I've just finished reading Jon Savage's The England's Dreaming Tapes for the second time. It consists of the interviews he conducted for his earlier book England's Dreaming, an overview of the English punk scene. There's a shitload of take-aways in it, as far as common pre-punk tastes (Roxy Music, Bowie, Mott the Hoople, the Stooges, and the MC5), what gigs they went to, when they first became acquainted with the Sex Pistols, the impact of the Pistols, and so on. Everyone saying that the pre-Nancy Sid Vicious was really nice, surprisingly smart, and funny. I haven't read the book that the interviews were conducted for, but this follow up is deep, I can't imagine the earlier book adding all that much.
I haven't listened to punk rock all that much in recent years because I've listened to all of the seminal stuff so much I'd practically memorized much of it. You can debate all that you want about whether or not "punk is dead", but to me much of what has been labeled punk rock in the last thirty years is derivative, just banging out three chords and showing an angry face. All the mosh pit and stage diving nonsense, everybody's seems to forget the part about thinking for yourself and debasing what came before. Well intended or not, most of it seems disingenuous. Punk rock is decidedly dead. The spirit of punk is not, but you'll have to look elsewhere for it (the first thing that comes to mind is the lone protester standing in front of the tanks in Tiananmen Square. Oh, and the Pussy Riot thing).
I haven't listened to punk rock all that much in recent years because I've listened to all of the seminal stuff so much I'd practically memorized much of it. You can debate all that you want about whether or not "punk is dead", but to me much of what has been labeled punk rock in the last thirty years is derivative, just banging out three chords and showing an angry face. All the mosh pit and stage diving nonsense, everybody's seems to forget the part about thinking for yourself and debasing what came before. Well intended or not, most of it seems disingenuous. Punk rock is decidedly dead. The spirit of punk is not, but you'll have to look elsewhere for it (the first thing that comes to mind is the lone protester standing in front of the tanks in Tiananmen Square. Oh, and the Pussy Riot thing).
In the midst of reading the book I did some poking around online and while looking for the current status of Jamie Reid, the situationist pal of Malcolm McLaren who did all of the Sex Pistols graphics, I ran into his semi-recent revisit of the original "God Save the Queen" graphic, this time around with Trump the target. It got me to thinking that if punk rock did truly still exist, shouldn't there be an anti-Trump anthem by now? There may very well have been an attempt, but if I haven't heard of it, the splash wasn't big enough. You can't leave all that to Uncle Neil. I mean, jeez, show us what you're made of.
~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~
Listen:The Sex Pistols - God Save the Queen mp3 at Marty Sport (?)
The Clash - I'm So Bored With the USA mp3 at Review Stalker
The Buzzcocks - Boredom mp3 at Inside Pulse (?)
The Damned - Neat, Neat, Neat at Jorge Farah (?)
Plaster these around the hood:
God Save the USA - Jamie Reid, high resolution version of above
God Save President Trump, God Save Us All, alternate version
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