most underrated British punk band?

ummm that's like saying new zealand is part of australia. although the undertones were from northern ireland so i suppose technically they would have british passports etc. however i rather think they identified themselves as irish.

http://www.pooterland.com/index2/bandsmenu/bands_d/PTOOF.jpg

Subway Sect wins.

NO IT FECKIN' ISN'T!

NORTHERN Ireland is part of the UNITED KINGDOM!

There were thousands of British (and UK) punk bands; many of whom released absolutely nothing; many of whom released 1 or 2 singles on independent labels with little or no distribution and disappeared; and people are seriously nominating The Jam, Sham 69 (and The Undertones) - two (or three) of the most comercially successful artists to emerge from the British (or UK) Punk scene as being the most underrated?!?

I'm voting for the Pseudo Existors.

or..

Rudimentary Peni.

So Rudimentary Peni are more recognized than Sham69 or The Jam or The Undertones..?

And you sure hear a lot of people discussing the "ep's of r.p" album, eh..?

Good one, pal.

Rudimentary Peni more popular with da kidz and critically acclaimed by da criticz than The Jam shockah !

Try limiting your rudimentary peni search to: Go

We did not find any items for your search.

Try using a more generic term, for example, "pants" or "dress"
to broaden your search and increase the number of item

Do they sell Rudimentary Peni sweatpants and sneakers too..?

I heard Reebok were bringing out a Flux Of Pink Indians sneaker to compete with the G. Unit sneaker that Hot Topic will only be selling in their store and not on their website.

Find threads from I Love Music, subject contains 'cravats'.

None found

Find threads from I Love Music, subject contains 'zounds'.

None found

And the puppet punks parted with their hard earned cash
To buy the exploiter's rip-off trash
Unable to see that these people only sell shit
As long as the people are willing to buy it.

None found"

They may not be mentioned in the thread titles but I can certainly remember having discussed them here before more than once....

Threads that contain the word "Zounds".

If we're assessing the extent to which a band is underrated as a fraction derived from the level of recognition received relative to each band's activity / output; rather than as an absolute; then Knox & Eddie win must surely the "Most Underrated British Punk Band" title hands down.

http://www.thevibrators.com/images/news_01.jpg

"the sex pistols"

-- J.D. (aubade8...), August 3rd, 2005 12:16 PM. (later)

Well, there's certainly a high level of consistency in your thought processes, since I would humbly suggest that, as British punk bands go, Sex Pistols are / were "underrated" to precisely the same extent that Ireland is part of Great Britain.

for the record, even tho my nomination was clearly intended as a joke, the sex pistols are certainly underrated as musicians.

I agree that The Cravats are pretty obscure but they aren't exactly underrated because for them to be underrated they'd have to be good.

Which they aren't. And Zounds were terrible.

sigh. so what does underrated mean, anyway?
-No one has ever heard of them but you like them
-People have heard of them but think they're "shite" as the brits say
-Critics love them but they aren't a a household word
-You want to talk about your favorite band, but no one cares

Following on, as it did, from your confident assertion that "ireland is part of great britain!" I'd suggest that the only indication I had pointed extremely clearly to the contrary.

Not around (lead singer ODed) to remind the world how good they were.

for Life is Just a So-So, UFO and Let's Go.

UK punk was never as big over here. It had an impact on our underground movement but not commercially. The only two bands that anyone over here gives two shits about ate the Pistols and the Clash. So maybe by "commerically successful" you're talking about in the UK, and yes, if you mean JUST the UK, then yes, I suppose they aren't very underrated. But, I'm sorry to say, the UK is not the world. I am referring to the most underrated bands period. Not just "underrated in the UK" or any shit like that. No one knows who The Jam is over here, or Sham 69, or the Undertones. To most Americans, the Clash and the Pistols ARE British punk, and that's all there is to it.

And Reggie, the Jam may not have been punk "per se", but you certainly won't deny that they were part of the movement, will you?

Perhaps not the Jam though, to be fair.

As for the Hot Topic reference- I wouldn't know, but I find it hard to believe. If a chain store does carry RP shirts, it's because they think the imagery fits their model, as will most of the kids who buy the shirt, initially anyway. It's got nothing to do with what they sound like, or whether or not they're underrated (which they are)....

OK, maybe few if any of these bands managed to get in the charts - but a lot of British punk bands managed to get to tour over there, and even more didn't; and there certainly was (and I believe still is) a huge market in the US for imported UK punk singles.

Misfits
Exploited
Clash
Ramones
Dead Kennedys
Minor Threat
Sex Pistols
Germs

add assorted ska-punk bands, etc.

How about The Skids? Became New Romanticised, but had some cracking singles and seem virtually unknown outside the UK.

i vote for toy dolls, cuz i suspect there are WAY too many people on ILM who don't own ANY toy dolls records, and that is a fucking crying shame.

I agree that The Jam are a very underrated British band, but not an underrated British punk band.

(xxpost)

The idea of the Jam being underrated in the UK is like saying Cliff Richards had Jandek like obscurity in the UK for decades. Or that Elvis Presley was merely a cult artist in the U.S. in the 50s.

..

The Embarrassment were from Kansas i.e. not British.

nderrated may be not, but a whole thread re bristish punk with no mention of them needs to be rectified.

glad to see MGE is at last being recognised as THE punk/pop classic of the era.

So we all agree it's Blitzkrieg Bop?

They sang the immortal lyrics, to the (approximate tune) of Scott Mackenzie...

"If you go, to San Francisco, you're sure to find...lots of weirdos there..."

Donut, I'm not talking about in just the UK. I was referring to everywhere. And yes, compared to the Clash, the Jam were vastly underrtated. Maybe the question should have been phrased differently, like "rank the top 10 UK punk bands besides the Clash and the Pistols." Then I wouldn't have gotten such a shitstorm of controversy because of it.

Anyone want to take up that top 10 list, and give a guy some good insight?

Actually I think that's a different question entirely....

"Anyone want to take up that top 10 list, and give a guy some good insight?"

Sure, why not, I'll start the ball rolling:

1. The Damned
2. Buzzcocks
3. The Slits
4. Wire
5. Alternative TV
6. Siouxsie & The Banshees
7. The Vibrators
8. Penetration
9. Adam & The Ants
10. X-Ray Spex

Bubbling under: The Adverts, Angelic Upstarts, The Boys, The Jam, The Lurkers, 999, The Ruts, Stiff Little Fingers, Subway Sect....

Proto-punk, power pop, new wave, post-punk and anarcho-punk bands; and anyone else who wasn't about and gigging by 1979; has been consciously, specifically and deliberately excluded because, regardless of whether they're any good or not, they don't fulfill my personal definition of "Punk".

Sham 69 otoh have been consciously, specifically and deliberately excluded because they were shit.

The only bands in my list that I'd actually consider to be underrated (in general, relative to other comparable bands, by people who take an active interest in the scene, wherever they may live) however, are: Alternative TV; The Vibrators; Penetration; The Boys; The Ruts.

-- cutty (holle...), August 3rd, 2005 6:16 AM. (mcutt) (later)

The first answer was right.

Do you mean by me or in general?

"and, as you are probably aware at an unconscious level, Sham 69 should be number one on that list"

I would certainly have to be unconscious not to dispute that vehemently.

Of course I still think this is pointless as we have never on ILM agreed on a definition of 'punk' nor 'underrated'.

and also I wanted to say Stranglers, not because I think they were underrated but because every other punk band has been mentioned ...

I was going to mention Blitzkreig Bop and I loved 'Lets Go' but they've already been mentioned and Basczax were more post punk, what about The Table? That first single is great. No? The Members then? Doctors of Madness?

Now there's a name I haven't heard in a long time. Did they actually do anything other than a couple of tracks on one of Earcom's?

BOTH singles by the Table are brilliant. Sex Cells is really, truly, punk rock. The other single, Do the Standing Still/Magical Melon of the Tropics is a bit, I dunno, ambitious for 77 punk rock.

http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:8gdnvwvia9rk~T1

I think most record stores I go into still put bands like XTC and the Jam into Punk sections. The one I went into yesterday had them sorted into "Indie" (as in modern indie and punk), "classic indie and alternative", and "rock". The Jam, XTC, Talking Heads, Blondie, ect, were in there right with Minor Threat, Rites Of Spring, Sex Pistols, and the like.

Lots of good suggestions (Prefects esp.), but I'm going to go with the Partisans. Smart kids.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apart from their first couple of singles, which I think were quite good (and presumably, by extension, therefore must unconsciously think were absolute rub.)
-- Stewart Osborne

__________________________________________________________________

Unconsciously you absolutely adore me too. And frankly, it's making me a little uncomfortable.

I'd like to fuck you, softball

Oh f'fuck's sake.... NO IT ISN'T!

"The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, was created on 1 January 1801 by the merger of the Kingdom of Great Britain (itself a merger of the former Kingdoms of Scotland and England in 1707) and the Kingdom of Ireland. The merger followed the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and was facilitated by the Act of Union, passed by both the Irish Parliament and the British Parliament. The British government awarded gifts of titles, land and money to Irish Members of Parliament to encourage their support for the merger, since most of them had previously been against union. Under the terms of the merger, the Irish Parliament was abolished, and Ireland was to be represented in the united parliament, meeting in the Palace of Westminster. Part of the trade-off for Irish Catholics was to be the granting of Catholic Emancipation, which had been fiercely resisted by the all-Anglican Irish Parliament. However, this was blocked by King George III who argued that emancipating Roman Catholics would breach his Coronation Oath.

Whilst the Irish Free State became independent in 1922, after the Anglo-Irish War, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland continued in name until 1927 when it was renamed as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in accordance with the Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act 1927."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_of_Great_Britain_and_Ireland

DO YOU SEE????

"Unconsciously you absolutely adore me too. And frankly, it's making me a little uncomfortable."

I can assure you there's absolutely nothing unconscious about my feeliings for you: I love you madly, passionately and extremely messily; and I don't care who knows it any more - so don't be shy Moley baby, come here now and let's make some real hot lurve....

Wait a moment 'though.... you're not Jimmy Pursey, are you?

I also nominate The Outsiders.

Never 'eard 'em, what were they like? (If they sounded like Slaughter And The bleedin' Dogs then I can't say I'm too bothered!)

If you look at a passport of someone born in Northern Ireland (or indeed Scotland, Wales or England for that matter) as you suggest, you will find that it says quite clearly "The United Kingdom Of Great Britain And Northern Ireland".

As regards the nationality stated on that passport, apparently it is actually legal to put "British" or "English" but not to put "Scottish" or "Welsh".

This has - understandably, and quite rightly too imo - been a major bone of contention with many Scottish and Welsh nationalists for many years.

I must admit I wasn't actually aware that the same was true for people born in Northern Ireland but it doesn't surprise me in the slightest (quite apart from anything else, I imagine that's so as not to cause confusion with people from Eire who I'd assume would also describe their nationality as "Irish").

Please understand: I don't make the rules, I don't approve of the rules, I'm not even trying to suggest that they make any sort of sense - I just happen to know what they are, so please don't try to blame me for them.

Perhaps you should be grateful you don't come from the Isle Of Man, which isn't technically part of Great Britain but is part of the UK, although it isn't actually even mentioned anywhere in the definition? No, you're not allowed to give your nationality as "Manx" either.

Television Personalities, Alternative TV, the Adverts, are all generally overlooked, though not without adherents. And are certainly not punk in the stereotypically tunnel-visioned sense... TVP pre-empted C86? Adverts' songwriting is very prescient of Luke Haines... Alternative TV at times were even 'free punk'.

I only actually met them a couple of times but in my experience this is very true: extremely puerile; and none of them exactly the sharpest knives in the box; but nonetheless all very genuine and likeable guys.

Unfortunately allowing Jimmy Pursey to adopt them and act as their mentor; moulding them to his own retarded and myopic vision; didn't do them any favours whotsoever: and to absolutely no-one's surprise (except apparently their own), they successfully managed to win them precisely the same violently moronic fanbase that repeatedly dogged, and ultimately, destroyed Sham 69's career.

Still, their first couple of singles were great and the first album had it's moments.

As we've raised the bar on what counts as underrated, I'd say that the Adverts first LP is probably my all-round favourite.

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=13225830&Mytoken=20050808000552

Blnak Frank (aka John Hodgson)

1) Physical
2) Plastic Surgery
3) Beat My Guest
4) Nietzsche Baby
5) Red Scab
6) Press Darlings
7) Don't Be Square

Some very disonant, wierd, disturbing S & M based stuff
with humour and silliness.

Catholic Day and Whip in My Valise are classics.

Incredibly far removed from 'Goody 2 Shoes'...

Frankly I think there's way too many underrated British punk bands, but lately I've been listening to early Simple Minds demos when they used to be called Johnny & The Self Abusers. Yes, that's right, Simple Minds were punk once, too. It was during this period that they did a song called "Cocteau Twins" from which that band subsequently took their name. Excellent stuff.

I'd call it more progressive art-rock than punk, but
that's just me.

The first few Simple Minds releases were very much Roxy/Bowie influenced art school hop stuff. Then they went all anthemic and turned into the U2 reserves.

Most underrated punk singles: Sick Of You - The Users / Shadow - The Lurkers / New Religion - Some Chicken.

Nice to see Blitzkrieg Bop get some recognition. I always liked "Bugger Off", on the B-side of "Let's Go". (And hello to Blank Frank, who sent me a handwritten letter with my copy of the original Morton Sound single.)

re Generation X, I actually think lots of people I know underrate their Ian Hunter-produced *second* album, *Valley of the Dolls.* (But I bet Hanoi Rocks don't.)

its all about genx!!

FASHUN PUNX.

hahahaha...

Cardiff otoh is a small suburb / community on the outskirts of central London, located just slightly to the West of Hammersmith.

S.Osborne in today?

http://www.visi.com/fall/bio/biography.html

has info on English Subtitles, but no obvious Fall connection as far as I can see.

'Evenin' Doc.

Demon Preacher was Nick Fiend's pre-Alien Sex Fiend punk(-ish) band.

English Subtitles were from Oxford and had some sort of link to Play Dead IIRC.

Can't help with the others I'm afraid.

The only thing I know by the Disco Zombies is Drums Over London which is a good song let down by the stupid racist lyrics. Haven't heard their other singles.

yeah, I hate it when that happens.

On heavy rotation this morning : Nicky and The Dots - Never Felt So Stuck. What a fucking great single. Great singing, nice trash organ, clever riff. All I know about them is that they were from Brighton.

x-post : Old pub rockers etc etc. Yes! The Vibrators, for example. Eddie And The Hot Rods. Funny how we spent a lot of time and effort at the time on trying to decide if such bands were really 'punk' or not. Most of em sound great to me, but maybe I'm just an old pub rocker too.

Re: Disco Zombies, yeah I did wonder if the lyrics were supposed to be a parody, but if it is, it's a bit too good a parody! It sounds like some kind of anthem for the NF.

The track on the Seeds 2 is amazing, but the song that seems more known now is Performance, which is on one of the Messthethics volumes, or at least, the older volumes before they got all the permissions.

Idiot.

...is a major cause of celebration, at least in my house. Alright it's not a proper nuggets-style crate digging exercise, but they have had a good trawl through the Rabid/TJM catalogue and improved the sound quality on some really cracking stuff like The Out's 'Who Is Innocent' (but where's b-side 'Linda's Just A Statue'?). Also most of the TJM comp 'Identity Parade' is on here, which means goodies like the Steroid Kiddies 'Seaside Teaser'and Eddie Mooney's great powerpop 'I Bought Three Eggs'. There's also two tracks by The Teardrops (Steve Garvey and Karl Burns), Deaf School's outrageous speed-Roxy 'All Queued Up', the magnificent 'Naive' by proggers in disguise Public Zone (feat. Stewart Copeland!) and loads more.
Some of the comedy stuff is obv a trial and you'll never listen to Norman and The Hooligans or Richie Hale and The Stormers more than once, but hell...more like this please!!

Allardyce's no-nonsense tactics having a much broader effect than had previously been suspected.

I wanna hear those Small Wonder Demon Preacher etc. singles pretty badly. Also the one with "Safety Pin Stuck In My Heart", I forget who that was right now.

Other noticeable ones:

"Gerry and the Holograms" self titled, very like "Blue Monday"
"Increased Resistance" it's b-side very like "Murder"

And, "Dancing Doctors" The Freshies is not dissimilar to "Every Day is like Sunday" the Mozzer.

That'd be Patrik Fitzgerald

Machine Gun Ettiquette, The Black Album and Strawberries were probably the strongest trio of albums made by any of the original punk bands outside of the first three Wire albums.

I was also wondering how long this thread could go before somebody finally mentioned the Desperate Bicycles.

Has anyone mentioned the Prefects yet?

Oh yeah, I did. They really deserve more acclaim. They were there pretty early on, were so punk rock they didn't put out any records untill after they broke up, Bernard Rhodes said they were amateur wankers, they appear uncredited on the recording of We Oppose All Rock-N-Roll with the Subway Sect and the Slits, etc.

http://www.carolinetruerecords.co.uk/

They also put out the Nightingales "In the Old Country Way" CD and have some more cool stuff planned.

I do feel the Damned are a far better band than I gave them credit for when I first heard them 20 years ago.

That "White Dopes On Punk" comp. looks really appealing. Unfortunately I've already spent far more money on music right now than I'd planned. I think I can fairly easily convince my friend to buy it, though.

The Users released a fantastic single, Sick of You, and never got as far as an album (as far as I know) but they also deserve to be remembered.

Generation X were the most underrated British punk band.

Because punk was such a limited thing? Is that it, Geir?

Anyway, can I change my vote, I'm going for Doll by Doll, really liked hearing the first album again now its re-issued - I'd not paid much attention to their other albums at the time - and they aren't as good as the first one.

Were 'Doll By Doll' ever a punk band? Really?

Well, see my comments above, basically, what qualified as a 'punk band' in 1978 was much wider than what would qualify now. They were gigging on the circuit (I saw them supporting Ultravox!) and were pretty aggressive, especially the last song they did (Palace of Love).

The first Doll by Doll album is at least as punk as the 1st Psychedelic Furs, or Killing Joke albums - depending on your definition of punk, this may mean 'not very'.

Well, yes. Definitions, definitions . . I would have said New Wave at the time, but I never saw them.

I do remember them being VERY highly rated indeed by critics, though. It was just the record buying public that didn't seem too bothered.

I think The Stranglers should be viewed as the best band from that era, and they aren't (for mainly political/ageist reasons) so I say, by George, that they are the most underrated British punk band.