"The Filth and the Fury" - are we destined for a new age of Punk?

[Taverner]

I just watched the excellent documentary about the Sex Pistols, The Filth and the Fury and something dawned on me. The movie starts showing London in decay - garbage piled up high due to striking sanitation workers. Unemployment is rife, and the Great British Welfare State is in decline. Everything the Brits had grown up accustomed to and had taken for granted was falling apart. The perfect environment for Punk Rock to germinate in.

Fast forward to today. The US is in Decay - not because of the death of the welfare state - alas, we never had one. But its in decay because of the death of the Great American Corporate State. Instead of garbage piled up, we have empty boxcars. People are out of work, but things are even more dire as there is no welfare safety net to help us.

So - to me - it seems like music should head in a decidedly Punk direction. Part of the Punk ethos was the do it yourself mentality. Instead of big color glossy concert posters, there were xeroxes done in monochrome. At times the letters were simply cut out of old magazines. Most punk music was simply traded - it was more common to have a copy than an actual album from Tower Records.

Being that there will be a lot of people unemployed with less resources and more time, this DIY mentality will proliferate. Shows will be more common at places like the Gilman Street Club in Berkeley than the Astrodome. If you can't afford to pay the rent, what makes you think you can afford a $100 concert ticket?

So what say you?

[Sheets of Easter]

1. Unfortunately, we'll never have the DIY aesthetic like it was in those days.

Not for want of trying, it's just that it's so easy now to make professional-grade fliers and recordings using computers. Back in the good old days of punk and hardcore, you were lucky if you could cut a demo on a 4-track recorder, and fliers meant a trip to Kinko's.

[Taverner]

2. Well, yeah it will be different

But DIY in the Internet age will be the spirit

[Threedifferentones]

3. Sure you're partly right but

Blues music also flourished in dysmal locales. And it is quite unlike punk. What I am saying is that this new form of pissed or sad music won't be quite like the last. Whether it will be "punk" will likely be up for dispute. But, you are right, desperate times bring people together and foment "grassroot" movements, once people lose interest and faith in the culture at large. So, if things keep getting worse I think we can expect a new growth of badass music. Interesting times, as they say.

[MedleyMisty]

4. I thought that music trading had been going on for years on the net?

I don't know much about the current underground music scene, but I do know that there's been a ton of stuff traded on the net for quite some time.

Speaking of that, if there are any lurking record company employees - if I can listen to music online first and see if I like it, I will appreciate that you were cool about sharing it and making it available and I will want to buy it and support you. If you pull all your stuff from the net and use draconian measures to try and keep people from putting your stuff online and act like assholes about it, I will make it a point to never buy any of your stuff.

[nomorenomore08]

5. The musical form itself never went away, though it was bastardized and commercialized all to hell.

The "real" punk/hardcore/crust/grindcore kind of stuff (not to be a snob, but...) still exists on a small scale - we're talking, as often as not, living-room-gig small. Bands with names like Autistic Youth and Vitamin Piss, and music way too fast, angry, and all-around scary to ever be close to "mainstream."

Meanwhile, what passes for "punk rock" in said mainstream was already pathetic 10+ years ago, and it's downright infuriating now. I mean, My Chemical Romance? Fall Out Boy? What human being over the age of 14 could possibly find this music compelling?

So I guess my answer is a very mixed and inconclusive one. Sorry I couldn't be of more help... :shrug:

[DBoon]

6. Punk was born in bankrupt New York City

"Ford to NYC: Drop Dead!" was the headline at the time the Ramones and other bands started punk

Punk followed urban decay from the Bowery to London to Los Angeles. It entered the suburbs during the Reagan era, when the middle class began its long decline.