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This is why Punk happened.

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Our Parents were out of control and had to be brought back to earth.

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  4. Nah, punk happened because of high concept triple albums, double-necked guitars, capes on stage, satin tour jackets, private 747s with the bands name on them, 30-minute drum solos, 14-year-old groupies, making the audience wait 4 hours because the ‘vibe’ wasn’t right, keyboard and guitar solos having to be exactly the same length because of the monstrous egos of the players, prog versions of songs from West Side Story, songs about goblins, coke-addled bass players stumbling around the stage, and your big brother liking Yes so you had to hate them.

    Talking of punk, what do Jimi Hendrix and Johnny Thunders have in common, as of yesterday?

  5. This is a wide open field with many factors, but I’ll just plant my flag here and say I (pretty much) hate punk. It’s brattish, unsophisticated and has an air of am dram pantomime that I can never quite stomach.

    I think the worst thing is its in-built aggressiveness, this stupid “us vs them” sneering attitude. If you are one of us, then great. But if you don’t like what we are doing, then it isn’t meant for you anyway. It must be thrilling for those on board for the party, to feel like you are part of a gang kicking it to the man, but it also must get like a feedback loop where you can just disregard any opposing view. It’s immensely off-putting for the general populace (and the fact that’s kind of the point makes it worse).

    I suppose I’ve never really liked tribalism, especially when it’s based around aggression. In this way, I feel the same about punks as I do about football fans (the loud, boorish ones or sectarian ones anyway).

    There have been good things that have come out of the general sense of “new wave” attitude and forward-thinking of the late seventies (The Cure, Talking Heads, The Jam, etc) but I think the sad little circle of “punk” in the middle was a bit of a damp squib.

    Okay, I’ve said my piece, now I’ll get back to my Dire Straits and my Pink Floyd!

    • What the red-top newspapes & public think of as “punk” is the Sex Pistols and the Clash. What I think is the crap bands like Eater, the Exploited and GBH who occupy the Punx Not Dead festivals at Butlins.

      The pistols were a great rock and roll band with an ace guitarist recycling Chuck Berry riffs (compare with AC/DC), the Clash were almost ‘World Music’ by comparison (compare London Calling and Sandanista with their first album).

      Punk was the leveller which led on to post-punk/new wave. There’s really not much difference between the Modern Lovers (1973), the first two Talking Heads albums and early Dire Straits. Knopfler never had an Eno/African phase, though.

    • Let’s try to avoid received wisdom in this discussion. Many of us lived through the punk wars. As a teen progressive fan, I had no problem with punk and the opening up of things – “Third Uncle” on an Eno album was exciting, and I knew of iggy Pop through Alice Cooper, and liked them both. I was never one for 20-minute drum solos and elf-themed albums – I was too much of a “science head”. (Besides, long solos were a hangover from the psychedelic/blues-boom 60s – Cream, Grateful Dead, Ten Years After, etc, were doing them when the most progressive thing was “The Nice” and “Days of Future Past”.) There were a lot of people like me at the early punk gigs in Brighton squaring the circle.

      What I DIDN’T like about punk was that suddenly people would throw glasses at gigs, spit, and provoke fights (possibly by spitting, throwing glasses, and covering people in expensive club beer). The morons who did this (initiated, I believe, by Sid Vicious who contributed to someone losing their eye at the 100 Club; another time he hit someone with a bicycle chain) were not sticking it to hippies. They were just pricks.

      Last thing; Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, Fleetwood Mac, and The Eagles didn’t get touched by punk. You want decadence, that’s where it was, not in Van der Graaf Generator.

  7. Punk has had more impact on me personally than any other ‘genre’ or ‘movement’.
    Having participated in audiences & garage bands & discussed the whole thing at inordinate length with numerous pals & fellow travellers the following is clear.
    It was great fun, far more about doing it yourself & discovering art, literature, politics etc. than being against anybody else.
    That said, by the time it was defined & labelled, it was effectively over- meaning I’d actually missed it by perhaps 2 years & it rapidly became an orthodoxy that was far more closed minded than anything it had once railed against.
    Slavish, dolt punks were the absolute pits. Happy & proud to be ignorant & boorish. This is where many peoples’ notion of punk stems from.
    A generation or 2 of media savvy types took part or were inspired by it, so it got endless retrospectives & mullings over that were disproportionate to what it had actually been, as opposed to what some folks thought it should have been.
    I’ve always loved the comment ( possibly by Edwin Collins) that ‘Punk was buying ‘The Ramones’ and ‘Pet Sounds’ on the same day’.
    Truth is, there was no Year Zero, & there’s loads of Prog & other stuff under the bonnet of the ‘Punk’ motor- Lydon never disguised his love of Peter Hamill, Can & Beefheart to cite just one.
    Nearly all my dearest associates were punks or very influenced by it & was their springboard to a world of much broader possibilities- they aren’t nostalgic for the thing itself, having found their true passions as a result of having ‘got involved’ at an almost fleeting moment.

    • Right, interesting. I was too young for punk at the time so didn’t hear about until later, after The Young Ones, after Sid Snot, etc, so maybe I’m railing against the cliche it became rather than the open-minded voyage of discovery you describe. “Buying The Ramones and Pet Sounds on the same day” – yes, that I can get with.

      • When asked who Edwyn Collins wanted to produce Orange Juice’s debut album, he (in)famously replied “Either John Fogerty or Nile Rodgers”. Hardly rejecting the past, that. I can hear both CCR and Chic in OJ’s music.

      • Seems improbable now, but when I started grammar school in ‘74, all the ‘smart’ 6th Formers wore flared black cords & would lecture anybody within earshot about how Floyd Live at Pompei was the ‘pinnacle of Western civilisation’ or some such tosh – they were very smug & absolutely sure of their ‘superior, serious taste‘ – a definite part of my relish of punk type stuff was a reaction to that pomposity as much anything in the wider world.
        Once upon a time everything in pop culture was a reaction to a greater or lesser extent to what gone before- meaning a blanket dismissal of the previous era was almost obligatory- From Teddy Boys right up to New Romantics, probably.
        It doesn’t happen anymore & in many ways that’s a relief!

        • I entered sixth form in 1974 and I was into Sparks, a bit of Roxy Music, more Sparks and Elton John. Some of my contemporaries were insisting that I should be listening to Pink Floyd and Mike Oldfield and, of course, Jimi Hendrix, but (unknown to me at the time) the Ramones were already making the music I would love and am still listening to…. along with Sparks, of course!

    • I’m with Junglejim on this. Music for and by those without enormous amounts of money behind them – DIY spirit, that lived on through indie culture and bands like Crass and Chumbawamba following their own path.

      The rest is just generic (ha!) noise.

  8. Chiz’s resume of the record industry c. 1974 is spot on.
    Those pictures of the Sainted Dave, Lou Reed, John Lennon etc. in LA genuinely, ironic given the punk angle, make me want to vomit.
    I hate it. The mid-1970s were awful.
    Problem is I hate punk too (simply replaced something crass with something crass, I can barely tell the two apart), and my earliest memories of pop music (Philly Soul, Bryan Ferry, Reggae), I also hate.
    Triffic … I’ve won the jackpot!

    It was only when I listened to the early Beatles/Stones et al that I realised I did like pop music, and it was those guys, no D.J, who got me into black music. Indeed, DJs, circa 1970s/dire 1980s like Robbie Vincent, put me off black music.

    The only post-60s act that even slightly addressed what I thought of the world was Weller (“I woke up sweating to this modern nightmare,” “the public get what the public want, but I want nothing that society’s got”), or, and I’ve only discovered this in the last month, The Modern Lovers.

    It strikes me that Jonathan Richman is a real hero, who straddles the 60s and beyond. I’m definitely claiming him for the Golden Age.
    In 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974 when EVERYONE looked shite (including the Sainted Dave), he looked fabulous; when everyone else was snorting coke, he was boasting of being straight; and his version of pop music went back to the 50s, it didn’t start in 1965.
    The Modern Lovers LP must be the most ahead-of-its-time record ever made. It’s as if The Beatles had done Sgt. Pepper’s in 1963.
    I really like the guy.

    • That first Modern Lovers album was recorded in 1972 I believe, even though it wasn’t released until 1975 or 1976. Absolutely no one was doing anything like that at the time.

    • Wow! That’s a lot of music not to like…. Since the 60s, the only acts you like are Paul Weller and Jonathan Richman? Or am I misunderstanding you – those are the only SEVENTIES acts you like?

      • I don’t much care for anything after the 60s and, in an age of expanding back catalogues everywhere, I can live off 50s and 60s recordings for ever anyway. There’s only one Golden Age.

        Weller? Nope, don’t much care for him either … I own “no” Weller albums … but there’s no doubt that one or two of his observations at the beginning of the dire 1980s chimed, and still do, with my own. “Town Called Malice” is another.

        Thing is, I put myself – aged 20 or so (also rans), circa 1972, when I should have been 30 (Beatles, Dylan et al) – and imagine what I might have done as a performer or punter. Here’s another act I slightly get, Dr. Feelgood.
        Strewth, that’s two! And with about 4 Jam 45s, two-and-a-half!
        I’m on a roll!

    • While our musical tastes differ – I love TSOP & Reggae – I think you are spot on about Jonathan Richman.
      Jon Savage chose The Modern Lovers as the starting point for his superb ‘England’s Dreaming‘ book on punk which I consider pretty much the definitive work so far.
      This is contrary to the received MC5/Stooges wisdom, although Jonathan was famously obsessed with the VU & loved Iggy.
      He was totally against the prevailing grain & interestingly, by the time many others had adopted the ‘snotty’ attitude synonymous with ‘punk’, he’d moved on to sweet guileless ditties about honey bees & was mistaken by fools almost as a simpleton.
      He could have been cashing in, but followed his heart & produced some of the most beautiful rock n roll & pop music I’ve ever heard. I’ll treasure some of his gigs in the 80s to my dying day.
      A proper artist & absolute one off.

  9. Punk was a useful corrective even if not many of the records stand up. A whole style change came about in terms of dress, haircuts and the sound of records and how they were made. The new wave, sharp and snappy, more diverse acts, post punk, all freshened up the scene. Even old guard acts had more aggression and attitude. Many acts that weren’t punk and emerged at that time made music that you couldn’t imagine in the charts or even hearing prior to punk. Ian Dury, Madness, synth bands and many more vital new stars were all able to find success with the upheaval that came about. That was good. And a more diverse bunch of musicians. Women!

  10. Lots of negative comments on YouTube for this, except about the tits of the females.
    It’s not a great performance by any means and it drags on a bit too long, but it’s an old prison work-song so it’s meant to be somewhat dirge-y.
    Of course Rockists would hate it on principle. No widdly/crunchy/jangling guitars, so it can’t possibly be any good.

  11. Punk happened, like many other tribal youth moments, because a number of people were dis-satisfied with their lot, had nothing to do, and found like-minded people who could share that release of energy.
    Punk as a thing is not truly about the music, although that was the catalyst, it was about an attitude, a belief in ones own abilities (or lack of abilities) to do something, be heard, and be happy they have achieved it.
    Musically, it was a reaction to the ponderousness and MOR and novelty that filled the airwaves, and the fact there was an aggressive streak came form the way untutored players played (I still play like that). Once you get 2 or 3 bands doing that, others follow the buzz.
    The first wave was genuinely exciting, and not as one-dimensional as perhaps media histories tell us. It was the second wave spiky haired brigade that genericised it.
    People like Howard Devoto and John Lydon could see beyond three chord thrash and create something interesting.
    And Punk gave a platform to many artists who weren’t Punk, but without them may never have got out of the backroom a Pub – The Jam, Elvis Costello, XTC

    Punk was intended to be all embracing – about what you want to do, not how cool your trousers are or how big your mohican is.
    The original “break down the walls” Punk was over by 1978. This opened up the playing field for more tolerance, more creation, more invention, and less reliance on “the man”.
    It was another in the long line of Youth Cults that occur every few years when the world (and not just the music world) needs freshening up a bit.

    I may only have been 7, but I identify as a Punk. I like to thank I share it’s ideals and tolerances.
    And despite the amusement of seeing 60 year old blokes in ripped jeans, huge mohicans and spider web tattoos on their face, a nicer bunch of people (OK, with some exceptions) you couldn’t wish to be stuck with at Butlins events or Rebellion Festival.

    • I was on the seafront the other day and saw an older couple out cycling. The bloke was dressed in a nondescript way, the lady was about 65 with grey hair and riding one of those Dutch style bikes in a sedate fashion. She was wearing a Stiff Little Fingers T Shirt.

  12. This is fun. In truth I was a bit frightened of ‘real’ punks , in the same way I was of real rockers(as in mods and)and am now of the scarier end of the Bearded Theory type crusty component. Real as in embracing the lifestyle of booze, drugs, violence and crime that often sits within such hardcore single mindedness. Much too middle class, me. But, back in 1975, I was still strangely drawn to it, eavesdropping and peeping in. I liked the idea and liked those who had enough ability to recycle the past in the emperors new clothes: the Clash, the Damned and the Stranglers. New wave, when those who looked and thought more like me joined in, I adored and still do. But I never chucked out my old prog records either. Or folk. Or country. All just music, innit?

  14. Punk was also the final pop culture invention of the Baby Boomers, and they have held sway over media/academia/ music industry for enough time to make the year zero version the historical orthodoxy, although as people here have pointed out that may not be what people felt at the time. Yet despite being born too late, I enjoy the Jon Savage/ Greil Marcus commentaries and so lend an ear to punk things that seem interesting and odd, but find much of it (Sham 69 or even The Clash) sounds underwhelming. I go with the cliché that the 6th year of every decade(1956-86?) had a readjustment to rock music that could be misinterpreted as a brand new start.

  15. I always considered punk was just one branch of a more general ‘back to basics’ movement. Yes, it was a reaction to the excesses of prog et al, but you had the likes of Dr. Feelgood and a host of pub rock bands paving the way and doing just that years before the sainted Pistols. There were a few good records, but not many, and most of the punk thing seemed to be about attitude and being obnoxious. The whole year zero twaddle annoyed me too, as if nothing else had had value that been recorded before some vague date in….well, 1975?

    • Dr Feelgood were brilliant in 1975 weren’t they, and I regard Ian Dury and even The Stranglers as arising from pub rock.

      I enjoyed Punk. It livened things up just when a bit of excitment was sorely needed. The country was in a dire state, under a Labour government, bailed out by the IMF, growing employment, rampant inflation etc. Life was pretty grey.

      The Sex Pistols had rumbled on for a little while but punk was short-lived (26th October 1976 to 28th October 1977 in my view, New Rose to Bollocks). I saw early Clash, Damned and Banshees and queued up for a Sex Pistols gig that the local authority cancelled. It was a wild, exciting time and kicked open the door for some great innovative musicians and bands that were unlikely to get anywhere prior to Punk. New Wave was packed with fantastic music that I still listen to today.

      Thank god for Punk I say.

      • One year for punk? Can I ask what made it stop for you in 1977? One of the complaints I’ve heard about the Swinging Sixties was that it didn’t swing for a lot of people away from Carnaby St and Haight-Ashbury. Is punk then similarly restricted to a small coterie of those who were ‘there’?

        • We waited a long time for Bollocks. By then, the music had become more sophisticated and less bloody. Ian Dury, Elvis Costello and The Jam beat The Sex Pistols to their debut albums. Plus, the Americans had stepped forward from Punk with Television, Talking Heads and Blondie etc. You could go to gigs without worrying about your physical safety.

          I enjoyed Punk but I loved New Wave.

        • For those of us outside London, we had to rely on John Peel and Sounds which had the best coverage of this strange movement emerging. The first record for me was the first Ramones album which was both brilliant and hilarious. I always think it is a giveaway that someone either wasn’t there or didn’t get it if they missed the humour in punk.

          I saw the Pistols on Xmas eve 1977. They were my favourite band, NMTB was my favourite album ever and that night they were fantastic. I haven’t been to a more exciting gig since. I knew then that punk had probably come to an end. The reason was that they only played one new song- Belsen Was A Gas. For me punk was about new and exciting music. The Sex Pistols were the kings and for them to be producing only one new song was worrying even though their album was only a couple of months old. It seemed like great punk singles were being released every month and it was a singles genre.

          They split up a month later and were irreplaceable really. In March, I think it was, the Buzzcocks released Another Music In A Different Kitchen, a brilliant punk album. There continued to be some great punk records released, but as time went on a fairly clearly defined look for punks was established as was a clearly defined sound for punk rock. New Wave and post punk was much more interesting than 3rd Division punk as was the influences of those bands, something that they weren’t ashamed to hide.

  16. Punk opened the door for (some) working class youth to realise that they could make records and play live. You didn’t need tons of money or go to university, though Art School might help. You could be on the the dole or have a grant and make a noise. You could be bored and not know what you wanted to do with your life and the government would give you money until you were happy with your Art.

    And of course Post-Punk was even better!

  18. I turned 18 in October 1977, so I was the right age for punk, and punk was my thing. If I had turned 18 in 1957, I would probably have been a teddy boy; if I had turned 18 in 1967, I would probably have been into kaftans and psychedelia; if I had turned 18 in 1987, I would probably have been a goth.

    • I turned 18 in early 1988 and goth was already on its last spidery legs by ’87. It was the early days of Acid House – Jack Your Body, MARRS, Hi-NRG. I think you’d have been a smiley-face raver.

    • I was born in 1973 and turned 18 in 1991, so by rights I should have been into.. .. what? Baggy? Acid house? Early Britpop? I must have been born at the wrong time because I don’t really rate any of that stuff and my golden age marker is much earlier.

      • Acid House (begat Rave) and Baggy were over by mid-’91, the Hacienda closed for the first time, and it was a bit early for early Britpop. Take your pick from Shoegazing, Grunge and Screamadelica. Or, in my case, all three.

        • Forgot about grunge. And I suppose I was including Screamadelica and Shoegaze under Baggy. I feel like Deramdaze now (see comments above) but i didn’t really LOVE any of them.

          Screamadelica was decent, but I preferred the Dixie Narco EP that followed it (and always wished they had done more in that style).

          Oh actually, I loved Spiritualized.

          If I go any further I will keep remembering stuff I quite like and it’s going to go a bit “what did the Romans ever do for us?”….

          But I suppose my point is, I never, ever felt part of any movement and I don’t think my music taste has ever had anything to do with my age. Even the “softer” stuff I like, like Dire Straits, Mike Oldfield and (yes) Enya, I loved that when I was 17 and all through my adult years, so it wasn’t as if I mellowed out when I aged.

          • Grunge was basically just re-cycled Neil Young. A bit louder and a bit more boring. Nice shirts though. I do like a good lumberjack shirt. I can highly recommend Landsend UK. That’s where I buy mine.

              • Rave? I don’t remember any previous genre reminiscent of jumping up and down to a hideous electronic repetitive squall whilst clutching a bottle of Evian. I’ll give it that. Originality in its horribleness.

                  • I quite like The Sex Pistols in small doses. PIL were/are far better. I also like The Stranglers, then as now. I too was a bit a young for the original punk era itself.

                  • Ooh, that’s a statement. I’m sure we’ve discussed this on here before.

                    I’m sure my answer would be trip-hop (ugly phrase but it fits the genre) for the last truly ground-breaking musical genre.

                    But if you are talking a cultural shift… hmmmm….. Much as I am not a fan, wouldn’t you have to include Oasis and all that Britpop stuff? It seemed to forge a generation of bedroom guitarists and scallies. I suppose it wasn’t really musically ground-breaking though, which rave was.

                    • At 25 years distance, play some mid-period Blur and it sounds like the Kinks. Oasis sounded like the Rutles back then and even more so now.

                      Acid House sounded like nothing which had come before. The illegal warehouse parties and raves in home counties fields certainly seemed like the new punk at the time. The Man certainly thought so, enough to use the law to get it shut down.

                      I didn’t much like the music (a 2CD compilation was, and still is, enough for me) or the drugs, but raves were proper underground Events.

                      I saw 808 State in a Slough warehouse. The bass kicked so hard I threw up a fountain of bottled lager.

      • I think the music from the late 80s and early 90s that has aged the best is old school hip hop. I was 18 in 1987 and Public Enemy were by far the most exciting act in the world. Add in De la Soul, Eric B and Rakim, the Beasties, A Tribe Called Quest and the rest and you have a vibrant and innovative scene.

        There’s a recent compilation called The Daisy Age that covers this time which is really good.

        • I love a lot of that stuff, and I also love the stuff in the later 90s that kept the same spirit going, like Jurassic Five and Ugly Duckling. But it was only in the later 90s/ early noughties, I got into all that.

          And I think it has aged best because it was all based around timeless, warm sounding 60s/70s drum and groove samples.

        • Have an ‘up’ Hawk – that period was a brief golden age with tons of great stuff, seemingly coming out all the time & a generally friendly vibe on dance floors that played it!
          I recall it being a real musical shot in the arm at the time & seemed to dovetail in nicely with Rare Groove & even Go-Go (though that was very short lived!)

  19. I’m a buddhist. Stay with me here. As far as I can see Buddhism has had 3 waves. The origins (whats known as Theravada – the original Buddhism) the Buddha reacts to his native Hindu-ism with its pantheon of Gods by saying, there is/are no God(s), people can work out their own liberation from the in built disatisfaction of life by meditating/being ethical/self discipline.

    Other years and millenia, more teachings get put on to this – (this is the Mahayana school)including a pantheon of Gods, heavenly realms and calling on others to help with your liberation ie prayer to higher forc) which to me indicates a basic human need for religion/transcendental values – ie something bigger and better than us.

    The third wave – Zen – a reaction to the above,back to basics, stripped down, back to yourself dealing with your life. Remind you of anything?

    Let’s go back to 1976, I’m a 12 year old rock fan going to a Catholic school. I was a Bowie fan way back in 1972/73/74. I saw the TOTP Starman and it spoke to me as a alienated skinny second generation immigrant and got me into music. He’s moved a bit too fast for me and I didn’t keep up with Young Americans and am floundering around looking for my new excitement. That year I am investigating the Who, Bob Marley and Peter Frampton – an interesting dead end. I bought Frampton Comes Alive because of the upbeat energetic single – Show Me the Way – and found it full of dull as dishwater soft rock – however it exposed me to the rock du jour.

    I have been watching So It Goes which goes out late night in my area, for the anarchic slightly Pythonesque presentation – featuring the Albertos and Clive James and Tony Wilson being snidey and silly. The Sex Pistols come on doing Anarchy in the UK. I can still remember the thrill. It’s strangely different to everything else, not out and out wild rock but contains a suppressed violence and disastisfaction that you can’t quite put your finger on. I think, in hindsight, fed up with the bullshit of the Catholic regime I was forcefed, I identified with Johnny Rotten’s (also brought up a Catholic) speaking truth to bullshit and power.

    Then I was hooked. Started buying the NME and my sister, 4 years old and on the scene started taking me to gigs. In 78/78. I saw the Jam, XTC, Buzzcocks, Clash, Damned, Elvis Costello and caught up with many of the rest over the next decade or so. I still love the Buzzcocks, the perfect band for lovelorn teens and the first Clash album really encapsulates the reality of the ‘shit McJob – get your kicks where you can’ lifestyle that many people lead in a defiant yet empowering manner.

    I feel Rotten painted himself into a corner with his negative world view. After one defiant angry blast you have to go positive. Bless him, he has tried in his music to move forward but unfortunately his public persona seems to be a bit of a Kenneth Williams Chat Show staple, aiming for national treasure but more of an embarassing Uncle that never grew up.

    For me the real gem of Punk came in 1978, 79 even up to 1980 – both the stayers – Television Personalities, Subway Sect, Gang of Four but also especially all those indie one off singles by people with much more creativity than technical ability who created funny, deep, one off magic. Just a few examples off the top of my head

    Television Personalities – Part Time Punks and everything else
    The Mekons – Where were You
    Girls at Our Best – Getting Nowhere Fast
    Golinski Brothers – Bloody.

    Talking to others on the scene at that time – it seems every town had their own Punk/new wave band or two whose best songs are still remembered fondly loved by those who saw them. I would love a British Alan Lomax to collect these.

    Over and out

    PS – I always take ages to write/respond to threads and feel that I by the time I have posted I have missed the boat and no-one is reading so please prove me wrong by commenting. Thanks

  20. Since there has been some dispute over the actual meaning of “punk”, would anyone care to name, say, five songs they consider to be the best examples of the punk genre? Is that possible, or is it too wide ranging? I’m just curious as I might end up coming out and liking some of it after all.

    Anarchy in the UK would be one, surely?

  21. Hi Arthur – I can’t reduce it to 5, so give this dozen a perusal (in no order at all)
    New Rose – The Damned
    Action Time Vision -ATV
    Complete Control- The Clash
    Perfect Day – The Saints
    God Save The Queen – Sex Pistols
    California Über Alles- Dead Kennedys
    You Say You Don’t Love Me – Buzzcocks
    Search and Destroy- Iggy & The Stooges
    Identity – X Ray Spex
    Roadrunner (Twice)-The Modern Lovers
    Where’s Captain Kirk? – Spizz Energi
    Rockaway Beach – Ramones

    A bit of mixed bag- if you can’t find anything you like in there, it probably *isn’t* for you!

  22. Giving you 5 of the absolute genius, one off, post punk singles
    Siouxsie and the Banshees – Hong Kong Garden, – just two chords, described by ZigZag magazine at the time as The Velvets play the Water Margin and quite unlike anything else they, or anyone else did subsequently
    The Cure – Killing an Arab/10.15 Saturday Night – perfectly formed quirk pop from the get go.
    The Normal – TVOD/Warm Leatherette – possibly my favourite single of all time
    Joy Division – Transmission – yet another two chord wonder. Check out the Warsaw semi-legal album -not quite there yet but well interesting
    Alternative TV – How Much Longer – although not as anthemic and classic as Action Time Vision, a hilarious and incisive poke at the musical tribes around at the time. Mark Perry was a true one off and is still producing good work

  23. I shall have a listen to all of these suggestions tomorrow. Maybe I’ll turn out to be a punk after all.

    Of those, I know the Sex Pistols ones of course, and Blitzkrieg Bop, and I’m ambivalent about them.

    From your post-punk suggestions Stan, I know the Cure quite well (but prefer their later, poppier stuff) and Transmission is decent. Were they punk inspired? I suppose they were, and if so then yeah it has some positives.

  24. Wire are thought of as post punk I suppose but their debut Pink Flag came out in 1977 and I think of it very much as a form of punk, art punk maybe. It’s got the short, fast aggressive energy with songs less than 2 minutes long. It’s so lively it’s quite joyous. Also catchy and poppy at times with a nod to psychedelia such as the first Pink Floyd album. Plus there’s wit and humour. Great for showing what punk can do without the earnestness and lumpen approach of much of the genre.

  26. The 70s TotP repeats on Beeb 4 made it perfectly obvious why punk rock had to happen. The fkin Dooleys on week after week and a suffocation of yellow and brown draylon. Makes you wanna spit, maan.

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