Gothamist: When Did Punk Die?

r1b2

Fri, 24 Oct 2008 16:11:30 -0500

This was not a great article. Although New York isn't where one goes when looking for terrific writing, this really wasn't a first-rate effort. Boring, uninformative. Coincidentally, walking down Broadway in the Financial District today, I saw two wannabes, strictly visiting the big city from the Jersey home, and one had a bookbag with the words "Sex Pistols" and the defaced portrait of the Queen stitched on it. There I am, suit and tie, running an errand, and I really had to restrain myself from punching this K-Mart shopping mother f**ker in the head. How is punk relevant to these emo/ quicksilver/ billabong/ A&F pieces of sh*t? Can't you come up with your own identity, mall-douche?

DrScientist

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 12:42:39 -0500

I think it happened around the same time that SLC Punks came out. The movie with Mathew Lillard and the crazy Punker hair and leather. The Synopsis is interesting enough. Just look at the crazy hair!

x_x

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 11:35:49 -0500

The Exploited established in 1981 that "Punks Not Dead", so this article must be wrong.

Bouncing Soul

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 03:14:40 -0500

Saying punk died with Nancy Spungen (the original Courtney Love) is completely absurd. Nancy only represented a small part of the punk scene: the groupie junkie whore turned annoying band girlfriend junkie whore. That type of punk whore has evolved and is now just the punk scene whore minus the drugs. Where did the punk go? There’s no one definitive moment of the death of punk like there is for grunge. We knew grunge was dead the minute Kurt Cobain decided he wanted to change his tune and then checked out before it was all over, “It’s better to burn out than fade away.” For punk, there are major events that have slowed down the scene and caused a decline but I can say for sure there are still people holding on. If there weren’t there would not be any shows, like the summer shows in Tompkins Square Park with Leftover Crack and Two Man Advantage or the Lust shows with bands like WWIX, Hyen Holocaust, Yo! Scunt and many more (www.myspace.com/leftoverproductions). Punk is there, you just have to look for it.

MFer

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 23:00:53 -0500

Sid and Nancy were the least of Punk. And in some ways that is why they are remembered most. (I call this the Che phenomenon.) But Punk died with the last show the Sex Pistols performed at the Winterland. "Ever get the feeling you’re being cheated? Good night." No fun, in deed. I love Sonic Youth and Nirvana. But they are not Punk. Not when they finally broke out. And the Ramones by this time were a cartoon farce, the Fat Albert of Punk. By Stiv Almighty!

NannyState

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 22:23:46 -0500

People are still arguing about Punk, its values, its relevance, etc. So it isn't dead, it's undead. And as an undead movement, it can still take a nice bite out of the system but while we old punks tried infecting the system, the system infected us so we're all just these walking undead contradictions. But as Sid and Nancy proved, we always have "the option".

ck

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 22:10:30 -0500

It takes zero percent free-thinking skills to be a "hipster." All you have to do is play like you reject everything that has ever come your way, except the people you follow's style and shitty attitude about life. Pathetic and useless. Yet they feel like that's their statement, i suppose. Wonder what it will feel like when they've contributed nothing to the world much less themselves 10 yrs down the road.

mx0

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 21:21:46 -0500

"has all been poured over" Kind of evocative, though lacking completion; that should read "pored over" as written. Or it should be rewritten.

Joclyn

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:23:54 -0500

11, my understanding is that the word "hipster" refers to someone who dresses like the guy from the Strokes if male, wears gigantic sunglasses and shower curtain looking dresses if female, does not eat enough on purpose, has moved to Williamsburg less than ten years ago to an apartment that his or her parents pay for, sits on the sidewalk a lot, and listens to crappy music. Am I wrong?

kcin122

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:06:52 -0500

greenpoint grouch... so you think you're gonna be punk and not wear a dumb leather jacket and have some clothes pins in yr face? the "punk rock" image has the same line of thinking as the "hipster" image. Both have subgroups and variations which sometimes cross. Sonic Youth is just as planted in the "punk rock" movement as they are in the "hipster" movement. Hipsters are not new it just seems people started bitching about them recently and gave a group of people which listened to pavement and guided by voices a name. now this doesnt take into account all the dumb cross sections of hipsters like those who go clubbing and listen to Hercules and the Love Affair and DFA stuff. people like to stick things into neat categories so they dont have to think about them. Grouping everyone from Jersey or Europe or those than play golf and wear Izod is something we do to make our selves feel better. Its human nature.

HUGO_MEGO

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 18:57:39 -0500

CBGB PIZZA, OH YEAHHHHH!!!!

greenpoint_grouch

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 18:50:21 -0500

About the hipster thing, hipsters are conforming to their own subculture. I get sneered at for not wearing skinny jeans or giant white sunglasses (I live in North Brooklyn so this happens a lot) but I'm the one who was going to see some of the bands hipsters are listening to now the first time around 10-20 years ago (my dad started taking me to shows when I was 13). I learned long ago that the people who were truly unique and interesting were the ones who didn't necessary *look* it.

MrCow

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 17:52:28 -0500

i agree with 9.

whitecastlerock

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 17:13:11 -0500

@slappy, when the hipsters do something worth noting then maybe they won't be ridiculed. Right now they are just fucking stupid-en masse. Please don't compare them to the punks of the 70s- that is just stretching it way too thin...

slappy

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 17:02:15 -0500

@hitlerbaby et al I always wince a little when I read wholesale dismissal of the "hipsters" in the comments here. Cultural transformation begins with free thinkers. That's the American legacy. Some people create and some people follow; also among "hipsters". Its OK. But don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. We need new ideas. That ideas can be bought and sold is besides the point. Hipsters want something new. Some new ideas are stupid and some new ideas are inspiring. So it goes. It takes considerable courage to think differently. Its a quality to admire, not ridicule.

dreamking

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:51:03 -0500

"Punk DE-volved into emo." There, fixed that for you. It's better to follow the chain down from punk to post-punk to new wave to new romantic to grunge to alternative to post-punk revival...A tangential dead-end called emo occurred somewhere along the way. We -are- talking about music, right? Cuz emo wasn't anything ever. At all. For anyone. And even then, it's just music. Oh, and the apathy. For people whom goth is just too much work - choose emo. If you feel up to it.

drewo

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:45:49 -0500

New York is too rich a town for punk rockers. Sure, there's folks who dress and act the part - but real punks are out in those small, depressed towns scattered across this country where the new riche dare not tread. And punk as an attitude is most important to young people seeking an identity (somewhat) codified outside of the mainstream. When you get to be old (like me) you see Punk Rock as just one more strain of the various pop cultural movements that stretches back to the folk revival to flower power up through hip-hop and electronica. Alas, the punk rockers, like the hippies before them, have become too self-centered and smug.

w0wzers

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:42:57 -0500

Punk evolved into emo.

grifforama

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:33:44 -0500

If you read the whole article, it's pretty interesting. The above is just a very short synopsis, and not a very good one. Go read it.

hitlerbaby

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:14:29 -0500

"Though many hipsters are for real..." Illuminate, please.

slappy

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:11:29 -0500

Punk is an active and aggressive refusal of the status quo. Hippies on steroids. Good that it happened. Its still a part of the cultural imagination. Resistance to square complacency in the face of injustice is not a bad thing no matter what you think of the style. Whether it was or can be effective is not the point. What was great about the punks is that they didn't care whether you thought it was effective or not. Far cry from fake hip consumerism. Though many hipsters are for real.

chuzzlewit

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 16:09:55 -0500

sid the torch bearer. he would have really liked that.

Amanda Harlech

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 15:27:18 -0500

so fkn passe!

Wza

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 15:17:35 -0500

On the flip side, the girl on the cell phone probably wouldn't have lasted here 30 years ago.

CR

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 15:10:42 -0500

All of the above is one of the stupider things I've read about punk rock is quite some time.