Phlegmata wrote:
Mike Puke wrote:
I suppose I seem to think that punk has just gotten "stale". There just doesn't seem to be any real anger or energy left in it! No one seem interested in "anarchist" ideals anymore! All I seem to see these days is "mainstream/conservative" type opinions! People only seem to want to talk about the actual music these days and nothing deeper! It was so much fun when we were all writing/singing about police state/surveilance cameras/CND/vivisection/corporations etc etc etc... there was a good energy and buzz to it all! People just seem so accepting of it all now, even though it's still all there! These days if you talk about any of this shit, people just seem to think you're mad or something!
Maybe easier forms of worldwide communications has just encouraged more meaningless and trivial dribble to be written, rather than people putting in some real effort and feeling...
Pretty sure there are still bands such as Born/Dead covering those subjects.
I'm well aware that there's still bands out there that sing/care about such issues, I'm talking about the general populace that don't care! Not that that's anything new...
Punk is just so dumbed down now, now that it's just another mainstream genre of music! You have lots of people who like the music, but that's about it... their attitudes/lifestyle are just so... well, mainstream!
But we're going round and round in circles here, I just keep repeating myself!
I watched "Punk In London" last night, a DVD filmed in about 1978 about the early London punk bands! Some of them were talking about how punk's already dead, after the mainstream media/record labels cottoned on to it and exploited the fuck out of it... about how bands would sign up to a big label, make some money and just turn it all into exactly what they were rebelling against in the first place!
The early 80's movement injected some new life into it for a while! Until that died in about the mid 80's and a lot of the band's music turned to pus in an effort to "appeal to the mainstream"... I can remember some really bad songs/albums from the likes of Blitz, ANWL, Abrasive Wheels, Partisans etc etc etc... Their music got really tamed down/turned to utter crap to try and sell more records! It failed... and the bands broke up and disappeared!
And then during the 90's and 2000's when there was a new interest in these bands, a lot of them reformed...
So basically, what I'm always trying to say is, is that punk is so popular as a "genre of music" now, now that it's been so watered down by all the "normals" who just don't get it... In the past, all the "normals" didn't listen to punk rock wherea's now they do! And message boards are a great place to ultimately realise that... by reading all their "normal type" attitudes and opinions that haven't changed since I got into punk in 1979... it's just all the same old shit!
Thankfully, there's still a hardcore element of punks and the like who think outside the square! I just wish the other 95% would fuck off...
Ha ha, only on a New Zealand punk message board could you be called "useless" because you've spent the last more than 20 years playing in punk bands/organising gigs/recording and not working a "real job"! Which showcases perfectly the corservatism I'm trying to explain...