What does Punk Rock mean to you?

[JennyB]

Punk meant a lot to me when I was 17. Now I'm not sure what it means to me at 33, beyond metaphors and platitudes.

Although I still love the music.

That pretty much goes for me too, although I'm 38.

[Heston]

As a visual artist, the DIY ethos of punk is something that has informed my own work for the past 30-odd years. There are no rules (or perhaps equally-important, you are free to set your own rules) and you're free to carve out your own space and find your own audience.

This is my answer too, though I'm a musician. Punk informed my worldview in ways that are now integral to my personality. Realizing I could do music in my own way with my own ideas, with nobody breathing down my neck.

I agree with your sentiments, but surely people tried to do their own music in their own type of way before punk came along? You'd think there was no amateur budding musicians before 1976 if you believed the punk hype.

[Rat Patrol]

I boil it down a bit simpler than all of this:

Punk's action-reaction. In the sense that it throws out so much stimuli at you that something ends up firing a neuron back in response. Most other genres, you can be a much more transparent listener...it can pass right through you as background noise without you ever even noticing if you're obliviously enough inclined. It's hard to not notice punk. If you don't like it you brush it off with some sort of unpleasant reaction, however brief. But you don't really ignore it. (And you can even ignore things like really noisy post-punk, since it's often a little more rhythmic and a little more circular in the way songs are constructed).

I like that the music itself, and the attitude around it, forces the "Are you in, or are you in?" question and doesn't let you dodge it. It makes you THINK. If nothing else than thinking, "I find this and those louts involved in it really irritating." But it forces you to at least think that far, instead of giving you all kinds of outs to be oblivious. I hate unthinkingness. Nothing makes me angrier than people who can't be arsed to notice their surroundings, who base their lives on total ignorance of their environment and the generally horrible things they do to people and people do to each other. Because how deaf, dumb, and blind to you have to be to not notice how FUCKING INSANE so many things in our surroundings are, and how preventable that insanity would be if we wrapped ourselves in anything other than utter senselessness. Punk doesn't let you off so easy on that. It forces you to ping back something. And something is--truly--better than nothing nearly all of the time (really...a few bad-egg skinheads taking it the wrong way are a small price to pay for all the horrors wreaked by people's silence throughout history).


Goes back to The Clash for me. They're full of shit. They were cowards. They lost the plot. They made a lot of pretty mediocre music by punk standards. Yes, yes, yes. But I was 5 years old when Casbah was taking MTV by storm...by my childhood brain little more than the "mohawks, armadillos, gas masks, and guys in funny ethnic clothing" video with the vocalist who sorta dry-heaved the lyrics more than he actually sang them. And after dinner I'd have to shut the fuck up and watch the news with my family even though it was boring as hell and I knew there was something better on Nickelodeon I was being deprived of. But...no choice...suck it up and watch the news like I was being force-fed the nastiest brussel sprouts on earth. Well, dawned on me after not too long that the dude in the mohawk was dry-heaving about the same stuff I was forced at gunpoint to watch on the news. And the dudes frolicking at Burger King were killing each other in real life. And...uh, gee...I think Mr. Mohawk Guy, Mr. Gas Mask Guy, Mr. Gap-toothed Beret Guy, and Mr. Drummer Guy Who Looks Like He Needs To Poop Very Badly are trying to say something significant about that "Beirut" place Tom Brokaw keeps droning on about while I count down the minutes to Vanna White's then-youthful tits greeting us at the bottom of the hour.

5 years old...pinged. It maybe took another 8 years before I even knew what that made me think about. But I was curious right from back then. Something was cool about being goofy and showing attitude, but seeming to care about the same stuff my unspeakably boring family was force-feeding me. Or daring-but-caring enough to take the piss on it without fear of getting shushed 'cause Dad is trying to listen to how many points that Dow Jones asshole scored today. That's the kind of punitive old-school upbringing that you'd think would produce a lot of aware people...but rather creates a sort of either/or crapshoot between being aware and 'rebelling' by tuning out and wallowing in the coolness that comes with unawareness.

3 siblings, 4-year age spread. My sister and I are news junkies at various points not on speaking terms with various extended relatives we brawl with over politics. My brother watches SportsCenter and movies with lots of CGI explosions, went about 8 years between reading books until he started picking up Dan Brown novels, and has never voted or expressed a political opinion beyond "that guy uses nerd words"...and IQ-wise he's probably the smartest of the three. He's also told me "I don't wanna listen to that Oingo Boingo shit" when I've tried to pop GEER in the CD player.

Crapshoot. I could've grown up that instead. I didn't. I'm fairly well-convinced that chance exposure to punk in my most formative years helped settle that one. And for that I thank the silly-looking poseurs in combat fatigues and that terrible album they made in 1982 for pinging my tiny malleable brain at just the right time.

[Kory]

As a visual artist, the DIY ethos of punk is something that has informed my own work for the past 30-odd years. There are no rules (or perhaps equally-important, you are free to set your own rules) and you're free to carve out your own space and find your own audience.

This is my answer too, though I'm a musician. Punk informed my worldview in ways that are now integral to my personality. Realizing I could do music in my own way with my own ideas, with nobody breathing down my neck.

I agree with your sentiments, but surely people tried to do their own music in their own type of way before punk came along? You'd think there was no amateur budding musicians before 1976 if you believed the punk hype.

Well yeah, but punk is what influenced me in that way, not those other. jokers. (Kill Bill reference)

[Still216]

I boil it down a bit simpler than all of this:

Punk's action-reaction. In the sense that it throws out so much stimuli at you that something ends up firing a neuron back in response. Most other genres, you can be a much more transparent listener...it can pass right through you as background noise without you ever even noticing if you're obliviously enough inclined. It's hard to not notice punk. If you don't like it you brush it off with some sort of unpleasant reaction, however brief. But you don't really ignore it. (And you can even ignore things like really noisy post-punk, since it's often a little more rhythmic and a little more circular in the way songs are constructed).

I like that the music itself, and the attitude around it, forces the "Are you in, or are you in?" question and doesn't let you dodge it. It makes you THINK. If nothing else than thinking, "I find this and those louts involved in it really irritating." But it forces you to at least think that far, instead of giving you all kinds of outs to be oblivious. I hate unthinkingness. Nothing makes me angrier than people who can't be arsed to notice their surroundings, who base their lives on total ignorance of their environment and the generally horrible things they do to people and people do to each other. Because how deaf, dumb, and blind to you have to be to not notice how FUCKING INSANE so many things in our surroundings are, and how preventable that insanity would be if we wrapped ourselves in anything other than utter senselessness. Punk doesn't let you off so easy on that. It forces you to ping back something. And something is--truly--better than nothing nearly all of the time (really...a few bad-egg skinheads taking it the wrong way are a small price to pay for all the horrors wreaked by people's silence throughout history).

This nails it for me. Excellent post, RP...

[eumaas]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

[Dr. Medulla]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

I went thru that period after discovering punk. Totally liquidated all my old albums and cassettes. After several years, tho, I recognized the value in diversity, especially pop. The silliness of zealotry.

[Wolter]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

I went thru that period after discovering punk. Totally liquidated all my old albums and cassettes. After several years, tho, I recognized the value in diversity, especially pop. The silliness of zealotry.

Yeah, 19 year me wouldn't listen to 97% of what I listen to now. And I don't just mean proggy death metal. I wouldn't even listen to guitar pop bands like XTC or THE FUCKING BEATLES. Or hip hop. Or most post-punk.

[eumaas]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

I went thru that period after discovering punk. Totally liquidated all my old albums and cassettes. After several years, tho, I recognized the value in diversity, especially pop. The silliness of zealotry.

Yeah, 19 year me wouldn't listen to 97% of what I listen to now. And I don't just mean proggy death metal. I wouldn't even listen to guitar pop bands like XTC or THE FUCKING BEATLES. Or hip hop. Or most post-punk.

I had enough jazz and classical background not to get that nuts, but at the same time I was also an avant jazz zealot. Bubblegum punk or mainstream pop and hip-hop on the one hand and Marsalisism or smooth jazz on the other were foes with whom there could never be any compromise.

[Kory]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

I used to alienate a lot of people with this attitude.

[Wolter]

I used to be a punk fundamentalist and would give people shit for listening to mainstream pop.

I used to alienate a lot of people with this attitude.

Me too. Now I alienate them with a sophisticated array of noxious body odors.

[HaydenWar]

Nothing...and everything

[Flex]

Now I alienate them with a sophisticated array of noxious body odors.

So, the Punk Spirit remains alive and well, eh?

I won't make fun of anyone for liking pop generally, but I will make fun of anyone who likes Taylor Swift. Fucking idiots.

To me, punk rock is about feeling like you're getting a musical punch in the face. I like that.

[Wolter]

To me, punk rock is about feeling like you're getting a musical punch in the face. I like that.

Fuck yes. Also, fuck you!

Because I'm fucking punk.

[Heston]

Now I alienate them with a sophisticated array of noxious body odors.

So, the Punk Spirit remains alive and well, eh?

I won't make fun of anyone for liking pop generally, but I will make fun of anyone who likes Taylor Swift. Fucking idiots.

To me, punk rock is about feeling like you're getting a musical punch in the face. I like that.

I love Punk and Pop, but I hate Pop/Punk.