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New punk bands serve a purpose
By Josef Palmersheim
Published:
Thursday, September 4, 2003
Joe Palmersheim -- Reader´s Advocate
As an American who is rapidly dwindling on the list of "most important advertising demographic," I try to keep up with the times. I read a lot, and one thing I noticed that kind of crept up on me this summer was something I had an interest in. Namely, punk rock.
It seems as though all of those boys and girls who made Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys (where have THEY been?) a household name have finally had their teeth rotted out by bubble gum pop and have decided to go for something harder. Good for them, I say. Maybe they want something that wasn't marketed though Disney Channels, written by someone else, and delivered by someone with a pretty face. Yes, it seems as though punk has hit us once again.
I was a mere zygote when punk first came around. Bands like the Clash (we miss you, Joe Strummer) and the Sex Pistols became household names and kids around the world began to terrify their parents by participating in something that the elders would never understand. Well, here we are, 25 years or so later, and although AFI is NOT the next Clash, bands who straddle the line between pop and punk serve a purpose.
In 1994, I was in eighth grade. Kurt Cobain had just died, and everyone kind of seemed to be lost, musically anyway. I remember watching MTV in a friend's basement one afternoon when a little song called "Longview" by some band I'd never heard of came on the air. I was transfixed. It had an energy to it that was really lacking in the other things I had been listening to at that time. That band turned out to be Green Day, and I grew to love them.
Green Day turned me on to punk rock, and through them, I was able to delve deeply into a music world that didn't ever end.
So, although I could really care less about Good Charlotte and their compatriots, I don't hate them like all of my friends do. I realize that, like me in 1994, someone may love the sound and want to dig deeper. Punk is dead - long live punk.
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