What the Fuck is Post Punk?

[bowiglou]

...Mary when I initially e-met you I heartily recommended Magazine's "Correct use of Soap", probably their most accessible album..now with a few years of knowledge of your taste I actually should have recommended their first two releases: Real Life and Secondhand Daylight......both great albums but a bit more 'spooky' and 'caustic' in veneer

yeah, Ken is right...I adore/adored the Doors.......I suspect I do have gut reaction to music, though I will admit when I hear one of you rave about an album , I might come in with some preconceptions...............so there is definitely a cognitive component (see the whole domain of 'confirmatory bias' and 'expectations' in the Social Psych lit).......However, I'm not totally susceptible to critic-bias....for instance, I fairly much loathe Arctic Monkeys and I read a few of the much hyped-reviews.......so for the most part I think I have a visceral reaction to music, and especially as Ken alluded to, when it is associated with some event of history....................guess music touches my head and my heart!!!!

[pauledwardwagemann]

mary said:

Well, the thing about the prefix "post" is - it's always supposed to imply a simultaneous disavowal of the thing which proceeds it, combined with an undeniable debt of influence and respect. That's certainly what it means in the term "postmodernism" in which postmodern artists are self-consciously trying to move "beyond" modernism while at the same time inevitably affected by it. (In fact within art history circles there's an endless debate as to whether postmodernism is a distinct thing at all, or just another reflex of modernism itself) So I agree with Reynolds that there was a genuine effort on the part of former punkers to distance themselves from punk as they embraced post-punk, but I actually think the self-consciousness of this effort betrays the extent to which the long shadow of punk still hovers over all these bands - like the absent father or whatever.

Also in the case of Johnny Rotten you have to keep in mind that a lot of what he was doing was less about "punk" per se than about Malcolm McLaren. He resented the scope of McLaren's influence over the Pistols, and the way that McLaren dictated "orthodoxy" for the band. So he was determined, after the Pistols, to reinvent himself in a way that gave him a distinct persona from the one McLaren had foisted upon him.

I'd be interested in reading the Reynolds book sometime, but probably not this summer....in the next month I have to plan two university classes, sell 80% of my possessions, find a new apartment, move across the country, and start a completely new life.... so not much reading-for-fun for me this summer, alas

Cheers,
M

Ah yes, starting a new life...I used to do that every couple of years of so, but now with a kid that's not so practical...
I really dont know enough about post-modernism to compare it to postpunk...and I cant think of any other 'post' movements either. Maybe this book will change my perspective, but it seems to me that the bands Reynolds is labeling as post punk, although certainly influenced by Punk were mainly just a continuation of art rock or new wave rock.
The thing is that punk in the US had never made that big of a impact nationally, it was always smaller local scenes. From the early NY stuff onto the DC scene and hardcore. So I really dont see punk as a huge enough influence in the US to have spurned something that could be called Postpunk. What I do see though is a continuous line of art rock bands that eventually became what was called New Wave Rock and then morphed into College Rock radio, which then became 'Alternative rock' and then eventually became Indie Rock. And is now virtually on the cusp of becoming straight up 'Outsider Rock'. And I'm not really sure where Brit Punk or Brit Postpunk plays a part in any of this. I guess that's why I'm interested in the subject at this time...

Here's a blogger that kinda agrees with me:
www.last.fm/user/RowanInBlack/journal/2006/05/17/137718/

[pauledwardwagemann]

One Brit postpunk band that looks interesting is the Telelvison Personalities. Does anyone have any songs by them that they could post on the YSI thread? They had an album in 1981, ...And Dont the Kids just Love it..., that Andrew Earles discribed like this:
"The album is the gem deed of hyper-cynical, over-artsy punk rock Situational hippies with a frightening knack for incandescent postpunk pop..."




*Bonus Track* For those of you looking to find late 70s/early 80s punk on vinyl, here's the best place for that I've found:
www.collectorscum.com/index.html

[skvorisdeadsorta]

Most of the bands that Reynolds lists were obviously an extension of Art Rock, and Prog Rock. Like he mentioned in the book several times, which it sounds like you have yet to read or fully comprehend what it is that the book plainly states, they have elements of punk that was mixed with other elements of other genres. There was still a quality to the music that would not have been there had punk rock never happened.

I would also like to point out that punk rock was a huge phenomenon in the United States. Minor Threat was on Saturday Night Live for god's sakes along with Fear and the fact that The Clash were pretty huge.

As I have pointed out before, Punk was actually coined way before the term of "new wave". Got it? BEFORE! It was a magazine that was started by Legs McNeil and a friend and if you would actually read the articles posted throughout the internet instead of skimming through them for information that you want to hear, you would be better off. Punk was also a derrogatory term in the 70s that had several connotations, one of those being that of a male prostitute. So you can see why during the 70s, labels who were signing bands decided to get radio air play, they might want to call the bands "new wave". This phenomenom has been explained on the "Punk" IFC produced documentary from guys such as Jello Biafra and a slew of others.

[skvorisdeadsorta]

pauledwardwagemann said:

mary said:

It's ridiculous to criticize a book that is supposed to be about BRITISH PUNK ROCK for being about.... British punk rock. And Savage intended his book to be even more narrowly focused than that: its primary object is the Sex Pistols, although obviously Savage is trying to use the Pistols to capture a more broad cultural zeitgeist, so the book also looks at British punk more generally. So naturally it ends when the Pistols perform their last, infamous concert at Winterland. Surely if I decided to write a book about the Ramones it would be ridiculous for some Anglophile to criticize me for neglecting British punk.

Besides which, Savage doesn't deny the significance of American punk in the book - there's a discussion of CBGBs, Hilly Kristal, the Ramones, the New York Dolls, Television, Richard Hell, and Patti Smith - but it's brief because the book is about England, not America.

As for Duran Duran - pretty good band. Not really my favorite kind of music but catchy. Good stuff to throw on at a party for sure.

M

I wasn't criticizing Savage's book per say, I was criticizing the common attitude among Brits of thinking of Punk Rock only in terms of the Sex Pistols (with perhaps a nod to the Ramones) when in fact punk rock was totally an AMerican original that Maclcolm Mclaren ripped off...

A little late on a few of these, but dude, the reason why the British act like they invented Punk Rock is that most bands weren't known until McLaren's brilliant PR made Punk Rock known. Yeah, we invented it and then the Brits promoted the hell out of it. If hadn't been for them, it would have been a sidenote that became popular later like the Velvet Underground.

[skvorisdeadsorta]

"Reynolds argue in his book that Postpunk looked at punk as having failed."

In so much as that he argues that the punks were very disenfranchised in what had happened after punk. Many in the genre that was supposed to just be about straight up rock and roll with zero pretenses, got caught up in money, fame, pretenses, drugs, and untouchable status as most of the big hippie rock bands of the 60s had. They had become the very thing that they hated so many left. It wasn't that they failed, they had just veered a little too far off of the path that they had initially placed themselves on. I think with post-punk, many felt that they were taking control over their own destiny again. They find a way to be quietly subversive as oppossed to being in everyone's faces all of the time.

[Thorngrub]

skvorisdeadsorta said:

A little late on a few of these, but dude, the reason why the British act like they invented Punk Rock is that most bands weren't known until McLaren's brilliant PR made Punk Rock known. Yeah, we invented it and then the Brits promoted the hell out of it. If hadn't been for them, it would have been a sidenote that became popular later like the Velvet Underground.

Excellent, necessary point there man. That's a perspective I hadn't thought of - - and you're perfectly right. kudos

[Thorngrub]

the punk I listen to right now are old records by the Accused and Nausea, mainly.

Sure the latter is a grindcore band, and you can call the Accused what you want, but if you think they're not punk, you can all bite my ass *sneers*

[skvorisdeadsorta]

Thanks!

[Thorngrub]

Any punk that dated from the 80's on is post-punk to me bitches/*pukes*

[skvorisdeadsorta]

Oh man, I have been rediscovering the San Francisco scene with The Screamers, Flipper, and a bunch of Maximum Rock N Roll comps I have from the early 80s.

The Accussed is totally punk rock. Totally.

[pauledwardwagemann]

skvorisdeadsorta said:

I would also like to point out that punk rock was a huge phenomenon in the United States. Minor Threat was on Saturday Night Live for god's sakes along with Fear and the fact that The Clash were pretty huge.

The Clash werent huge in the US until Combat Rock. Also Fear only appeared on SNL because John Belushi was a huge fan of punk rock and said that the only way he would guess host is Fear appeared on the show as musical guest--its not like Fear was so popular that they just had to be on. As for Minor Threat??? When the hell were they ever on? Please, dont bullshit me. Are you talking about the same show Fear was on where Ian MacKaye and a few other punks from the DC area got up on stage, surrounded Fear and started a mosh pit before the producers could pull the plug and cut away to a short of Eddie Murphy that they had waiting in the wings?
I think you are being deceptive saying that punk was big in the US if that is what you are referring to: Fear being on SNL and a couple DC punks jumping up on stage during their performance. Punk made a slight blimp on the pop culture radar in the early 80s, but it was more along the lines of fabricated made-for-tv bands that appeared on CHiPs or Quincy episodes than any real hardcore influence.

[skvorisdeadsorta]

Yeah, that's the one. Minor Threat on SNL for the Fear show. I thought that had full on played, but that is not the case.

Alright, seriously, punk was huge in the SEVENTIES. The Sex Pistols were pretty big in America, especially after all of their antics on their US Tour. Blondie was huge. HUGE. Talking Heads were HUGE. The Clash got pretty big with "London Calling" and with a couple of singles like "Rock The Casbah" before "Combat Rock". Still, the bands actually being on those mainstream network channels means that punk did have a pop culture effect. It wasn't like it was the Beatles, but it was there.

Also, being on SNL at that time was a big deal. Come on.

Deceptive? Dude, hardly, that's what you're for.

[pauledwardwagemann]

thorny said:

Any punk that dated from the 80's on is post-punk to me bitches/*pukes*

The thing is Punk wasnt really big enough in the US on a national level to warrant having a post punk genre named after it. Punk was a bunch of small local scenes scattered across the US and connected via zines, independent record lables and stores, and dudes who drove across country in broken down vans playing abrasive guitar noise in teenage kids basements or shitty clubs. The sex pistols barely made an appearance in the US national stage, and that was only as a novelty cameo--nothing close to the impact they had in the UK. So there wasnt this huge backlash against punk by US bands like their was in the UK. Instead punk pretty much remained underground. I mean how punk bands did you see on Mtv? Punk was turning more hardcore however, and getting more extreme inside its own little underground/local scenes until it became sort of a lame joke--with the exception of a few bands like the circle jerks and dead kennedys.
Anyway, I cant see postpunk being a term that applies to anything but the rock that followed the punk explosion in '76-'78 in the UK.

[pauledwardwagemann]

skvorisdeadsorta said:

Yeah, that's the one. Minor Threat on SNL for the Fear show. I thought that had full on played, but that is not the case.

Alright, seriously, punk was huge in the SEVENTIES. The Sex Pistols were pretty big in America, especially after all of their antics on their US Tour. Blondie was huge. HUGE. Talking Heads were HUGE. The Clash got pretty big with "London Calling" and with a couple of singles like "Rock The Casbah" before "Combat Rock". Still, the bands actually being on those mainstream network channels means that punk did have a pop culture effect. It wasn't like it was the Beatles, but it was there.

Also, being on SNL at that time was a big deal. Come on.

Deceptive? Dude, hardly, that's what you're for.

Okay, I'm just gonna say that yoru defintion of punk and mine are totally different. The Talking Heads were not punk--they played in some of the same venues as punk bands, but they were an Art Rock band (or New Wave Rock band along with telelvision, pere ube, devo, modern lovers, the cars, etc.). Same goes for Blondie. As for the Clash, personally I never heard of them until Combat Rock (although I was only about 14 at the time) and by that time they were Brit postpunk more than they were punk. And I already explained about the Sex Pistols being barely a blimp on the national radar in the US...more of a novelty along th elines of "Oh look at those whacky Brits with their safety pins in their noses--they'll do anything to try and get noticed by the big ole USA--let's just pat them on the heads and send them on their way..." That's hardly a huge influence...