Re: re punk (off topic rant)

[bobzilla77@mindspring.com]

Well I would agree with that, Brian.  I remember when someone refused to
give me a ride to see Suicidal Tendencies because I was wearing a Peter
Gabriel t-shirt and he was sure I'd be killed.

I guess I do have to admit that part of the appearance of punk rockers was
hatred of anything old, the great "no" to everything you were asked to buy
into as Good Music.

I never bought into that & was sorry when people did. Music fans should take
time to understand the history of what makes the music what it is.  I did go
through that phase of rejecting major label music, but having watched a few
minutes of "1987: Behind The Music" I'm convinced I didn't miss much, with
the exception of maybe Prince and Neil Young.

Anyway many people - rock critics and fans alike- seem to enjoy making rules
about what to agree on, it's an idiotic mentality.  But among musicians,
it's not the case now so much.  Ever since Sonic Youth started lionizing
Karen Carpenter, everyone is finding the "beauty" in things that were
wholesale rejected in their time.  Hey, my girlfriend cleans house to disco
sometimes and I have to admit, it sounds pretty good to me now.

So I would never say that Yes ain't rock music, after all they got guitars
in there.  I will admit to enjoying Yes music on cretain occasions. But I
don't think it was wrong to say "NO!" to that becoming the dominant rock
culture in 1975 either.
Maybe at the time, we needed the passion of that "no" to generate such a
powerful response and move forward with the alternative.



(PS-
Bob's Top 5 for 1987:
Butthole Surfers - Locust Abortion Technician
XTC - Skylarking
NoMeansNo - Sex Mad
Big Black - Songs About Fucking
Pere Ubu - The Tenement Year
...betting a million bucks not a single one is mentioned on that goddamn TV
show.)



-----Original Message-----
From: Brian Cady <cadyb@home.com>
To: Paul's Who List <TheWho@igtc.com>; bobzilla77@mindspring.com
<bobzilla77@mindspring.com>
Date: June 10, 2001 5:05 PM
Subject: RE: re punk (off topic rant)


>> I should have asked exactly what you meant, because I still can't
>> make head
>> nor tail of it.
>
>No I guess I should clear things up:
>
>1) I like punk rock. I really do. I think that rap and punk were the last
>new forms of rock 'n' roll.
>
>2) Almost everything I've said about punk has nothing to do with what the
>bands did or felt towards the music that came before them. It has to do
with
>what it means now to music critics (and has meant for twenty years).
>
>3) That rejection of rock music that came before punk, in the minds of
these
>critics (and a few of the actual British punks as well, by the way), was
NOT
>a rejection of Kiss, Loverboy, et al. It was perceived (and still is
>perceived) as a rejection of The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Yes, Rod Stewart and
>all but the early works of The Kinks, The Who and The Rolling Stones. And
if
>you want to put a blanket term on it, what is the nastiest thing a punk can
>call you? Not a heavy metal fan. A hippie. What was John Lydon wearing on
>his T-shirt when he was discovered and put into The Sex Pistols? "Fuck Pink
>Floyd"  Punk was (theoretically, mind you) a rejection of The Sixties and
>the direction towards which the bands of the Sixties were pushing rock;
>i.e., complexity, size and influences outside rock 'n' roll music.
>
>4) This attitude was a shocking one for critics to voice back in the late
>1970's. Those critics thought they were a small group attacking a prog rock
>leviathan that would never be changed. After 20 years, however, it's become
>holy writ with almost every critic, so much so that the fact that most punk
>rockers don't hold to it doesn't change it. It is now understood by
>practically every rock critic and writer in the U.K. and U.S. that good
rock
>music died when psychedelic music started in 1967 and good rock didn't
>return until The Ramones and The Sex Pistols. Although Pete Townshend is a
>great writer for penning "My Generation" and "Substitute" he will always
>have a stain on his reputation for inventing the rock opera. All rock songs
>that go over 3 and a half minutes are pretentious crap. Etcetera, etcetera.
>
>5) My contention and goal, if you will, is to destroy this view and
>ultimately to make room for both. To see punk not as salvation or the only
>correct way to make music, but just one form of rock 'n' roll amongst
>others. I want to say that liking NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS doesn't mean that
>CLOSE TO THE EDGE isn't rock music. They're both rock music and as long as
>we keep saying rock music MUST be this or that, must hold to a certain
form,
>we've as good as declared that rock is dead.
>
>-Brian in Atlanta
>