Punk - musically significant or not?

[martthebass]

The early 70s was more than Glam and Prog.  I always thought the Pub Rock scene with the likes of Ducks Deluxe, Feelgood, Ian Dury, Brinsley Schwarz and the like was like high energy 'proto-punk.'

[steantval]

Looking at this from an entirely bass playing point of view, the Pistols are obviously being mentioned a lot as well as in a really negative light, Led Zeppelin.

In terms of contribution to playing ability and quality bass lines it’s a really hard to separate Sid Vicious/ Glen Matlock or John Paul Jones. 😜

Just thought I would drop this one in the liven things up 😀

No gobbing please 😀

Edited January 29, 2019 by steantval

[PaulWarning]

7 minutes ago, steantval said:

Looking at this from an entirely bass playing point of view, the Pistols are obviously being mentioned a lot as well as in a really negative light, Led Zeppelin.

In terms of contribution to playing ability and quality bass lines it’s a really hard to separate Sid Vicious/ Glen Matlock or John Paul Jones. 😜

Just thought I would drop this one in the liven things up 😀

No gobbing please 😀

not sure you should be bracketing Sid Vicious and Glen Matlock.

Punk had some really good bass players (JJ Burnel, Bruce Foxton, some of the The Rezillos bass playing is exceptional, not sure who it was as they changed bass players at the time) as well as the root note merchants 

[JellyKnees]

Of course it flippin' was. Next.

[steantval]

43 minutes ago, PaulWarning said:

not sure you should be bracketing Sid Vicious and Glen Matlock.

Punk had some really good bass players (JJ Burnel, Bruce Foxton, some of the The Rezillos bass playing is exceptional, not sure who it was as they changed bass players at the time) as well as the root note merchants 

I thought Foxton, The Jam were more retro Mod than Punk.

[Lozz196]

2 hours ago, martthebass said:

The early 70s was more than Glam and Prog.  I always thought the Pub Rock scene with the likes of Ducks Deluxe, Feelgood, Ian Dury, Brinsley Schwarz and the like was like high energy 'proto-punk.'

That’s an era I would like to have been around in. I was 11 when punk came in, but would have loved to have been able to be in the pubs watching those bands, especially Dr Feelgood.

[Woodinblack]

Well, that is a thing when people say that punk encouraged them to pick up an instrument and play. What bit of it? Some of the punk stuff could be done by people with absolutely no musical talent, some was every bit as hard as some of the prog around at the time, so it is hard to know what people mean when they were talking about punk in that context.

Also read quite a good paper on the revisionist history of musical genres, noting that at no point in the areas that were known as the time of a specific genres (punk, metal, disco, rock'n'roll etc) did the average chart exceed 25% of that genre. Borne out if you look at top albums of 77 - Queen, abba, Slim Whitman, Shadows, Sinatra, The Beatles, The muppets, Johnny Mathis, Yes, Connie Francis, Elvis Presley, Diana Ross, Cliff Richard, Sex Pistols, Bread, a compilation disco album and a OST for star is born.

Frankly, no year can claim to be innovative when it had a Johnny Mathis album in the charts!

[Roger2611]

3 hours ago, martthebass said:

The early 70s was more than Glam and Prog.  I always thought the Pub Rock scene with the likes of Ducks Deluxe, Feelgood, Ian Dury, Brinsley Schwarz and the like was like high energy 'proto-punk.'

I have to agree, speaking as a life long punk rocker, was there actually a point where punk started and finished, I offer up MC5, New York Dolls, David Bowie, Dr Feelgood e.t.c  all pre-date punk but certainly had that punk ethic, today's grime scene demonstrates punk sensibilities in being one of the few current forms of music where the lyrics still have an important message, other than that I would offer up Idles and Slaves as still in the punk ethos? Did Punk really have a beginning and an end, probably not but I'm bloody glad it happened 

[steantval]

Lots of folks on here are placing Dr Feelgood as punk, they were R&B, as were 9 Below Zero and the Blues Band.

British R&B, nothing to do with Punk.

Edited January 29, 2019 by steantval

[casapete]

49 minutes ago, steantval said:

Lots of folks on here are placing Dr Feelgood as punk, they were R&B, as were 9 Below Zero and the Blues Band.

British R&B, nothing to do with Punk.

Also anyone remember The Count Bishops, later just The Bishops? High octane r'n'b like the Feelgoods and 9 Below Zero IMO.

[martthebass]

52 minutes ago, steantval said:

Lots of folks on here are placing Dr Feelgood as punk, they were R&B, as were 9 Below Zero and the Blues Band.

British R&B, nothing to do with Punk.

There’s definite blurring of the edges though; pub rock to punk to new wave. Some pub rock bands morphed into punk/new wave like Dury and arguably the Stranglers.

[Conan]

6 hours ago, oZZma said:

records or tickets one has sold says NOTHING about quality. I won't start listing the utterly stupid stuff that polluted the top of charts, in ANY decade. Poor argument.

Inti? Is that you? 🤔

[casapete]

15 minutes ago, martthebass said:

There’s definite blurring of the edges though; pub rock to punk to new wave. Some pub rock bands morphed into punk/new wave like Dury and arguably the Stranglers.

Always felt a bit miffed that most of the pub rock scene seemed to be very London / SE based. Can't remember much similar stuff oop North?

How about Eddie and the Hot Rods - r'n'b / punk / new wave? More blurring.

[Lozz196]

1 hour ago, Woodinblack said:

Well, that is a thing when people say that punk encouraged them to pick up an instrument and play. What bit of it? 

For me it was The Sex Pistols, as an 11 year old their sound was like something I`d not heard before, at that point I knew what type of music I wanted to make when I got older, and that`s what I did once I turned 15 and got a bass. Started a band, playing punk songs, wearing DMs and Fred Perrys. And at 53 not a lot has changed, pretty much zero development. Which is nice.

[Guest oZZma]

6 minutes ago, Conan said:

Inti? Is that you? 🤔

Not that I am aware of 😂

[Conan]

3 minutes ago, oZZma said:

Not that I am aware of 😂

Sorry. Facetious comment rather than trolling attempt. Inti  (an ex-member on here) took musical snobbishness to elevated (?) heights, to which we mere mortals could only aspire in our dreams (or nightmares).

We clown-whores can only... Er, no, wait - he was a git.🙄😁

[Guest subaudio]

I love technique, orchestration, harmony, rhythmic complexity but above all, I love the art of music.

Punk has and continues to inspire musical artists of all kinds to many and varied degrees, to me it's a part of musical language.

It's a colour, a flavour and an energy.

To what degree it is important or not is subjective and personal of course, it can also inspire people to be nothing like it, it's all good.

Music is about humanity and spirituality to me personally and punk energy is part of humanity, it always was, even some classical and jazz music expresses it.

[Hobbayne]

6 hours ago, steantval said:

I thought Foxton, The Jam were more retro Mod than Punk.

True dat.  😋 Weller started out as Pete Townsend and morphed into Steve Marriott shortly thereafter. 😊

[tauzero]

8 hours ago, steantval said:

Looking at this from an entirely bass playing point of view, the Pistols are obviously being mentioned a lot as well as in a really negative light, Led Zeppelin.

In terms of contribution to playing ability and quality bass lines it’s a really hard to separate Sid Vicious/ Glen Matlock or John Paul Jones. 😜

 

I think the Led Zeppelin negativity is aimed at Jimmy Page live (mine is, anyway), with a little bit at Bonham for 20 minute drum solos. See if you can stay awake all the way through the film "Song remains the same".

[Ricky 4000]

8 hours ago, martthebass said:

There’s definite blurring of the edges though; pub rock to punk to new wave. Some pub rock bands morphed into punk/new wave like Dury and arguably the Stranglers.

Having read a lot about them, I'd agree certainly the Stranglers. 👍

What I suppose nobody can really know, is what the Stranglers records would have been like without the punk rock influence...

In my view, looking back as somebody who was there and young at the time, the UK punk movement wouldn't have been the same without Malcolm Mclaren's Sex Pistols. It wouldn't have been as big, it probably wouldn't have been enough of a thing to trigger the record companies into the goldrush to sign punk bands as they did. 1977, it took a lot of different social / economic / political factors to align, by chance... rock music was stale and pop was crap, youth unemployment was high, industrial strife, the troubles in N.I. ... and there's posh yet zany Malcolm, running a boutique in the Kings Rd, mates with Vivian Westwood, forms a band from his younger customers - and the next thing you know, there's hoards of working class kids travelling to London to spend 2 weeks wages (or 4 weeks dole money) on a pair of bondage trousers and a ripped tee shirt, so they can show off an image that they have "no future"... it was all great spin, with a huge dollop of luck...

So yeah, my point up above is - punk was a significant movement in music, and for sure it's influence continues today, but we can't judge it, because we can't for example: re-run the 1990s with 1977 deleted.

Some folks on here say they wouldn't have been inspired to play the bass if it wasn't for punk - but maybe they'd have been influenced by something better in, say, 1981 if punk (as we know it) never happened?

Kinda like in "back to the future"...

And by the way, 4 pages of a punk thread, and has anybody even mentioned The Clash?? 😲

Edited January 30, 2019 by Ricky 4000

[Newfoundfreedom]

Funnily enough I watched a couple of punk documentaries a couple of weeks ago on YouTube. This one is particularly interesting. It shows where punk came from and what influenced it. It certainly didn't spring out of nowhere with Malcolm McLaren as some might assume. Definitely worth a watch. You might be surprised at how far the roots go. 

 

[steantval]

9 hours ago, tauzero said:

I think the Led Zeppelin negativity is aimed at Jimmy Page live (mine is, anyway), with a little bit at Bonham for 20 minute drum solos. See if you can stay awake all the way through the film "Song remains the same".

At my age, I struggle to stay awake through any film I watch.😀

[Rich]

^^^ Thank god it's not just me. I actually nodded off in the cinema the other day, a first for me. Yet another step in the process of turning into my dad.

Edited January 30, 2019 by Rich