[The Watcher]

Ann Ashtray, great fucking post. Really enjoyed it. Will comment more later today on why.

[ann ashtray]

Comment away.

[fugazifan]

Originally Posted by ann ashtray

But really, fuck punk rock. Fuck labels. Put on some khakis and a v-neck sweater and read books and boggle the minds of those often leather clad idiots when they discover you know more about their own "labels" than they do. that's punk rock to me. Miles Davis is punk rock to me. Pere Ubu is punk rock as fuck to me, Stooges, Dolls, Iggy (come on, fucker used to roll around is glass now he rolls around in cash, pretty punk if ya ask me), Coltrane, Sun Ra, Prurient, Merzbow....none of which claim punk rock but are considerably more punk rock than those that think the label really serves any purpose in 2011.

this sounds a lot like the way the minutemen and mike watt felt about and lived punk rock. definitely what i feel as well. although i much rather hear clever lyrics about a faulty system than nonsensical ones.

[DeadDiscoDildo]

^^That, except for the last part. You gotta balance intelligence AND nonsense in my opinion. Becuase too much of anything is boring and self defeating, if your goal is to speak volumes.

[ann ashtray]

Music + art for me has pretty much always been an escape from reality. I seldom turn to it as a means of relating to a world I already deal with on a daily basis. Politics and relationships and good/bad experiences alike are everywhere...good music that takes me away from that into, sometimes, realms that refuse to be defined by words are rare.

That's just me, though.

[Genteel Death]

Thanks for that, sway. I always thought of Sun Ra as a folk musician myself. It helps me feeling a little more racist than calling his music jazz, a genre too closely associated with black people.

[Genteel Death]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

Thanks for that, sway. I always thought of Sun Ra as a folk musician myself. It helps me feeling a little more racist than calling his music jazz, a genre too closely associated with black people.

Scratch that, what I really mean is that there is only good music and bad music.

[ann ashtray]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

Scratch that, what I really mean is that there is only good music and bad music.

like.

[Genteel Death]

Thread should have been titled ''uk good music vs. us good music''. I mean, seriously.

[ann ashtray]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

Thread should have been titled ''uk good music vs. us good music''. I mean, seriously.

Now yr getting a little silly, silly.

[Genteel Death]

Originally Posted by ann ashtray

Now yr getting a little silly, silly.

You have to act silly if you're making fun of a silly post. Didn't your mum teach you that?

[ann ashtray]

Originally Posted by Genteel Death

You have to act silly if you're making fun of a silly post. Didn't your mum teach you that?

nah. I'm an american which means my parents didn't teach me shit....just fed me on corn dogs + television.

[demonrail666]

Originally Posted by ann ashtray

Difficult, considering all the waves + directions punk has taken since it's origins. If we're talking that first wave (mid to late 70's), then I'm going with US. Straight ahead fun/sometimes silly/next to always trashy rock n roll vs. the (typically....) more fashion oriented (usually) psuedo-political vibes going on across the ocean. Sure US punks were fashionable, too...but feels to me as if the music has aged a little better as I've aged, which I'm sure says something about the music itself. I'll listen to the Voidoids/Ramones/Dead Boys/Heartbreakers/etc any day over the Pistols/Clash/Damned.....that said, I absolutely love Slits, Crass (more as an artsy weirdo thing than a political voice).


Opinions change as we age, and reevaluating some of that material is interesting. I enjoy the Pistols from a distance, books and photos more than the actual music which just sounds a little tooooo adolescent for where I'm at at this stage of my life (as do the vast majority of their peers). Sometimes images on a postcard are more fun than the actual music.

I'd rather hear songs about trannies and prostitutes and drugs and girls and fun than songs about what's wrong with the system or how I should live my life. More than either, songs consisting of lyrical nonsense. I'd rather the music speak more than the actual words.

Fuck the Exploited and all that "UK '82" shit. Boring. If punk means (better yet..."meant") anything ever to me it was a freedom/no-rules-do-it-yr-own-way concept. In the same way, the vast majority of early to mid 80's US (and I'm sorry, "hardcore" to me will always be as American as baseball or whatever) hardcore does little to nothing for me even if I like a few of the bands that lead up to that movement (Black Flag, Bad Brains) and a few others that happened loosely as a result (No Trend, Flipper, Stick Men w/ Ray Guns, early Butthole Surfers, Scratch Acid, Big Black, Meat Puppets). Fuck Minor Threat. Ian Mackaye was and still (mostly...) is a total self righteous bore. Again, I don't dig preachiness or songs written around lyrics. Youth Brigade, boring. I'm might be an asshole but it damned sure isn't because I drink or smoke cigarettes.

Post-punk:

Joy Division were and still are awesome. I've dug them since I was probably 16 + their music sounds better to me than it did back then. The Fall are hella cool. Smiths are total shit. The Cure usually sucks, too.

Sonic Youth are still my absolute most favorite band of all time (imagine that! But yeah, I still think the Stooges kick total fucking ass and come in at a close second). Nirvana are still cool to me.

But really, fuck punk rock. Fuck labels. Put on some khakis and a v-neck sweater and read books and boggle the minds of those often leather clad idiots when they discover you know more about their own "labels" than they do. that's punk rock to me. Miles Davis is punk rock to me. Pere Ubu is punk rock as fuck to me, Stooges, Dolls, Iggy (come on, fucker used to roll around is glass now he rolls around in cash, pretty punk if ya ask me), Coltrane, Sun Ra, Prurient, Merzbow....none of which claim punk rock but are considerably more punk rock than those that think the label really serves any purpose in 2011.

Who cares.

US punk....this entire nonsensical response just to say that. yeah.

I don't think the UKs first wave of punk can compete with America's, if only because it was pretty much only interested in mimicing it. As it moved on though, I think Britain was far more open to a far more varied set of musical influences than seemed to be happening in the US. So by the time groups like The Fall, Joy Division, P/I/L and TG started to emerge I think US punk had pretty much exhausted itself of ideas and the more interesting stuff was definitely coming out of the UK at that point. Then when that started running out of ideas, I suppose we have to credit American Hardcore for providing a spark for bands like SY, the Buttholes, Big Black, The Pixies, to reclaim the initiative back to the US, where I tend to think it's probably stayed ever since.

[The Watcher]

Originally Posted by ann ashtray

But really, fuck punk rock. Fuck labels

This is the part I really like...... punk is so fucking safe and has been forever, even the 90's hardcore scene was in retrospect some of the most douchey people on the planet crying fucking foul about every perceived slight or injustice and thinking handing a like minded person a flyer or some shitty fanzine is going to do anything about anything..... even when I got into hardcore through thrash metal in the mid 90's it was so fucking safe, yet still snobbish and exclusionary and elitist, like all the worst elements of it have congealed into a bunch of whiney fucks....... bands like Sun Ra was alientating and challenging people 25 years before punk even existed and a guy like Prurient can still alientate "open minded" punks....... this isn't even a rant against "corporate punk" (which is obviously bullshit) more about the underground so smug in it's own elitist mentality......... you guys remember when Cripple Bastards came all the way from Italy to tour the US and the staff at ABC No Rio cancelled their show the day of because they used pornographic imagery in their band artwork? Not to be offensive but as a genuienly concerned statement against sexism, yet it was because they had used the imagery, regardless of the intent that caused them to cancel their show at the last minute........ fucking punks.......