I GREW UP LISTENING TO NEW WAVE.EXCEPT THOSE BADHAIR DAYS.I LOVE THOSE DAYS WHEN YOU COULD JUST TURN ON THE RADIO AND LISTEN TO NEW WAVE.I LOVE THOSE DAY WHEN LIFE WAS MUCH EASIER,AS REFLECTED IN THE MUSIC THAT WE HEARD THEN.........
*Punk/New Wave
Punk Rock returned rock & roll to the basics — three chords and a simple melody. It just did it louder and faster and more abrasively than any other rock & roll in the past. Although there had been several bands to flirt with what became known as punk rock — including the garage rockers of the '60s and the Velvet Underground, the Stooges, and the New York Dolls — it wasn't until the mid-'70s that punk became its own genre. On both sides of the Atlantic, young bands began forsaking the sonic excesses that distinguished mainstream hard rock and stripping the music down to its essentials. In New York, the first punk band was the Ramones; in London, the first punk band was the Sex Pistols. Although the bands had different agendas and sounds — the Ramones were faster and indebted to bubblegum, while the Pistols played Faces riffs sloppier and louder than the Faces themselves — the direct approach of the bands revolutionized music in both the U.K. and the U.S. In America, punk remained an underground sensation, eventually spawning the hardcore and indie-rock scenes of the '80s, but in the UK, it was a full-scale phenomenon. In the U.K., the Sex Pistols were thought of as a serious threat to the well-being of the government and monarchy, but more importantly, they caused countless bands to form. Some of the bands stuck close to the Pistols' original blueprint, but many found their own sound, whether it was the edgy pop of the Buzzcocks, the anthemic, reggae-informed rock of the Clash, or the arty experiments of Wire and Joy Division. Soon, punk splintered into post-punk (which was more experimental and artier than punk), new wave (which was more pop-oriented), and hardcore, which simply made punk harder, faster, and more abrasive.
New Wave was usually used a catch-all term for the music that directly followed punk rock; often, the term encompassed punk itself, as well. In retrospect, it's became clear that the music that followed punk could be divided, more or less, into two categories — post-punk and new wave. Where post-punk was arty, difficult, and challenging, new wave was pop music, pure and simple. It retained the fresh vigor and irreverence of punk music, as well as a fascination with electronics, style, and art. Therefore, there was a lot of stylistic diversity to new wave. It meant the nervy power pop of bands like XTC and Nick Lowe, but it also meant synth rockers like Gary Numan or rock revivalists like Graham Parker and Rockpile. There were edgy new wave songwriters like Elvis Costello, pop bands like Squeeze, tough rock & rollers like the Pretenders, pop-reggae like the Police, mainstream rockers like the Cars, and ska revivalists like the Specials and Madness. As important as these major artists were, there were also countless one-hit wonders that emerged during early new wave. These one-hit groups were as diverse as the major artists, but they all shared a love of pop hooks, modernist, synthesized production, and a fascination for being slightly left of center. By the early '80s, new wave described nearly every new pop/rock artist, especially those that used synthesizers like the Human League and Duran Duran. New wave received a boost in the early '80s by MTV, who broadcast endless hours of new wave videos in order to keep themselves on the air. Therefore, new wave got a second life in 1982, when it probably would have died out. Instead, 1982 and 1983 were boom years for polished, MTV-radio new wave outfits like Culture Club, Adam Ant, Spandau Ballet, Haircut 100, and A Flock of Seagulls. New wave finally died out in 1984, when established artists began to make professional videos and a new crop of guitar-oriented bands like the Smiths and R.E.M. emerged to capture the attention of college-radio and underground rock fans. Nevertheless, new wave proved more influential than many of its critics would have suspected, as the mid-'90s were dominated by bands — from Blur to Weezer — that were raised on the music.
Punk/New Wave Styles
Synth PopPunkAlternative Pop/RockHardcore PunkNew WavePower PopSka RevivalMod Revival Post-PunkNew RomanticNo WaveProto-PunkOi!Garage Rock RevivalBritish PunkChristian Punk New York PunkL.A. PunkAmerican PunkStraight-EdgeAnarchist PunkSophisti-PopCollege Rock
Synthpop
Often characterized with new wave, it is the genre that first introduced the synthesizer as an essential piece of the pop band's arsenal of instruments.
New Wave Rock
Two styles of music diverged from punk, post-punk and new wave. While post-punk took a more arty approach, new wave offered pop hooks, modernist, synthesized production, and a left of center attitude.
While the name "New Wave" originally described a diverse, creative underground form that was (confusingly) often seen as a part of Punk, it eventually came to be used as a blanket term for any early '80s pop music that used synthesizers.
Early New Wave included the likes of the legendary Talking Heads (who were a part of the original New York Punk scene, but were also classified as post-punk for their artfulness and as New Wave at least partly for their MTV success), the bubblegummy Blondie, the poppy but smart Cars, the opera-singing spaceman Klaus Nomi, and the anxious and articulate Elvis Costello. With the birth of MTV, New Wave became a household phrase associated with a new, telegenic crop of pop-influenced acts such as Culture Club, Haircut 100, and A Flock of Seagulls.
Today, the term is almost too broad to be meaningful as a true description of the sound, but ask any child of the '80s what New Wave is, and almost everyone is likely to mention some of the artists listed on these pages.
Post-Punk
Growing out of the punk movements of the late '70s in both Europe and North America, this is the birth place of what is now referred to as alternative. A group of bands tied together by their counterculture spirit, use of electronics, deep dub-bass and knowing defiance of accepted rock conventions.
After the punk explosion of 76-77 and after all that chaos, violence, attitude and fun came a time to transform the sounds and the style into darker more introspective realms. Whereas punk used traditional rock and roll structures, the Post-Punk style used influences as varied as Jamaican reggae, french philosophy, synthesisers and latino-disco funk to promote their metropolitan world view.
The main cities involved in the Post-Punk emergence was New York and Manchester, UK. Bands like Talking Heads, Joy Division, The Fall, Blondie, Pere Ubu were all different in form, but all promoted clever, wry, stylish and jaunty rhythms that spanned both rock venue and nightclub. All had a common ground of being experimental and all will influence future generations of musician and artist.
Post-Punk
After the punk revolution of 1977, a number of bands inspired by the d.i.y. spirit and raw sound of punk were formed. However, instead of replicating the sound of the Sex Pistols, many of these bands forged into more experimental territory, taking cues from a range of artists and styles, such as Roxy Music, David Bowie (especially Low, Heroes and Lodger), disco, dub and Krautrock. The result was Post-Punk, a more adventurous and arty form of punk, no less angry or political but often more musically complex and diverse. Many of these groups — like Joy Division or the Cure — created dark, synthesizer-oriented soundscapes while others— like Orange Juice or XTC — had a lighter guitar-based musical approach but their lyrics and music were off-kilter and often subverted traditional pop/rock song structures. Post-punk eventually developed into alternative pop/rock in the '80s.
Related Styles
Alternative Pop/RockHardcore PunkNew WaveGoth Rock ShoegazePost-Rock/ExperimentalNew RomanticIndie Rock Jangle PopDream PopNew Zealand RockC-86
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alternative Rock
A catch-all phrase which refers to non-main stream music starting from the early '80s onwards.
Alternative/Indie-Rock
Alternative pop/rock is essentially a catch-all term for post-punk bands from the mid-'80s to the mid-'90s. There is a multitude of musical styles within alternative rock, from the sweet melodies of jangle-pop to the disturbing metallic grind of industrial, yet are all tied together by a similar aesthetic — they all existed and operated oustide of the mainstream. In some ways, there are two waves of alternative bands, with Nirvana's unprecedented crossover success in 1991 acting as a dividing point. Throughout the '80s, the majority of alternative bands were on independent labels; those that eventually signed to major labels, such as Hüsker Dü and the Replacements, didn't break through to the mainstream and thereby were able to keep their hip credentials alive. If anything, Alternative Rock of the '80s was even more diverse and fractured than the mainstream; among the styles classified as alternative was roots rock, alternative dance, jangle-pop, post-hardcore punk, funk-metal, punk-pop, and experimental rock. All of these genres made into the mainstream, in some form or another, after Nirvana's success in 1991, but their edges were sanded down since many of the new alternative bands were signed by majors. Consequently, '90s altenative rock often sounds more sanitized and homogenous than its counterpart, especially since the heavier material proved to have greater commercial appeal than the quieter or quirkier elements of alternative rock. Most of these idiosyncratic bands didn't sign to majors (those that did quickly disappeared), deciding to stick to independent labels, where they had more artistic freedom. These bands were grouped together under the term indie rock. Although the term had been around since the '80s, in the '90s it connotated bands that were dedicated to their own independent status, either for musical or hipness reasons.
Alternative/Indie-Rock Styles
IndustrialAlternative Pop/RockGoth RockLo-FiGrungeShoegazeBritpopPost-Rock/ExperimentalFunk MetalIndie RockPaisley UndergroundJangle PopAlternative Country-RockPunk RevivalPost-GrungeThird Wave Ska RevivalNeo-PsychedeliaRiot GrrrlSpace RockAdult Alternative Pop/Rock Alternative DanceCocktailDream PopPunk-PopBritish Trad RockIndustrial DanceMadchesterPsychobillySka-PunkCowpunkNew Zealand RockChamber PopTwee PopEmoSlowcoreElectro-IndustrialAmbient PopC-86Indie PopNoise Pop Math RockQueercoreSadcoreShibuya-KeiSkatepunkGarage PunkAlternative FolkNeo-GlamCollege RockPop UndergroundAmerican UndergroundPost-HardcoreIndie ElectronicPunk BluesScreamoAlternative Singer/SongwriterNew Wave/Post-Punk Revival
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Indie Rock
Takes its name from "independent," which describes both the do it yourself attitudes of its bands/artists and the small, lower-budget
nature of the labels that release the music.
Indie Rock
Indie rock includes any rock band that is either unsigned or is signed to an independent label. This category is dominated by bands still living the "do it yourself" lifestyle. These bands don't answer to major labels for sales or distribution--they are left largely to their own blood, sweat, and creativity to get their music heard. A few of the early indie rock bands were signed during the early 1990's, but none of them achieved any notable commericial success. Based on today's music business, rock bands that currently are signed to a major label, distributed by a major label, or previously signed to a major label and have seen ANY commercial success are not eligible for this category. They should seek inclusion elsewhere. Indie rock split off from the second wave of alternative music when Nirvana crossed over to the mainstream. Nirvana's success prompted a surge of major label signings of alternative bands and marked the point when alternative music became just a newer form of hard rock music. Bands that rejected that mainstream or were not commercial enough (or too weird or wimpy or poetic) to be mainstream were then considered "indie". The spirit of indie rock is the do-it-yourself ethnic, coupled with the philosophy that you should aspire to create your own unique sound--regardless of what is commercially successful.
Hardcore Punk
Emerging in the early '80s, hardcore took the ideals of punk to a new extreme. The music was fast, the vocals were screamed, and the structure was simple.
Gothic Rock
Goth rock is an offshoot of post-punk that existed primarily during the early to mid-'80s. It took the synthesizers and processed guitars of post-punk and used them to construct foreboding, sorrowful, and gloom-ridden opuses. Its lyrics were usually introspective and personal, but also included a taste for literary romanticism, morbidity, religious symbolism, and/or supernatural mysticism.
Industrial Rock
Industrial's trademark sound is menacing, but its rage is subordinate to the mechanical, repetitive qualities of the music, which fit the lyrics' themes. Industrial was born out of a fusion of rock, electronical and punk but has grown in its own direction. Including its own subordinate branches like industrial metal and industrial dance.
Emo Send to Friend
Genre
Originally an arty outgrowth of hardcore punk, emo became an important force in underground rock by the late '90s, appealing to modern-day punks and indie-rockers alike. Some emo leans toward the progressive side, full of complex guitar work, unorthodox song structures, arty noise, and extreme dynamic shifts; some emo is much closer to punk-pop, though it's a bit more intricate. Emo lyrics are deeply personal, usually either free-associative poetry or intimate confessionals. Though it's far less macho, emo is a direct descendant of hardcore's preoccupations with authenticity and anti-commercialism; it grew out of the conviction that commercially oriented music was too artificial and calculated to express any genuine emotion. Because the emo ideal is authentic, deeply felt emotion that defies rational analysis, the style can be prone to excess in its quest for ever-bigger peaks and releases. But at its best, emo has a sweeping power that manages to be visceral, challenging, and intimate all at once. The groundwork for emo was laid by Hüsker Dü's 1984 landmark Zen Arcade, which made it possible for hardcore bands to tackle more personal subject matter and write more tuneful and technically demanding songs. Emo emerged in Washington, D.C. not long after, amidst the remnants of the hardcore scene that had produced Minor Threat and Bad Brains. The term "emo" (sometimes lengthened to "emocore") was initially used to describe hardcore bands who favored expressive vocals over the typical barking rants; the first true emo band was Rites of Spring, followed by ex-Minor Threat singer Ian MacKaye's short-lived Embrace. MacKaye's Dischord label became the center for D.C.'s growing emo scene, releasing work by Rites of Spring, Dag Nasty, Nation of Ulysses, and MacKaye's collaboration with members of Rites of Spring, Fugazi. Fugazi became the definitive early emo band, crossing over to alternative rock listeners and getting press for their uncompromisingly anti-commercial attitudes. Aside from the Dischord stable, most early emo was deeply underground, recorded by extremely short-lived bands and released on vinyl in small quantities by small labels; some vocalists literally wept onstage during song climaxes, earning derision from hardcore purists. Fugazi notwithstanding, emo didn't really break out of obscurity until the mid-'90s emergence of Sunny Day Real Estate, whose early work defined the style in the minds of many. Tempering Fugazi's gnarled guitar webs with Seattle grunge, straight-up prog-rock, and crooned vocals, SDRE launched a thousand imitators who connected with their dramatic melodies and introspective mysticism. Some of this new generation connected equally with the wry, geeky introspection and catchy punk-pop of Weezer's Pinkerton album. While several artists continued to build on Fugazi's innovations (including Quicksand and Drive Like Jehu), most '90s emo bands borrowed from some combination of Fugazi, Sunny Day Real Estate, and Weezer. Groups like the Promise Ring, the Get Up Kids, Braid, Texas Is the Reason, Jimmy Eat World, Joan of Arc, and Jets to Brazil earned substantial followings in the indie-rock world, making emo one of the more popular underground rock styles at the turn of the millennium.
Related Styles
Alternative Pop/RockPunk Revival Math RockQueercore
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My Friendster Webpage:
http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623http://profiles.friendster.com/newromanticism623
