There was a bit of a discussion about punk in the vocalist thread, so I figured I'd start a new thread.

I'll start simply enough by listing some of my favorite punk bands.

First, I can't start a punk thread without mentioning the Godfather of Punk, Lou Reed, and his amazing band The Velvet Underground.
They pioneered tons o' stuff. Thanks to John Cale's ability to sustain and drone notes on his viola with a pickup installed, they had a very abrasive sound. Lou Reed's minimalistic but sharp electric guitar playing added to that. And they had extremely controversial lyrics for the time- heck, even by today's standards.

And then there's The Stooges, who were quite awesome. I've only heard a few of theirs songs, but I plan to listen to more.

Patti Smith- She was a popular underground poet, and started putting her poetry to music. As a performer, she put everything into it, going crazy in a life-and-death manner.

Television- Tom Verlaine, the singer, also created poetry with his lyrics. He was good friends with Patti Smith. He and Richard Lloyd created long, intricate guitar melodies that interplayed, all while keeping a lot of energy in the music.

Richard Hell and the Voidoids- The title of the first song on their first album is Love Comes in Spurts. Isn't that one of the best song titles ever?

Other punk bands I like from this time period (around 1975)
The Dead Boys
The Sex Pistols
The Clash
The Ramones
Blondie

Bands from this time period that I've heard of and probably would like but haven't heard much yet from:
The New York Dolls
MC5
The Dictators
The Heartbreakers


Well, that's it for now. I haven't posted all the punk bands I like, I'll see where this discussion goes.

Yes indeed punk is some great stuff.

Only problem I can see with your post is you seem to have not mentioned Green Day anywhere. It's my personal belief that they did a TON for punk. Some people might want to castrate me for saying that, but you just gotta face it. Green Day is the modern face of punk.

It could be worse. Good Charlotte could be modern day punk.

Green Day really brought punk to this generation.

Offspring were great, especially when the first came out.

Social Distortion

Bad Religion

Pennywise

i like hardcore stuff like black flag.

rancid and nofx are also two of my favourite bands, NOFX pretty much created the sound that blink, greenday, the offspring, new found glory, bowling for soup and all these other pop kinda punk bands use today.

the descendents also kick ***, although they kinda spawned emo.

I saw the New York Dolls perform, they were AWESOME.
In the same show I saw the Dictators... didnt like them too much.

They did? I hear a lot of pop punk in their music, but not emo.

??? When was this? How old are you?


I don't see how Green Day did anything for punk, really. I kind of like them, but it's not like they were really ever the face of punk anyway.

Good Charlotte most definitely is not punk in any way, shape of form. I mean, it's by a stretch that even Green Day is.
GD is certainly not the modern face of punk. That would go to bands like Interpol, Wire, and The Jam.

I don't really like pop-punk, but I've never really heard much of the original stuff. Maybe I'll check some of these older band out.

http://www.littlestevensundergroundgarage.com/festival/lsugfestival.html

punk really isn't my thing, although I do like the ramones on occasion. I'm mainly into 1970s-1980s metal. (stuff like Sammy Hagar, Van Halen, Ratt, Survivor, Deff leppard, Motorhead, etc.)

I'm getting into it now b/c I was too young to appreciate it when it first came out.

The New York Dolls AND MC5 both played at Leeds Festival last year.

Bad Brains
Bad Religion
Green Day
Minutemen
Social Distortion
Subhumans
T.S.O.L

Not necessarily the best bands, but the ones I end up listening to the most.

I've been starting to get into Punk recently... real punk. The Clash, The Sex Pistols and the Ramones are all great stuff. I've really been listening to them quite a bit. I've been listening to a lot of Post Punk, though... I mean, with the 80s being shoved down my throat and all... How could I not listen to Joy Division and The Smiths and The Cure and all those bands...

I really want to get into the Buzzcocks.

Bouncing Souls!

I've been listening to The Clash a lot lately. I should reall listen to other old Punk but it would require more effort.
I also want to hear more Joy Division and hear more of the newer good stuff.

Bleh.

Beat me to my post!
NOFX, keeping it real since they were old enough to drink underage! It's the music of my generation, man...

The Clash=win.

No contest.

I've been listenting to alot of them, and am looking at a Sex Pistol's album, but I haven't heard much of their stuff.

MBeggar, the link's not working for me. All I see is a black screen.


You might like stuff like The New York Dolls and The Stooges. I've heard it said that a lot of the hair metal guitarists ripped off the NY Dolls' guitarist.
I myself haven't heard the New York Dolls yet. I'm saving my money and haven't been downloading music lately.


Awesome! I love Joy Division and The Smiths! I like the Cure too, but not as much.
I'm not sure about Buzzcocks albums, but their Singles album "Singles Going Steady" is good.


The Sex Pistols aren't really the end-all, be-all to punk. I like them though. They were controlled by Malcom McLaren, who owned a music store. He managed them and also encouraged a lot of their behavior.
Sid Vicious sucked. At the bass at least, I haven't heard his drumming. He doesn't even play on Never Mind the Bollocks, they have a studio guy.
It's a good album. A lot of the songs are absolute classics. John Lydon's lyrics are excellent- really sarcastic and he delivers them in a voice that's a lot like a sneer.
The thing I like most about Anarchy in the UK is that it's not really promoting anarchy, it's part sarcastic and part just to be shocking.

I highly recommend the book "Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk" by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain. Great stuff, and it changed my perception of what Punk is.
Basically, Punk was an independant magazine started by a few guys in New York about the music they liked. The music was the stuff that I mentioned in the first post. It was basically just underground New York music, with a few bands in Detroit. It was more about the scene than the type of music.

When the Ramones toured in England, it really took off over there. The people there took it a lot more seriously than the people in New York, and it became a phenomenon. The media called it punk.

So I consider punk to be those New York bands, the original England bands, the bands that they influenced (post-punk), and bands that follow the spirit of that. It has to have roots in alternative to be punk.

Never mind, it works now.

I didn't know all of those bands were still around.

HOLY F***! Big Star was there!!!!!!
Did you see them?!

They are one of my favorite bands. Actually, the live album of them I had sucks, so they might not have been great.

Frenzal Rhomb!
The Living End (their earlier stuff - rockabilly/punk)
Refused