Why Punk Happened

Every once in a while, something extraordinary happens in rock’n’roll…I hate the use the cliché of “a perfect storm,” but that’s exactly what I’m talking about…a bunch of things involving culture, politics, demographics, economics and technology all collide and mix in just the right way for something totally new and unexpected to be created…

Lemme give you some examples…Elvis came along in the 1950s just as million post-war kids—these new constructs that were now called “teenagers”—began gravitating to new radio stations that played music derived from a mix of the blues, country and r&b…this music greatly annoyed their parents, something that made it dangerous and forbidden…

In 1964, the Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan show with a fresh, new sound that helped drag America out of the funk that followed the assassination of JFK…as far as rock is concerned, the 60s really began that February night in 1964…

Let’s try something more current…you might remember the appearance of the music video in the early 80s transformed the industry…. or the time you heard “smells like teen spirit” for the first time and immediately you somehow knew that whatever came next in the 90s would be very, very different…

And hip hop? don’t get me started…there are people—academics! —who will argue that the appearance of hip hop in popular culture was an even bigger deal that the Beatles…

There’s one other event that we need to include on this list: the rise of punk rock in the middle 70s…as it was happening, it was no big deal…it was an aberration, a niche thing that indulged weirdos and misfits… “it’s just noise,” said the rock purists, “ignore it and it’ll go away” …

But it didn’t…in fact, we’re still talking about punk…and punk became more than just a form of music… it became a way of thinking and acting and creating and presenting…it’s music, film, visual art, literature, dance, politics… it altered much of western thought…the punk aesthetic—that “screw you, I’m gonna do it anyway” ethos—can be found virtually everywhere in society today…

But what led to this? what were the factors that led to the rise of this music? and how it appears worldwide at virtually the same time in an era long, long before the internet? great questions…. let’s see if we can find the answer to the question: “why did punk happen at all?”

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