I realised today that I don'treally like punk music

C/D: "[band that existed when Joey Ramone was 10 and predated the term 'punk' by a good 15 years] were punk!"

You know the chronology of it well? People weren't calling Iggy Stooge a punk?

x-post: Matos, to me that's like someone saying Dylan wasn't a good singer

I got this vague memory of my first impressions of the Ramones. I remembered how different it seemed from all the metal bands back then. These punks weren't singing about how awesome they were and how they were going to kick ass, but mostly about how much they themselves sucked and what misfit, lazy idiots they were, how much they needed meds and lobotomies and how all their girlfriends were these suicidal psycho chicks and how much drugs they're going to do. I guess in it's own weird way it's more realistic than a lot of heavy metal, but I didn't exactly listen to metal for reality, anyway. My interest in punk started out as a laugh, but eventually I guess the cynical "laugh as your world falls apart" attitude rubbed off on me, as it seems to have on those old punks themselves. If they just started out to mock society and piss people off for a laugh, then why did they end up so serious and troubled?

x-posts to Matos

wow, i'm pissed up and it's 4am so maybe i oughtn't be typing.

I think I may be the only hardcore Pavement fan who reckons Slanted is on the whole a load of rub other than maybe Trigger Cut and Here (arguably the least punk tracks on the album).

Grunge wasn't a bad thing in most people's eyes in the 80's, so maybe it was kind of like that in the 70's, too. I know sometimes when I buy an album from the 70s or earlier, I sometimes find myself wondering if it was really a wise purchase. I tend to feel that I've heard it before and I didn't really need any more of it.

More likely that they never listened to the stuff to begin with. Come on.

It's not as if technical or conceptual music died completely after 1977, it's just it became really uncool and so acts like Dream Theater could never have become as big as Nirvana. It's also the reason Oasis won the battle over Blur - they were more punk, so they won.

It's like that joke in Family Guy

A: "I don't see any reason why we should go to war"
B: "Ah, but you are forgetting that anyone who doesn't want to go to war is gay."
C: "I wanna go to war"
A: "Hey, I never said I didn't want to go to war!"
D: "I said I wanted to go to war first!"

It's such an automatic excuse: Oh, so unless you respect these mohawk dudes then it means your into triple albums about trolls that eat maggot sandwiches and the inner meaning of ptolemiology.

Sure they did. And they got tired of it just like everyone else when they saw how pointless it was to try and stick a blazing fast solo in a song for no reason. Kurt Cobain and the dudes from Soundgarden had heard all the same shit I listened to growing up. They were all young boys once, too, glued to MTV just like every other kid. They watched Headbanger's Ball and 120 Minutes just like everyone else and every day after school they got to see Steve Vai doing "Yankee Rose," back-to-back with Megadeth's "Peace Sells" and Poison's "Every Rose," etc.

On the topic of Steve Vai, it's kind of funny that he offered to do some movie soundtrack with Perry Farrell. Perry Farrell's only response was "Wasn't he in White Snake?!" This proves (to me, at least) that Perry follows metal enough to know that shit. I didn't know about it until last week! And what is so different about Jane's Addiction, anyway? That shit is basically metal.

Maybe some grunge people were big metal heads previously - I dunno. I think it was just more punk w/ a bit of a retro Stooges/Blue Cheer/Sabbath or whatever thing.

Or broke...

well, then so was I... but, I not really. I practiced all the time. I just realized that I didn't need to be Yngwie fucking Malmsteen to make good music. (I never liked him, anyway.) I just wanted to make my own music ASAP, not waste time learning other people's music and, while I still respected Metallica and Megadeth, I knew my fingers wouldn't be able to do any of that shit for a long time, so I just kept plugging away at my own "style," which I thought was really important at the time. Besides, I knew what I thought were the only two scales, so I didn't think there was anything more to learn! Just practice, I figured. One day, it would all click. Haha.

http://photos1.blogger.com/img/263/910/640/dils.jpg

The reason punk matters, still, is because it is THE emblematic instance in popular culture when the urges to create and destroy were both given simultaneous expression, as the late twentieth century careened from utopian visions to dystopian comedown.

The very fact that what I just wrote sounds like a lot of bull proves how vital and versatile this thing we call 'punk' is.

-- Alex in NYC (vassife...), October 15th, 2005.

FOR THE LAST TIME KILLING JOKE IS NOT A GOTH BAND

They're not, though. Honest. Don't listen to the Suicide Girls, fuck do they know? Killing Joke aren't Goths. Call'em whatever ya want, but don't call'em Goths.

From where I'm standing, it really doesn't look like either band "won," and neither got within several zip code of Punk.

one other thing: no other genre of music has had more pretentious, hackneyed self-important BULLSHIT written about it (and i'm saying this as a fan of books like Jon Savage's England's Dreaming).

So true, although Hip Hop is catching up.

What's really got me puzzled is that some of you actually seem to like ELP quite a lot . . oh, wait, is this what you young 'un's are calling 'trolling'? You scamps!

that was never even 1% of the apeal for me. and I don't think it was for, say, phil spector when he produced End of The Century, or Lou Reed when, you know, he made two immaculate non-shit albums. Self-titled and Loaded, how can you even argue that the song writing/performances aren't amazing on those. I love, say, White Light/White Heat just as much, but it's not because it's a bit shit, it's because it's a whole lotta awesome in the dirtiest, dirtiest way. what's the difference between people saying this shit is untouchable compaired to people defending the stones or the beatles to the death? to most people who actually like music, The Stooges or the Ramones or the velvet underground or black flag weren't a novelty at all, I never listened to "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue" because it was funny, I listened to it because it was awesome. and still is. and always will be.

p.s. metal and prog rock suck balls

I think what we're talking about is rock music where almost everything has been stripped away. It's not that these bands are shit, it's just that they share an assumption that things like precision, formal experimentation and demonstrations of technical expertise DON'T MATTER, it's about the excitement of the basic form and the chancy elements of live performance. The roughness and the grit, the stuff other genres throw away, give it texture.

I suppose, at the end of the day, I do worship basic hard rock, and I suppose that is boring for other people. The institutionalisation of any form is a shame, and I wouldn't want to contribute to that. But imagine how I feel about being told off for not caring much for 'perfect pop' or soul.

I'm also baffled by the opposition of punk and metal, and have been since I was fourteen. The genres are so close I can't see that anyone could enjoy one without finding something in the other.

http://www.kronic.it/public/pics_big/NOJE-08s40-lemmy-31.jpg

-- sleeve (sleev...), October 15th, 2005.

otm!

Yes sir, I Will.

When you woke this morning you looked so rocky-eyed,
Blue and white normally, but strange ringed like that in black.
It doesn't get much better, your voice can get just ripped up shouting in vain,
Maybe someone hears what you say, but you're still on your own at night.
You've got to make such a noise to understand the silence,
Screaming like a jackass, ringing ears so you can't hear the silence
Even when it's there. Like the wind seen from the window,
Seeing it but not being touched by it.

*
Words sometimes don't seem to mean much;
Of anyone we've used more that most.
Feelings from the heart that have been distorted and mocked,
Thrown around in the spectacle, the grand social circus.

*
Up against the rows of grey robots who control our lives
The things we have to offer sometimes seem so frail.
As they plan destruction and gain respectability,
We offer our creativity and are made outcasts.

*
We didn't expect to find ourselves playing this part,
We were concerned with ideas, not rock and roll,
But we can't avoid that arena,
It's become a part of us even if we don't understand it.

*
In attempts to moderate they ask why we don't write love songs.
What is it that we sing then?
Our love of life is total, everything we do is an expression of that,
Everything that we write is a love song.

*
We look for alternatives,
But the enormous power of the media makes it so difficult
To establish foundations. Their lies and distortions are so extreme
That everything becomes poisoned and corrupted.
We can become media personalities, but it is always on their terms.
We're tired of living up to other people's expectations when our own are so much higher.
Intelligence seems so easily dismissed when it doesn't conform to mainstream values.
Lennon said "They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool",
He was right. Social intelligence merely requires agreement and compromise.

*
The boundaries are becoming narrower as the State becomes more paranoid.
Under authoritarian rule, conformity becomes the only security.
Fear is a powerful weapon against human development.
Cowering in our temples of self there's little chance of change;
The State is aware of that. The bomb serves many functions.
If fear of the omnipotent God is no more,
The nuclear Father will govern with his shepherd's crook,
Drawing his flock closer to the valley of the shadow of death.

*
Those of us who stand out against the status quo
Do so against all odds.
We cling so closely together
Because we have little other than ourselves.
Critics say that it's just punk rock or that we're just naive anarchists.
They hope to discredit us with their labels and definitions.
Throughout history societies have condemned those who are later celebrated as heroes,
In so many bourgeois homes Van Gogh's sunflowers radiate from the walls,
Yet he lived in utter misery, condemned by those very same people.
Why is it that the kind and gentle are subjected to violence and riducule?
How is it that the small and mealy-minded have gained so much power?
What perversion has taken place that we are governed by fools?

*
We've had problems from self-appointed Gods from Bishops to MPs.
They've tried to ban our records saying that we're a threat to decent society.
Fuck them. I hope we are.
What kind of depraved idiot thinks they can silence others by denying them their voice?
For fucks sake, who are these lobotomists?
As if walls only had one side.
Whispered intimacies might not get through,
But cries of anguish know no barriers.
But how long do we shout for?
Denied the airwaves, we trust in the wind to carry what we say.
But sometimes we've found ourselves shouting into the wind
When we should have been confiding in each other.
It seems so absurd that we are denied the chance of ever being truly free.
The terrible inequalities of the peoples of this earth
Make freedom at best a dream, at worst an insulting privilege.
What space is there for self-expression and personal development
When over half the world's population is starving?
There are so many things that might have been done,
But rooted on this spot in the desire to find solution,
There's little to see and feel but the sighing and dying of our world.
But for suffering we might have been a part of it rather than apart from it.

*
Making the compromises,
Brave fronts, deceitful disguises. What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
Turning a blind eye to the lies just to keep it all together,
But sometimes when I'm alone like this I wonder whether it's worth it.

Smiling and socialising.
Endless philosophising. What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
Surface agreements, statements of fact, trying to prove we can do it,
But sometimes when I'm alone like this I wonder just who can see through it.

Bargains and sacrifices.
Cheap tricks, cheaper devices. What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
Holding the vision, but losing our sight, endlessly searching solution,
But sometimes when I'm alone like this I wonder how much it's just institution.

What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
What did you know? What did you care?
Anarchy's become another word for 'got 10p to spare?' What did you know? What did you care?
Another way of saying 'I'm O.K., sod you out there'. What did you know? What did you care?
Another token tantrum to cover up the fear. What did you know? What did you care?
Another institution, another cross to bear. What did you know? What did you care?
etc. etc.

*
Anything and everything can be so easily institutionalised,
A poor parody of itself. Itself contained by itself.
There's no point in just mouthing the words.
The token tantrums just aren't enough,
Nor is speed and weed and the Positive Creed.
Exclusive clubs where the various tribes congratulate each other for doing fuck all
Will achieve nothing but the strengthening of the status quo.
Punk has spawned another rock and roll elite,
Cheap Rotten Vicious imitations thinking they'll change their world
With dyed hair and predictable gestures. Nouveau wankers.
There's a thousand empty stages waiting for their empty performances,
A thousand empty faces waiting for their empty stances.
How many times must we hear rehashed versions of Feeding of the 5000
By jerks whose only fuck off to the system has been one off the wrist?
It's the Feeding of the 5 Knuckle Shuffle.

*
If there was no government, wouldn't there be chaos
Everybody running round, setting petrol bombs off?
And if there was no police force, tell me what you'd do
If thirty thousand rioters came running after you?
And who would clean the sewers? Who'd mend my television?
Wouldn't people lay about without some supervision?
Who'd drive the fire engines? Who'd fix my video?
If there were no prisons, well, where would robbers go?

And what if I told you to Fxxk Off?

What if there's no army to stop a big invasion?
Who'd clean the bogs and sweep the floors? We'd have all immigration.
Who'd pull the pint at the local pub? Where'd I get my fags?
Who'd empty out my dustbins? Would I still get plastic bags?
If there were no hospitals, and no doctors too,
If I'd broken both my legs, where would I run to?
If there's no medication, if there were no nurses,
Wouldn't people die a lot? And who would drive the hearses?

And what if I told you to Fxxk Off?

If there were no butchers shops, what would people eat?
You'd have everybody starving if they didn't get their meat.
If there was no water, what would people drink?
Who'd flush away the you-know-what? But of course MINE never stink.
What about the children? Who'd teach them in the schools?
Who'd make the beggers keep in line? Learn them all the rules?
Who's tell us whitewash windows? When to take down doors?
Tell us make a flask of tea and survive the holocaust?

*
The rock and roll swindler says it's O.K. to plunder,
So the pirates set sail to rape any ethnic culture they can plug a mike to.
The imperialists rub their hands in glee
As the slave-boy hunts out butt-ends in the garbage cans.
Is it any wonder there was such sickening celebration over the Task Force
When so called radicals work hand in hand with the ruling elite?
Yesterday those wily creeps rejected the status quo,
Today they smarm and charm passageways to its very heart.
Where's the free individual in all that?
Where's the hope and aspiration?
Identities have become corporations,
Social egos and media moulds,
Scholars of ad-man's dreams. Prescribed futures;
Must we all down aspirins and shine beneath borrowed tans?
Are we really so dumb, so cowered into submission
That not only are we prepared to eat shit
We're also prepared to say thanks for the privilege?
Why should we accept servility as a bargain for dignity?
Why should we passively accept death as a bargain for living?
Why accept this robbery of life? Why accept this pillage?
For Christ's sake take up your bed and walk.
Let the blind see end the deaf hear.
The rights of the individual are dependent upon
You realising your right as an individual.
People are so easily deluded into thinking they've instrumented choice
Where in reality they're nothing but passive observers.
Passive observers do nothing but passively observe,
Passively soak up creativity and say "Wow, that's me!",
Passively soak up destruction and say "Oh no, not us, not me".
There are those who strive for value and meaning;
Who search for reason and purpose;
Their efforts are negated by the passive observers.

*
They spend days before the T.V. set so burned out,
Is it any wonder they've lost all sense of vision and possibility?
What chance does anyone have when all the spaces are filled?
Sipping breakfast teas to the sound of Space Invaders.

*
Television is today's Nuremberg.
Bowing to its authority, they become it.
I've seen four year old children conforming to media roles.
Main-lining the gross theatre that will become their lives.
The television has so dampened people's anger.
The population is mesmerised by the flickering screen
And the streets, where the politics of reality were once created,
Are deserted at night and the rulers sleep secure.
They are under no threat as long as the people are sedated.
Those who suffer head-aches from excessive intake of electrons are prescribed valium,
Or pay for a fix at the pub where men have to piss up the wall
And the stench of urine lasts well into the next pint.

*
Entertainment is designed to gloss over real problems
And very often those who profess dissent only add to the deception.
Words are banded about, but always at the whim of the puppeteer.
Actionless sloganeering is just another Punch and Judy show.

*
Any information that we receive concerning the real world is carefully controlled,
Why else would fiction have such licence?
We are allowed to see endless theatrical deaths,
But when the real deaths started on the Falklands
Government censors prevented us from seeing them.
We were given the excuse of 'National Security'
By the lying shits who were interested only in saving their political skins.
It didn't matter a fuck to them how many died
As long as their popularity ratings didn't suffer,
For that reason alone we were shielded from the truth.
While the real violence is kept from us
We are exposed to constant pantomimes of death and destruction.
Those in power are rightly aware that if we had access to the real facts
We would cease to be simply passive observers.
Media coverage of Viet Nam created massive dissent in the U.S.A.
Thatcher's government was aware of that when, embarking on the Falkland charade,
They refused press cards to anyone who they knew would not support their line.
Those who did travel to the Falklands found their reports dramatically cut down.
Meanwhile, at home, we were fed fabrications of Britain's 'glorious war'.
The truth that is now filtering out paints a very different picture.

*
It's often been said that truth is the first casualty of war,
It is, but the same could be said of life.
From birth we are threatened and beaten into submission
By family, church, school and state.
From then on we're easy game for the powermongers.
Like pathetic circus dogs we hunt out praise
Or, when our true nature finds its way to the surface
We hide in the darkness, our tails between our legs.
At all costs we are prevented from realising our own potential.
We are conditioned into being passive observers.
If the ring-master offers war,
We have been conditioned to passively accept it.
War can only exist through passive acceptance.
It is nothing but a demonstration of the weakness of human will.

*
If the clown offered peace
We will have been conditioned to accept that too,
But peace can not and will not be maintained through passive acceptance.
Peace will require constant demonstrations of personal strength,
Constant effort, constant hard work,
Reappraisal, consideration and devotion.
Which of those qualities were you taught in schoolroom?
Whereas war simply requires the masses as cannon-fodder,
Peace requires individuals to realise their own potential,
The odds are hopelessly against because the State deliberately destroys human will.

*
Passive observers offer nothing but decay.
The flowerbeds need weeding, the roses need cutting back before winter.
Freed from sedation, released from bondage,
People would demonstrate their own strength,
But the powerful elite are aware of this
And already have tabs on those who they regard as subversives.
It is easy for them to single out and intimidated us
And easier still for us simply not to bother.

*
It is impossible to gauge the effect that demands for peace may be having,
The authorities are skilled at concealing dissatisfaction.
For so long people have been saying "No more war",
But for all those demands little has changed.
Seeing that the Peace Movement was growing in strength,
Thatcher appointed Heseltine as Minister of Defence.
One specific part of his job is to discredit CND,
Such is the nature of Conservative democraty.

*
As pacifist we are too easily forced back into tokenism,
Making hollow gestures against the wheels of the juggernaut.
The line is delicate.
The spaces have always been created by the gentle and caring,
To be later filled by bullies and egotists.
We can try to fill those spaces with the strength of our love.
Gandhi called it Ahimsa. The Greenham Wowan call it the 'Politics of Whimsy',
But it doesn't end there, neither is it enough.
Gandhi played a major role in liberating India from Britain rule,
But conditions in India are still appaling for the ordinary people.
Limiting Greenham Peace Camp to women only is a sensible political ploy,
But if it is a demonstration of sexual exclusivity it is a sham.
Aren't we seeking to destroy all forms of exclusivity?
Does our own oppression give us the right to oppress others?
Unless we are prepared to oppose all oppression,
We stand guilty of direct contribution to it.

*
The neo-fascist plunder our land
And we must resist them on every level.
As outsiders we have few right with which to oppose them,
But on our own, together, we seek them.
They have their law and those who impose it.
We only have ourselves and each other.
They have their order and those who impose it.
We only have ourselves and each other.
It is easy to dismiss those who seek peace as dreamers,
But isn't our whole culture built on past dreams?
It is essential that our dreams become a reality
Or there will cease to be one.

*
Harrods boast that it can supply any whim that its wealthy clients might express,
Well let them supply me an Exocet missile and a starving Third World child
And I'll tell them the politics of choice.
Equality doesn't enter into the ghettos of wealth.
Beneath the protective sheath of Thatcher's economy
The right, rich and privileged get even richer
And they, in turn, support her barbaric policies both at home and overseas.
The Falklands war cost Britain over sixteen thousand million pounds - in whose pocket?

*
Throughout the world millions of people are employed making armaments,
Don't they realise that it's ordinary people like themselves who'll suffer the effects of their filthy labour?

*
The wealthy obscene with their obscene wealth
Applaud the carnage from their grandstand.
It's as if they were at Ascot laying their bets;
Five to one on the Four Horsemen.
They believe that money can buy them out of the responsibility
That they have for the world that they bleed dry.
They are the true pornographers
The real stylists in human perversion.
Rich educated tarts sit dumbly by
Watching their fortunes rise and fall
In the neatly pressed pin-striped trousers of the City.
Debutante whores in rich men's castles.

*
The ruling elite with their puppet figurehead
Queen Elizabeth the Second, Regina Virgina,
Strut about on the million of bodies
That they have sacrificed to gain their position.
Who are these leaders but those who have made violence pay?
Who are they but the inheritors of their ancestors greed and theft?
Their blood stained flags are rags to our future,
Tattered remnant of our individual rights.
These rulers are common murderers and thieves,
But still we bow before them.
For how long will the masses be so pathetically manipulated by God, Queen and Country?

*
For fucks sake where are we in all this?
We're given life yet we court death.
For Christ's sake how long? How long, oh Lord, how long?
Still we lay prostrate before a stylised figure on a crucifix.
As if the stone fool might be resurrected.
We are expected to bargain our lives for his
And join him in the ugliness of perpetual Christian guilt.
He hangs there as a remainder of our own subjugation.
Let it be known that he alone is Christ,
Those who dare emulate him shall suffer thus.
Each settlement is spiked with that stupid image,
Each conscience nailed to that diet of corruption.

*
Military acts are bathed in those gory tales.
Tired Marines, edgy to fuck and sleep, are blessed in his name.
Pious virgins in desire kneel in worship before the myth.
In anticipation of their own death, they await his coming.
Sweet Jesus have mercy on me.
Sweet Jesus, they share his agony.
Sweet Jesus, they share his misery.
Fuck his loaded deity.

*
Over half the world's population is starving,
Crucified by the greed of landowners,
Helpless against the imbalance of priorities
Practiced by the major powers who, if they wanted to, could help.
Every minute of the day millions upon million of pounds
Are spent on the machinery of war.
If only a half of that was spent on the machinery of peace,
There would be no more starvation on this planet.
Yet governments pay no heed to the cries of suffering,
They perhaps make token gestures to appease their consciences,
But no real improvements are made
Because to ensure control the superpowers need to maintain the imbalance.
Natives are slaughtered in their homelands
By governments seeking out new possessions.
Most of the wealth of the so called developed nations
Has been gained at the expense of the Third World
From whom natural resources, both mineral and human,
Have been unscrupulously exploited.
Peoples' pride and dignity is burnt in Napalm
And hand-held flame-throwers.
The poor and underprivileged are raped and tormented
By leaders who use their power not to assist, but to oppress.
At the wave of a gloved hand
These people can, and do,
Send young men to their death,
But not before others too have fallen from their bayonets and guns.
Such armies are invariably called 'peace keeping forces'.
The hypocrisy is as appalling as it is obvious.
The wealthy, educated, privileged and secure
Make the lives of those less fortunate a complete misery.
Million upon millions of people are dying from malnutrition
Because, to stabilise their economies, governments destroy food rather than giving it to the needy.

*
"Let them eat cake" said Marie Antoinette
As she wiped the calf's blood from her lips.

*
"Proud to be British" said Margaret Thatcher
As she wiped the Falkland's blood from her hands.

*
The ruling elite have no concept of what it is to suffer want,
Yet it is they who are directly responsible.
In a world where there are people who can't afford a crust of bread,
These arrogant scabs drive around in Bentleys and Rolls Royces.
Perhaps it amuses them to rub shit into the faces of the poor,
But there'll come a time when such overt displays of wealth
Will not be tolerated by the people in the street.
In a sane society wealth and possession would not be an asset.

*
A few years ago a politician was on the radio
Saying that no one in the UK suffered from want.
Next day I saw an old man pleading for a handful of coal;
His wife was dying of cold and he was penniless.
Maybe in the morning, as the politician sipped breakfast tea,
She lay cold and dead before the empty grate.
Every year thousand of people die of hypothermia,
Too hungry, too cold, too poor to stay alive.

*
At times of national crisis it's always the poor who suffer.
"Back Britain" we're told
As the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
At times of international crisis it's the same story.
"Back Britain" we're told
As the rich get richer and the poor get killed.
In the event of a nuclear crisis,
The rich will retreat to private bunkers with their wealth and possessions.

*
The injustice of inequality is sanctioned by the church.
With its tradition of finance from the gentry
The church has always been obliged
To ensure that its flock remains servile.
"Repent ye sinners or be devoured in the flames of hell."
Those very same flames that devoured their enemies in countless religious wars.

*
So often the church has marched hand in hand with the military
Casting its blessings upon the writhing bodies of the battlefield.
Each stab of bayonet is God's word.
Each crash of steel is God's word.
Each torn limb and splash of blood is God's word.
For he so loved the world he gave our only begotten sons.
Each sodden grave and sodding death is God's word.
For he so loved the world he gave our only begotten sons.
For he so loved the world he gave our only begotten sons.

*
In Christian societies executions are attended by representatives of the church.
Goggle-eyed before the gallows, the electric chair and the gas-chamber
They administer their Christ's blessing.
In America poison is injected into the blood-stream.
Another Christ dies, jacked up by the state.
Another glorious advance for civilisation.
One small step for man.
One giant step for mankind.
For he so loved the world.
He gave us his only begotten son
And likewise we are expected so to do.
For he so loved the world.

*
Violent, vicious hypocrisy.
How is anyone supposed to deal with these contradictions,
Confusions and lies? They defy reason.
Oh yes, you can inwardly laugh at the absurdity,
Satirise the obscenity, but the hysteria soon wears thin
And the tears wear a colder complexion.
Humour can offer diversion,
But it dilutes real anger
And nothing gets confronted.
We are ruled by dangerous mad-people,
What's funny about that for fucks sake?
The world is daily threatened with annihilation,
Is that really something to be trivialased?
The world is under constant threat.
Against this background of fear
We struggle to create our own authority.
While being bludgeoned into conformity
We struggle to find our inner selves.
Of course I feel uncomfortable when I'm laughed at in the streets,
But I don't want to be one of them.
I want to be an outsider,
At the same time I'd like to come in out of the cold.

*
Urgency overrules personal fears.
Against the scenario of total destruction
We demand a sanity that might save the world.
That alone excludes us from the mainstream of thought.
History offers no solutions,
Quotes from Mao or Stalin, Hitler or Marx
Simply confirms the oppression.
I'm tired of political experts,
Tired of 'if onlys'.
They have always been the same people,
Grey visionless robots
Who would have us all share their death.
History is simply a justification for oppression,
Written by those who practice it.
It is being constantly changed and rewritten
To conform to the requirements of the ruling elite.
A tempest of convenience that blasts across the blistered bodies of the dead.
We receive at best only filtered truths.
Most of what we see and hear is lies.

*
The Falklands War was rewritten as it happened.
It was not a glorious victory for the British spirit,
Nor an heroic defeat of a fascist dictator.
It was a callous and savage piece of electioneering
Designed to cover up horrific domestic problems.
At a time when a peaceful settlement was a possibility,
Thatcher personally ordered the sinking of the General Belgrado
Killing over three hundred men
And horribly mutilating many more.
She did this because her political neck required bloodshed
To prove her wisdom in releasing the Task Force.
The history books will not document her as a cold-blooded murderer.

*
I'm tired of the dull rationalisation of the politicians.
Weighed down with their sums and inadequacies
I feel only anger and bellied hatred for them.
How can anyone become so distorted?
How can anyone be so far from real human values?
I feel only disgust for their twisted minds.
How can peace be achieved through threats of violence?
What kind of hope is there in that strait-jacket?

*
The authority of those who oppress us
Is supported, maintained and defended
By those who are themselves the most oppressed;
Those who, because they have no alternative, are in service to the rulers.

*
How can I feel anger towards the squaddy?
Weighed down with his guns and inadequacies
I can feel only pity and bellied compassion.
How can anyone be so distorted?
How can anyone be so far from real human values?
I can only feel pity for his twisted mind.
How can freedom be achieved if the poor fight to uphold
The privileges of those who directly oppress them?

*
We look through one eye hoping the other won't see,
That way we only need deal with a half of it.
Like bloody ostriches, oblivious,
Not because we are, but because we choose to be.
Most people see through the lies
But are too afraid to admit it.
It's so much easier to be the passive observer.
How much longer can people afford to just sit by like this?
All the indications are there.
Massive unemployment,
Recession, depression.
But who's looking? Who cares?
Tamely the population is being led down the road to total bondage.
Government is daily strengthening its powers.
Those who stand against it are ridiculed,
Discredited or abused and punished.
Those in power are totally cynical.
Rather than analysing the seriousness of the problem
They simply strengthen the army and police to combat it
They are ready for the inevitable response.
It happened in Brixton, Toxteth and Moss Side.
It happens daily in Northern Ireland.
Under Thatcher's regime there has been massive increases in police brutality.
In London police shot down a man
Only to find it was the wrong person.
We regret to inform you. Regret to inform you.
Regret to inform you. We regret to inform you
That today another Christ was shot in the back of the head.
We regret to inform you. Regret to inform you,
That another Christ, not yet ten years old, was shot today,
By agents of Her Majesty's Government, with a plastic bullet.
They say that plastic bullets were designed not to kill,
They do.
I say that human beings were not designed to kill, not us, not me;
We do.
We regret to inform you.

*
1984 is a book about the positive danger of totalitarianism,
Under Thatcher's unfeeling guidance the scenario is one year early.
With the cold mechanism of the pin ball arcade
We're flicked around as numbers by the hidden computers.
Software in the hardware. Documented and filed.
We have no access to the information that they have stored on us.
Ticker-tape alter egos, print-out portraits.
We are becoming another.
As individuals within that mechanical system we are arbitrary,
Wanted only for what can be taken from us.
Our future is of no concern to the mega-corporations
Who determine the nature of our economic well-being.
Thatcher's policies require massive unemployment
Which makes her order to 'support our boys' nothing but a fucking insult.
When they were eight thousand miles away dying for her arrogance
She fabricated what was a complete mockery of compassion.
When they're at home, jobless on the streets,
She doesn't give a fuck for them.
Self determination and self enterprise are her big lines,
But just how much of that does she offer to others
In her contemptible use of people?
She was prepared to risk world peace
Saying that it was for the self determination of the Falklanders,
Those very same people who over a year ago
She was prepared to abandon without a thought.
And now, for all her empty talk,
They are forced to live in a fortress waiting for further hostilities.
Thatcher has recently sanctioned a loan of one hundred million pounds to Argentina
Claiming that it was to stabilise world economy.
The purchase of further Exocets and the development of nuclear potential
Should do much for world economy, but very little for world security.
Just what the fuck was all that bloodshed for?

*
Thatcher has signed away British self-determination in one single stroke.
She has agreed to install deadly cruise missiles on British soil
Over which the Americans have total control.
The American military presence is designed solely
To limit nuclear war with Russia to the 'European Theatre'.
Meanwhile we are sold the wicked lie of protection and deterrence.
American war planners have repeatedly stated that they intend
To fight the Third World War on European soil;
Cruise missiles greatly increase the danger of that happening.
Designed to avoid radar detection by skimming the earth's surface,
Cruise missiles are seen as the ideal 'first strike weapon',
They also guarantee a massive response that would make Britain into a nuclear desert.
Military naivety is astounding. The experts seriously believe
That they will be able to limit war to the 'theatre'.
In this particular show the world will be the stage,
There'll be no encore.

*
Thatcher and her cronies talk of 'limited tactical response'
And 'executive action' causing 'collateral damage'.
These terms are borrowed from their American counterparts
And are designed to mask the ugly reality that they describe.
In everyday language 'collateral damage' simply means civilian deaths.
In the event of nuclear attack on Britain that would amount to thirty-eight million people.
Is it any wonder that these crazy psychotics
Invent jargon to assist them in their studied madness?
Every year hundreds of innocent people still die horrific deaths
As a result of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
It is probably that an all out nuclear war
Would destroy all life on planet Earth.

*
We are not talking fantasy,
Nor preaching doom.
We are talking of an existing reality;
The one that we allow to exist around us.

*
Defence Secretary Heseltine disputes the kind of information that we offer
Claiming that it has 'no basis in fact'.
There are no words to describe the utter contempt
That we feel for people of his kind.
They sit in their seats of power
Distorting and perverting all human decency.
How can they dare be so blatant?
How can they dare be so hypocritical?
Who is this Heseltine with his corrupt lies?
Who is this Thatcher with her arrogant deceit?
These hideous mutants cast their shadows
Across all that is worthwhile and good.

*
Cruise missile will be installed because Thatcher has created some kind of deal with Reagan.
We will probably never know the details of that arrangement.
It will almost certainly involve some kind of economic juggling act,
The massive corporations turning political thumbscrews
On U.S. investment in Britain.
Russian tanks in Afghanistan are nothing
Compared with the bargaining power of American capital in the UK.
Whatever the nature of that deal is,
It has made Britain into America's front line,
The fifty-third State, with no rights of citizenship.
To many people that might not matter,
Fed from birth on American propaganda and Hollywood trash,
The resistance levels are low.
As long as we passively accept American domination
We can except no real advance.
We are being sold down the line.

*
To many people the missiles and warheads might not matter.
To many people nuclear reality is too huge to contemplate,
Yet for all people the reality looms constantly in nightmares.
In the nuclear state we are expected to accept those nightmares.
Is this really all that we can hope for as life?
Is this really all that we can hope for as death?
Maybe our lives don't matter that much,
But why impose our madness on future generations?
Or is it perhaps that you no longer believe that there will be future generations?
In your passive acceptance of it
You have already allowed the holocaust to happen.
The future is ended.

*
We are not talking fantasy,
Nor preaching doom.
We are talking of an existing reality,
The one that we allow to exist around us.

*
The nuclear hardware produces in the last three decades
Will pollute the Earth for thousands of years.
A nuclear war will destroy it.
Is that why the cherry trees blossom?
You are destroying and corrupting.
In condemning them to the nuclear nightmare
Are you willing to accept the burning of tomorrow's unborn?
They know nothing of this sorrow.

*
Suffer little children to come unto me.
Suffer little children to come unto me.
Suffer little children to come unto me.
Suffer little children to come unto me.

*
In your refusal to act against these hideous dangers
You are guilty of being the gutless passive observer.
Are you so inhuman that you will let this happen?
Just a helpless bystander waving your flag in mute acceptance?
Take up your eyes and see.
Take up your ears and hear.
Take up your mind and think.
Take up your life and act.

*
It is up to us all as responsible citizens of Earth
To work towards the downfall of the powerful elite.
Their rule has created dreadful suffering.
Their insanity precludes all reason and compassion,
They lie, trick and manipulate.
They are the maggots in the flesh of decency,
The vultures that pick at the bones of hope,
The carriers of famine, war, pestilence, and death.

*
They must be stopped.
Why should people die for their insanity?
Why should people starve for their insanity?
Why should people suffer the spitefulness of their greed?
We must not be intimidated by the authority that they appear to have.
We must be prepared to oppose them on every level,
To fight back in the knowledge that if we don't
We will have failed in our responsibility to life itself.
It has happened before
That the powerless have risen against the oppressor
Only to be beaten back.
But there have been cases where they have succeeded.
Ours is a just cause,
It is up to each one of us, alone, to do our best.
We must learn to overcome our fears.
We must realise that the strength that they have
Is the strength that we give them.
It is you, the passive observer who has given them this power.
You are being used and abused
And will be discarded as soon as they've bled what they want from you. You must learn to live with your own conscience,
your own morality,
your own decision,
your own self.
You alone can do it.
There is no authority but yourself.

*
One squaddy, horrifically burnt in the Falklands War,
Was approached by Prince Charles during a presentation.
"Get well soon" said the Prince, to witch the squaddy replied,
"Yes Sir, I will".

I still see local punk bands grinding it out and coming up with great songs. I like punk when it gets down to the stripped rock feeling, which is what I like in the Sex Pistols or in The Clash. It's fun to listen to, y'know? Stimulates the lizard brain. I'm not wild that the term gets applied to any pop rock with distortion, but it's not like I'm the fuckin' genre police. And besides, if people like Avril Lavigne didn't care so much about calling themselves punk, it wouldn't be as much fun to see their fans freak out when you call 'em "emo."

Point of this being, of course, that all these 30 or 40 something Brooklyn indie twee pop stars associate their girly sensitive music more with punk than, say, hippies, despite the fact their music is closer to hippy or krautrock than punk. And kraut's always seemed more hippy or prog than punk to me.

You're under arrest!

Robert Plant says on disc two of "the Drum N' Bass Show" 5-21-77 just before The Battle of Evermore:

"This was the plan. You see, When we were teenagers in about 1971, just before we started punk rock, we used to do an acoustic set and if you've followed some of the rubbish in the papers... not the papers in Houston, of course, you'll find out that we're just about to start doing an acoustic set for you right now, so I hope you like it."

The man makes no sense. There is a bonus interview at the end of disc three where they're talking about the black object on the cover of Presence and who knows what the fuck that is all about.

The only punk songs that I really like are all hardcore. (probably this is mostly to do with the fact that I listened to too much grunge in high school) So I think I have a self limiting thing going on, I know the punk songs I like are very few & far between, so I tend to avoid it- as opposed to other genres like shoegazing or something, where I'm way more likely to give new stuff a few listens.

http://www.highhopes.com/28B.JPG

The secret to the early Velvets' sound was John Cale's deep understanding of trigonometry.

;-) (jks)

Television
Black Flag
Wire
Ramones
Minutemen
Misfits
Fugazi
Stooges
Buzzcocks
Undertones
The Fall

If you think all punk is poorly played, hyperfast three-chord anti-government screeds, you're listening to somebody's bad stereotype of punk. Or you're thinking of hardcore, which was punk's stylistic blind alley anyway.

If you pop on "Orgasm Addict" or "Holidays In The Sun" and you don't get an instant rush of timeless rock pleasure, you may be dead.

Of this list, the only bands I have any passing desire to ever listen to are Wire, the Minutemen and The Ramones, and they aren't high on my playlist.

Any argument that starts out "Why should I respect a music genre that is a bunch of undifferentiated crap" is immediately suspect if said genre is full of differentiation. Although I suspect the basis of this argument is "Somebody turned up their nose at my beloved ELO CDs - I'll attack back!" Okay, life sucks. Buy a helmet.

It's uncompromising, DIY stuff done for the love of doing it, not because these guys think they have a chance in hell of making any money doing it. I am drawn to it because it's pure music driven by nothing more than love.

Anything that has ever been considered punk by anybody? Bands that sound like the Ramones? The New York 1970s scene? Detroit in the 60s, England in the 70s, LA in the 80s? Bands that are snotty? What do you mean by punk?

OH THE DIVERSITY

OH THE DIVERSITY

Have you ever listened to these bands, Theorry? There's an awful lot of stylistic real estate between Minor Threat and Pere Ubu and the Theoretical Girls, yet all fall under the umbrella of Punk. It is the quintessence of diversity.

but if punk is as diverse as you say, then why not ashlee simpson?

hardcore is to punk what acorns are to oak trees, silly person.

but if punk is as diverse as you say, then why not ashlee simpson?

Just because a genre is diverse, that doesn't necessarily make it all-encompasing.

when is punk's cut-off point then? anyone who is inspired by punk, and anyone who inspired punk, is a punk?

Unless they are lying.

And yeah, if you think DEVO and the New York Dolls sound the same you're a fucking moron.

ps... always thought hardcore was short for... hardcore punk... but maybe Im just crazy

Are you being "controversial" here?

I was going to cite that too, but I've seen arguments to the contrary.

...y'know, unlike, say, Hip Hop.

Are you being "controversial" here?

No, here I believe I was "being a dick," but by the same token, I'd assert with a straight-face that there's more diversity under the banner of Punk than there is under the banner of Hip Hop.