Punk's Evolution
"Punk is: a movement that serves to refute social attitudes that have been perpetuated through willful ignorance of human nature," at least according to Greg Graffin, a man who has a PhD and is also the lead singer of the punk band Bad Religion. This idea of social change in music is not new, by any means. People such as Bob Dylan, John Lennon, and many others had written songs of political injustice and the need for social change for a long time before punks were around. What made this different was the aggressiveness that they attacked these subjects with, a desperate, youthful, anarchic view that wanted change and they wanted it now. The Past 30 years have seen Punk music evolve with several punk revolutions in between. While Punk music is still thriving today for the most part the Punk ideology is dead. The initial idea that Punk could inspire social change through opposing mainstream methods failed due to the mainstreams acceptance and exploitation of the punk lifestyle. No one is quite sure who started punk first. Many would argue that it was the Ramones in New York with the CBGB club, while others would say it was the Clash and the Sex Pistols in England. However there is no controversy over w
That aside these two bands arguably reestablished punk in mainstream society which led to the various other scenes (post-punk, hardcore, emo) gaining more exposure. During a time of a slumped economy, a system of rules ran by people to high to reach, and with the common man having no apparent way to change things, the Sex Pistols gave punk its boost into the mainstream, and ultimately its down fall. In the movie SLC Punk, when the lead character, a punk named Stevo is talking with his father, a rich lawyer, about the future. With the advent of the Sex Pistols on the scene, punk started to break down upon itself. The past 30 years have seen Punk look to find its place in society to best achieve its ideals. These bands were labeled as pop-punk and used melodies and pop hooks with punk rock to establish the sound. The other scenario would be for Punk to utilize established means in our society to influence a new revolution of social change. This is the best example of punk's survival today. However Punk music was far different then the Punk music of the 1970's. Punk had exploded from a few bands that could hardly play in the underground to a group of socially conscious radicals looking to rise up against society. The first would be a drastic economic crash which would force society to abandon capitalism. While the so called "grunge" movement inspired by Nirvana was different than punk it did lead to the creation of various new musical scenes rooted in the Punk rock sound. Punk was a stance against consumerism, racism, prejudice or any other negative ill that was seen in the mainstream. Their message of denying social standards and becoming individuals attracted the youth plagued by class systems and a political system which did not appeal to the youth. However the label pop-punk is an oxymoron as being a punk has nothing to do with being popular.
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