Punk

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

This is a question for people who didn't experience punk firsthand (sorry o wise eldersaurs!)

How did the ideas/legacy/presence of punk affect your listening to and thinking about music?

(I didn't say it was a small question)

And do you still feel it as a presence within pop music and culture? Does it affect current music? Does it affect how you approach the music that came before it?

I'm interested in 'my' generation of listeners (30somethings) but also especially in 20somethings and younger - and in British people especially.

Comments

[aubade1984.livejournal.com]

punk was a big influence on me around the ages 16-20, for very personal reasons, but i couldn't really tell you what i think of it now. while automatic-contrarianism (this is bad therefore = it is punk = it is good) was pretty liberating at the time (and still is now and then) it starts to gall after a while.

i don't think it exists anymore - it seems grotesque to say that sonic youth or sleater-kinney or whoever are "punk" - any more than '50s rock'n'roll still exists; it was the product of a moment and that moment is lost.

my favorites were always the sex pistols, in part because i think NMTB is still the ultimate pop record, in part because of lydon, who remains the most fascinating stage performer ever. (are they a hard band to love? the distaste for them expressed in these answers, and among a lot of people i know, suggests so.)

i HATED the "stupid"/hedonistic side of punk - sid vicious, iggy pop*, "please kill me," et al - with a passion. no better than jim morrison - in fact, considerably worse, since it lacked even JM's occasional idiot elegance. metal bands always did that routine better.

*i do like the iggy of "funhouse," which seems barely comparable to the one who made the other records.