[kj] OT: "Punk's Not Dead" documentary

[Christof hamille]

I am in complete agreeance with Oliver, Greg and Alex.  I am in my mid 30s 
and I remember up to High School being the weird outcast.  Grant it I was 
known for being a music guy all around but everyone thought I was a weirdo 
for wearing converse and combat boots (amongst other things).
And then....
As my days of high school was about to end............
Alternative/Grunge happened
Lollapalooza
All of that.  And then everyone seemed, at least pretend, to understand what 
I was talking about.
I guess it is just like anything else that is hip and cool.  The underground 
gets cultivated, homogenized and sold to the masses.
Punk as I know it, and grew up with, is now the mainstream.  You can walk 
around in all black.  You can wear lewd band t-shirts.  Etc., etc., etc., 
etc.  Everyone likes the Sex Pistols and the Ramones.  All the cool people 
like Gang of Four.  Whatever.  Makes me want to be even more anti-social.
Maybe it is our generation (30-40 when the whole punk thing was starting) 
taking what they know and putting it into their work (marketing, ad 
agencies, corporate schilling, etc.).
What is the new underground?  What if the "punks" at the mall don't 
understand you?  What if there is no message board that you fit into?  What 
if you have no Myspace page, or worse, have no friends on MySpace?  Where do 
you go?

I would be interested to find out.

Chris



>From: GREG SLAWSON <gregslawson at msn.com>

>Reply-To: "A list about all things Killing Joke (the 

>band!)"<gathering at misera.net>

>To: "A list about all things Killing Joke (the band!)" 

><gathering at misera.net>

>Subject: Re: [kj] OT: "Punk's Not Dead" documentary

>Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2007 00:38:57 -0400

>

>

>For about the millionth time, Oliver, you hit the nail on the head. I 

>remember in college (from 81 to 85), my rather large circle of friends 

>being dumbfounded that I listened to bands like Black Flag, Minutemen, 

>Flipper, etc. It was almost to the point where people didn't even make fun 

>of or try to debate my musical taste, because they didn't understand what I 

>liked or why I liked it. My best memory is of someone downstairs from me 

>saying that (the Minutemen) sounded like someone playing up and down a 

>scale, and that Flag (whose records I'd often sing along to) just sounded 

>like a guy screaming. Another very clear memory is of a friend, one of 

>those very cynical guys who pokes fun at everything (to be fair he would 

>cleverly ridicule stuff like Hewy Lewis and the News--"The Heart of Barney 

>Clark is Still Beating/His Lungs and his Chest are not Breathing" and 

>whatever that horrible New Romantic group that sang "Gold" was called--"You 

>Are OLD/Always depend on your Social Security..."). This guy actually went 

>to a Black Flag show with me in 82 or 83, just so he could ridicule the 

>band. He actually did this to Chuck Dukowski's face while he palyed bass 

>during the show, to which Chuck told him, "You didn't have to come to the 

>show, you know". This was also the show where Henry Rollings, in just a 

>pair of golf shorts, crawled across the floor for about 10 minutes during a 

>slow tune, through all the spilt beer and broken glass...what a great 

>evening!> Date: Thu, 9 Aug 2007 23:10:22 -0500> From: 

>bigblackhair at sbcglobal.net> To: gathering at misera.net> Subject: Re: [kj] OT: 

>"Punk's Not Dead" documentary> > The rampant historicizing of punk nowadays 

>esp. in the endlessly-cranked > out documentaries, biopics (Ina Curtis 

>_Control_) and especially books > sort of gets to me only because I think 

>it creates the sense that > everyone loved punk rock, post-punk, whatever, 

>and younger people don't > realize that for a lot of people being into punk 

>was a kind of > isolating, bizarre, fringe culture thing that was seen as 

>very > antisocial; many people found punk actually very frightening into 

>the > late 80s. It became associated with Satanism (the Satanic Panic) and 

> > schools I went to began instituting dress codes where you couldn't wear, 

> > for example, more than 50% black. The Sex Pistols Nevermind the Bollocks 

> > barely broke the Top 100 when it was released, and didn't go gold until 

> > the early 1990s, in the wake of Nirvana. Members of the respectable > 

>media and bands like The Who claimed they hated punk and usually did > 

>"scare the public" hit pieces on it, etc.> > Now with all this glossy 

>"let's look back" stuff it makes it seem like > every one and their mother 

>liked it, and ... sorry, it wasn't like that. > People liked Bel Biv Devoe 

>and C & C Music Factory. Where are the > documentaries about that? About 

>the morons and idiots? They were the > majority. (Still are.) It sucks 

>especially for some of us who were > actually physically threatened etc by 

>jocks at school for having weird > hair, only to see the same jocks years 

>later moshing and shit, when it > became okay and safe to do that.> > 

>-Oliver> > > > > Leigh Newton wrote:> > We'd still like you even if you 

>just got into it yesterday, Oliver. That's the attitude associated with 

>punk rock (or any form of anything, for that matter) that bugs me the most. 

>The underlying impression I get from all these recent biographies/docs is 

>that if you weren't there when it initially happened, then you're just a 

>poseur who gets all their shit at Hot Topic and is being ironic. There's 

>nothing better than being an archeologist and uncovering all these gems 

>from the past. Hell, only a few weeks ago did I finally get around to 

>checking out Neu!> >> > > >> > > > 

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