Punk is dead.
This is an article from a local magazine called Exotic. It’s a strip-club / music magazine here in the Northwest. Anyway, here’s the story, it’s a good read. I typed it up from the magazine.
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By: Statutory Ray (of Exotic Magazine)
People have been tossing around the phrase “punk is dead” for years. Well, before anyone currently under the age of 30 was exposed to the genre, punk rock had already been declared a passing fad. However, record stores and radio stations have continued to feature “punk” sections on their shelves and, even as the unfortunate effects of time wore on the genre, the quality and popularity of punk rock were the only seemingly affected elements.
Until recently
Browsing through a record store that I have been patronizing for years, I recently noticed the same unfortunate change that I have already seen at college radio stations and on music web sites. The phrase “punk rock” has now been replaced with “punk/emo/hardcore” in terms of genre classification. At first glance it seems natural. As with “hip-hop/rap/urban” (I love how “urban” is a nice way of saying “Black”, that’s next month’s article) or “country/western” genre classifications tend to be based on aesthetic qualities. If it has a beat and a flow it’s “hip-hop/rap/urban”. If it involves a hatred of all things “hip-hop/rap/urban” it is “country/western”. And so forth. But “punk/emo/hardcore” doesn’t sit right. Everything from Skid Row to Slayer can be considered “hardcore” if it has enough distortion and blood-dropping typeset on the album art, so I will ignore the obvious genre cluster there. But I take serious issue with the work “emo” being placed next to the word “punk”. Analogous to the classification “vegan/poultry” or “feminist studies/pornographic magazines”, “punk/emo” groups, together, two subcategories that have historically shared nothing in common.
Until recently.
What follows is not a discussion to the effect of “Rancid sucks, Op Ivy is better, GG Allin is god, spare a dollar for Pabst, oi oi”. I do not intend to add to the endless list of cocky music columnists insisting on what is and is not “real” punk rock. Fuck, I’m barely 28 years old and I can still remember my first GWAR show. Rather, I am calling out an APB on the missing genre that once was. Where the fuck has punk rock gone?
An important note must be made here. Regardless of whether or not someone likes old school punk rock over the new school garbage and for purposes of discussion, I will consider even the most superficially rebellious bands (Blink 182, Good Charlotte) as “punk”, if for anything than to illustrate a point. Three chords plus anti-establishment lyrics to the power of cheap beer divided by clean clothes equals punk.
Now, returning to the most unlikely couple since Julia Roberts and Lyle Lovett, let’s contrast punk and emo. Emo, short for “emotional rock”, is a genre that celebrates apathy, superficiality, love letters and a general sheep-like existence where one’s only redeeming qualities are the amount of MySpace friends and rare (unplayable) records possessed. Punk rock is a genre that is supposed to celebrate integrity, active systems of belief (moral and political), hate mail and individualism. Whereas, punk rock is utilitarian in fashion (safety pins, patches and one-swoop-with-the-razor hairstyles), emo is post-modern and useless for practical purposes (non-prescription glasses, second-hand shirts that sell for fifty bucks and cheap plastic belts that don’t hold up pants). Oil and water if you ask me.
Although it may seem obvious to most, a serious lack of in-studio and touring punk bands with members under the age of retirement is the most rational choice of blame for the genre’s disappearance. However, the Ray-dar detects that the subculture has been infiltrated and destroyed from inside. For instance, PunkRock.org, which receives the most relevance for the Google search “punk rock” recently featured recording artists The Guts, a band that, according to a write-up on The Wire:…
(gets) a bit gush(y), hovering around the bitter theme of love’s maddening trials (in) numerous tracks, including “Cigarettes and Valentines”, “Heartbreaker”, “She’s Gone”, “Always and Forever” and “Down the Drain”, but the execution of these lovesick lyrics comes at a racing pace that never really slows.
The Portsmouth punk scene, famous for bringing us the Queers, is now churning out love ballads. What helps these spineless bleeding-heart pussies onto PunkRock.org and not RateMyEmoHair.com? According to The Wire, it’s their “execution”. If it’s fast-paced and high-pitched, it must be punk.
It’s not on the shelves or the dials, where has punk gone? If the yin of fast-paced distortion guitar has lost the yang of self-empowering, anti-establishment themes, where has the yang gone? Surprisingly, some of the most mellow and blatantly non-analog music has grasped the socially-critical and angst-ridden feel that once drew crusties to Pine Street. Signed to Epitaph (R.I.P., lol), Tom Waits informs a new generation:
The poor, the lame, the blind
Who are the ones that we kept in charge?
Killers, theives and lawyers
God’s away on business.
Electro-chick-rockers Ladytron “Destroy Everything”:
Anything that may delay you
Might just save you
You only have to look behind you
At who’s underlined you
Destroy everything you touch
And the following lyrics come from Sage Francis, a rap musician:
Makeshift patriot
The flag shop is out of stock
I have myself… via live telecast
Folk-singers, electro-clashers and backpack rappers are stepping up to address the very issues that punk rock has historically sworn to address. Meanwhile, Tim Armstrong is busy writing love songs with his wife. Ian McKay is getting drunk and Target DVD Presents: Dead Kennedys Live is selling like hotcakes. What does remain of decent punk rock (Defiance, the “new” Poison Idea and Suburban Anthem all deserve a NW-area shout out) is not in enough supply to compensate the demand for spineless, heartbroken whine-alongs about not getting an e-mail back from some broad. Although a genuine thread of anti-establishment centered self-empowerment runs through the airwaves, it is surrounded by drum machines and acoustic guitars. In short, one must construct a DJ mash-up using emo riffs over techno-bop lyrics in order to hear “punk” music.
Sweet lovely death.
Waiting. Breath.
Anyone?
Punk is dead.
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Statutory Ray… 
You tell ‘em. 
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