire’s 1977-78 output, Pink Flag and Chairs Missing. These sound unlike everything coming out of the punk scene at that time, and much of it still sounds fresh today.
IMO, punks greatest achievement was channeling anger. I was in the USMC in the early 80s and never big into it, but my favorite band, Oingo Boingo, was heavily influenced. My first concert was Boingo performing “There’s Nothing Wrong with Capitalism” live at the 1983 US Festival
My favorite bands of the “punk” era were probably the Jam and the Buzzcocks (although it can be argued that neither were actual “punk” rock bands).
The B-52s were the best punk band EVER.
My favorite punk bands are any band whose members have selflessly died or ODed in order to prevent the rest of us to being subjected to the utter, utter crap that is punk music.
Really? So you dumped my post because I said that “punk’s greatest achievement was channeling anger”? That’s not an insult, it’s reasonable.
WTF. My link to Oingo Boingo Boingo’s Capitalism at the US Festival was classic.
You’re not qualified to write an article on punk. You’re a coward and you know it. Post this and you’re a a fraud too.
I was never punk but I sure appreciate it. I love the folks saying it sucked and then those that call the Clash poseurs. Of what? People don’t get it. Music is what it is to each if us. You don’t get to tell me what is good ir bad. And anyone can make it – skilled or unskilled. Who cares? Anyone who claims that what came fore ir aft was unquestionably better sounds like sister mary elephant screaming “be quiet!” Your losers because you’re smug yet lacking the grace to simply love what you love and let others do the same. I loved the Monkees as a kid – and still smile to this day when I here Auntie Grzelda. So what if it was factory-assembled. My girls love Justin Bieber – that kid is very talented. Not at all my taste. But watching my kids scream and sing along with their friends? That is so rock n roll. Punk is a part of what made tgat possible
Oh, no, you have it all upside down: It wasn’t I who said punk-rock has no right to exist – it was the punk pushers and some of the punk musicians who said my favorite music and musicians have no place in music and should be brought down. It’s not I who said that unskilled or less skilled musicians shouldn’t make music – it’s the punk pushers and philosophers who said skilled musicians mustn’t make music. Several whole genres simply had to go, according to the punk pushers, and be replaced by punk. Talk about smugness. And judging by merit alone, it had no right to do that. That’s what makes people bitter.
Punk is the only genre I can recall that made destroying other musicians one of its goals, that created a movement against other genres, and verbally abused their musicians as a matter of strategic choice. Little Richard didn’t wear a tshirt saying “I hate Pat Boone” like Johnny Lydon wore a tshirt saying “I hate Pink Floyd”, even though Little Richrad had far better reasons to hate Pat Boone than Lydon had to hate Pink Floyd. Emerson, Lake & Palmer didn’t intentionally dedicate stage time and air time to bash these or those musicians that were popular before their rise like Lydon dedicated to bash Emerson, Lake & Palmer. And BTW, I like Lydon a lot, which I think is pretty big of me considering Keith Emerson is my fav musician. And BTW2, a few years ago Lydon said he hated everyone in the 70s music scene, except two he discovered were nice people – Keith Emerson and David Gilmour. So what was all that crap about them in the 70s? Just because you hate long solos isn’t a good enough reason to try and burry musicians under heaps of undeserved verbal stoning. IMO Emerson had too few solos in his prime days, and those he had were too short. And I’m not joking. His keyboards to me are like a fix to a junky.
One of the commenters here said that one of the ways punk adavanced music was tearing down the arena and prog rock of the 70s. If you ask proggers and prog fans what they think were their best achievements I don’t think you’d find even one who’d say one of their greatest achievements was to tear down the music and musicians that went before them. Only hate-based genres can say that destroying other musicians was one of their greatest successes.
Most music critics today, particularly of the “alternative” variety, are directly or (more often) indirectly influenced by the ideas and style of a star music critic of the 70s, Lester Bangs, the ideological godfather of punk-rock. He thought even Sgt. Pepper was too pretentious. In the 80s he wrote that the reason New Wave music sucked is that the musicians went out and learned how to play. Even the 80s New Wavers were too technically proficient in his mind to make good music. That’s the kind of ideology we inherited as a culture. So certainly members of this culture have a right to say what they think of it.
And it was all very political. Bangs, for instance, addmited he judged music according to moral stands. I don’t remember if he described himself as some sort of socialist or some sort of communist, but it was one of the two. Here’s a nice quote you can find searching the web:
“It’s much easier to wear a Chairman Mao button and shake your fists in the air and all that, then to actually read the Communist manifesto and things like that and actually become involved in politics.”
With the emergence of punk-rock in the 70s the music scene was reframed as a class war between the proletariat, supposedly represented by the punks, and the supposed “aristocracy”, supposedly represented by the proggers because many of them were influenced by classical music, supposedly the degenerated music of the ruling class. For that to work it also required some lies. The more things change the more they stay the same. All the proggers needed to be framed as talentless spoiled rich kids whose rich parents could afford music and art academic education, and who “therefore” made inauthentic music and were basically evil, and illegitimate bastards of rocknroll since it’s proletarian music. A lovely Stalinist theater. The so-called musical “aristocracy” had to face the metaphorical guillotine for the “revolution” to succedd. So the press said Emerson, Lake & Palmer were spoiled rich kids, and that Emerson was a music academy graduate. None of this was true, yet many people still think so. Not that it should matter – the fact some people have the misfortune to be born to rich families shouldn’t mean they don’t have a right to make music, even rock music. That’s not very democratic. It’s more of a communist mindset. But I’m just pointing to the fact the press has no problem lying to advance a political agenda, even in music.
The facts are that Keith Emerson came from what you’d call a modest background and Greg Lake came from a dirt-poor background. Don’t know what was the status of Carl Palmer’s family, but he became a professional percussionist in his teens, and a damn good one. So they weren’t quite the spoiled rich kids the media made them out to be for its own reasons. At one point, before reaching success, Greg Lake was almost the proverbial starving musician, living in such poor conditions that once he caught a cold and nearly died of pneumonia. He couldn’t read music. Yet he developed his own style as a bassist and vocalist, played also electric and acoustic guitars, was able to perform Keith Emerson’s technically demanding compositions, and write his own pretty evocative melodies. How come? Because he was naturally talented and he also practiced a lot, not everything is money:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5n_lZ7Et6M
(Music and lyrics: Lake. Arr.: the band.) But the punk pushers insisted he had no place in music and should be brought down. Is that just? Why? You don’t have to like the music, but tell me why it was just to want to destroy the musicians.
“Second impression” below…
Continued…
According to Keith Emerson’s mother, he was an only child because they couldn’t afford to have more children. His musical talent started to show when as a toddler he started singing his own melodies. His parents scraped and saved to buy him a piano. His father, an amateur musician who couldn’t read music, insisted he should take lessons. His formal music education consisted of weekly lessons with a local “small-time” piano teacher, not a music academy his supposedly evil rich capitalist parents send him to just because they could. And he worked too – providing the piano in ballet classes and later playing in bars. At some point his teacher did indeed recommend sending him to the royal music academy, and being the piano prodigy that he was he could probably get a scholarship, but he was too timid and insecure to live alone in London as a teen. In school he used to play rocked-up versions of classical music to entertain the bullies, so they wouldn’t beat him up (didn’t help him much with the punks and music critics later). He became an avid jazz fan and learned to play jazz by ear. He formed his first trio, an instrumental jazz trio, in his teens. In his late teens he discovered the commonalities between jazz and Bach who became his favorite classical composer. His father was worried about his future and wanted him to get a secure job and a college education, but he dropped out of both due to the late night gigs of his band and his general “obsession” with music. Finally a London-based blues band heard of the extraordinary organ player from wherever he lived (I forget) and convinced him to move to London and join them, though he was not sure he could be a musician because he was shy and suffered of stage fright (he remained shy too, but learned how to hide it EXTREMELY well..). His father’s sound advice was that if he must be a musician he should make music people can sing. An advice he followed. Some of the time, anyway.
He’s one of the founders of progressive rock, starting with The Nice in the late 60s. One of the first to form a keyboard-driven rock band and the first one to succeed as a keyboardist front man (rock is considered a guitar-driven genre, though originally rocknroll had many pianists. It was far more difficult to make it in rock as a keyboard-driven band). He was one of the two first to create music for a rock band and an orchestra (the other was Jon Lord of Deep Purple in the same year in the late 60s). He’s one of the pioneers of the synthesizer in popular music. His music style is, unsurprisingly, mostly a hybrid of rock, jazz, and classical music, primarily contemporary classical music, not 19th century classical which is the more common influence. Avant-garde prog, a genre founded in the late 70s (and still alive, thank you very much), incorporates influences of contemporary classical music. Emerson did it almost a decade before. He’s considered by keyboardists one of the all time greatest rock keyboardists. And for all that the punk ideologues hated his guts.
That’s how it sounded in 1971:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itl8s98klWg
It’s basically an anti-war piece (though there’s a lot more to it), and Emerson’s music is always loaded with musical images, so in the first couple of minutes you should imagine the aggressive, cold, mechanic movement of a tank (a mechanic-animal hybrid war machine, to be precise
) and the shooting of its cannon, and see how it fits. It sounds exactly like that, even though Emerson wrote the main theme before it had a name or a subject. A very instinctive and intense musician. With a great sense of humor too. And one of the most misunderstood musicisians in the history of popular music. Maybe it will change some day. One day justice will have to be made.
At least the classical world is starting to come around (they used to hate him too back in the day). Apparently even the classical world is less rigid than what the rock world had become. So now there is, for a change, a classical adaptation of an ELP piece, the same piece:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcUMnC_ku0c
The sound quality is too low to really appreciate it, but the orchestration brings out to the light everything Emerson tried to do with only a synthesizer and two other musicians at hand. Maybe that’s how it really should sound. A powerful, haunting, contemporary classical piece. Pretty genius actually, with all the contradictory musical and emotional themes weaved into one another. So maybe he should have been born to a rich family and be sent to a music academy where his great talent whould have been recognized at an early age, nurtured and tutored, but the fact is he wasn’t. He turned to popular music which he loved too, but he had to be brought down for the sake of the “revolution”. The destruction of great musicians was the great tragedy and injustice, to them and to the audience, and not the fact Cid Vicious couldn’t play bass. There’s room for Cid Vicious in music, but there should also be room for Keith Emerson, don’t you think? Please tell me why it was – and still is – just to go after Emerson with such vengeance. I need a good reason to make sense of it all, and above all to come to terms with the loss. Which indeed makes me a “loser” as you said, but not exactly the way you meant it.
Emerson was just a young man experimenting with the various genres of music that he loved, music that was a perfectly authentic part of his personal evolution as an individual from childhood to adulthood. He wasn’t some green monster, or a representative of a social class, nor the ghost of Evil Capitalism incarnated. You don’t have to like his music, but tell me, was it just to want him destroyed? Is it just to treat musicians like him as if they had no right to exist? Is it just that the rock establishment still treats them like outcasts?
So you’re barking at the wrong tree here. If you want a “live and let live” talk to the punks and their spiritual descendants in the rock estbashlishment (critics, music journos, radio editors, the ridiculous “rocknroll hall of fame” and the like) who turned my fav music into an outcast, and who even today don’t miss an opportunity to verbally abuse it in the popular music magazines. Thank god for the Internet that lets some other voices sound too. It’s thanks to the Internet prog had a revival in the last couple of decades.
And I realize nobody reads this thread anymore, particularly not long “comments” like that (kinda fit my subject). Even the moderator probably just glossed over my first sentece. But some things just need a response.
Take a good hard listen to the Sex Pistols–a lot of venom, but no real ‘political’ bent. Not left, not right, just an explosion of sound and attitude. Ramones were like that. And the Dolls, and the Heartbreakers, the Dead Boys. Lot of bands were like that. No left no right–because the right was taken aback and the left was openly hated–and they could see it. So not a lot of politics.
Enter the Clash. Fusion of lefty hippie politics with punk. Thanks. Thanks a lot. After them, the hippies took over, lefty blather all over everything. Leftists ruin everything they touch.
Blondie? Talking Heads? Billy Idol? Joan Jett? B52s? Lou Reed?
Several are more active & sellouts; Greenday, Blink182.
Should have looked up bands that played at CBGB’s. Remember that place?
http://www.glidemagazine.com/articles/47763/cbgbs-last-call.html
One thing that is overlooked in this whole article and by everyone here is that the term “punk” has had different meanings over the years. The earliest use of the term that I can recall was used with derision by a snooty music critics (who didn’t really care for rock music music until SGT Pepper) to describe the hundreds of “garage rock bands” of the mid sixties (hence the often used term “60′s garage punk) Lenny Kaye (with no derision intended) also sued the term in the linear notes on some of his early 1960′s garage rock compilations. When “punk” exploded in 1977, the term was used more to decribe a movement. Bands a varied as The Sex Pistols, Blondie, The Talking Heads, The Stranglers, Tin Huey The Buzzcocks, The Pop Group XTC Eddie and the Hotrods ect were all for a while called “punk”. Then someone invented the term “New Wave”. Today it is come to mean music that is mostly Loud, Fast and confrontational.
I forgot to mention, Radio Birdman recorded a new Cd a few years ago released on Yep Rock records here in the states.
No one cares.
Who cares about what? You? Why should anyone care about you! Now go back to maing marmelade!
It was all inevitable of course, but I like to blame Henry Rollins for single-handedly ruining punk rock music in the U.S. It fell apart on his watch to say the least. The spitting in the U.K. translated into random violence in California as slam-dancing mutated into ‘mosh pits’. Everything became a life-or-death political stance, and the whole thing devolved from a form of exuberant expression to a conform-school for wayward misfits.
I’m fond of a Leonard Graves Phillips quote I heard him say at a Dickies show referring to the ‘old days’ when it was still “Punk Rock MUSIC”.
Even the worst of the original bands from all sides still have a sound more timeless and enduring than all the pseudo political noise from the 1980′s. Thank goodness we had the next wave of great bands like the Replacements and even The Cure to remind us that there was still plenty of uncharted territory for unexpected sonic delights.
Grumble. Gripe. Moan!
Never mind me.
Somewhere, sometime, someone will write an article about the early punk bands without ever once invoking the word ‘seminal’.
Sadly, this was not the place or the time.
Check out this rendition of “I Want To Be Sedated”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46bnp8I28FU&feature=related
Loved punk rock! Loved it! And kept all my “corporate rock” records too. Zeppelin, Clash, Styx, Ramones, Dead Boys, Rush, Genya Ravan, Patti Smith…
The list goes on. What’s with the controversy? Socialism sucks; music great! Fire bad! Bread good! I remember VH1 once had an early Sunday morning chit-chat show, typically with a panel of assumed liberals, and Johnny Rotten himself was on. And whenever an “issue” came up, Mr Anarchy himself, would counter-punch with the free-market argument. I loved it. Thanks for the piece, PJ.
For those of you disinclined to enjoy “punk rock,” I suggest you listen to “English Civil War,” by the Clash. That would be the middle video as I view this array. It is a re-worked “When Johnny Comes Marching Home.” It was a revelation to me back then, and it’s a revelation to me now. A folk song staple, punk-a-fied into pure power-chord heaven. And I know the argument is about commitment to contrary aesthetics and politics, but music is music.
Way back in the ’80s I was romantically involved with East Bay Ray (lead guitarist of Dead Kennedys) for several years. I found him to be somewhat shy, very sweet, extremely intelligent and enormously talented. As a member of DK his true genius with a guitar was never truly showcased, IMHO. Klaus Flouride (the bass player) was a good natured, fun-loving guy. But Biafra struck me as a bit of a jerk, and the more I learned about him, the less I liked him. Years later, the rest of the band sued him and won. He’d been ripping them off! Yeah, he was worse than the people he was pilorying with his lyrics. The rest of the guys were great, and reformed the band with other singers, going on several tours. It’s a shame they never achieved the same popularity with the other singers that they had while that hypocrite was fronting the band.