Punk Rock

Other punk bands I dig a lot:

Bad Religion
Rancid (circa Out Come The Wolves)
Dropkick Murphys (Celtic punk)
Real McKenzies (see Dropkick Murphys)
Flatfoot 56 (Christian Celtic punk)
Rocket From The Crypt (punk-ish with horns)

And yeah, early Offspring and Green Day are melodic punk too. I think Offspring still qualify but Green Day has become a whole different animal.

Rocket from the Crypt rocks!!

Songs from some essential latter-day punk albums that tend to get overlooked:

From A Comprehensive Guide To Modern Rebellion


From Another Day In Paradise


From Leche Con Carne


From Feel Lucky Punk


The singer/guitarist for Klover is Mike Stone, one-time Queensryche guitarist. Relatively unknown, but he's damn talented. Great singer, great musician. He's done punk, metal, alt-metal, blues, more blues, has a jazz solo album.

Anyway, I'm getting off topic...

Oh, and you can't forget the almighty Meatmen!

That Klover album is great!

I need to spin that one again.

tohostudios wrote:

That Klover album is great!

I need to spin that one again.

It really is. "Illusions (Make It Go Away)" is one of those rare punk songs, like The Offspring's "Gone Away," that gives me goosebumps when I hear it.

Make it go away. Gone away.

tohostudios wrote:

Other punk bands I dig a lot:

Bad Religion
Rancid (circa Out Come The Wolves)
Dropkick Murphys (Celtic punk)
Real McKenzies (see Dropkick Murphys)
Flatfoot 56 (Christian Celtic punk)
Rocket From The Crypt (punk-ish with horns)

And yeah, early Offspring and Green Day are melodic punk too. I think Offspring still qualify but Green Day has become a whole different animal.

I totally agree that the Offspring still bring it, Green Day, however... well lets say they cater to the hot-topic punk scene.

I still love Green Day. I don't think they really cater to anyone; they're simply far more ambitious than most punks bands--or bands, for that matter. American Idiot had two nearly 10-minute-long punk songs. Epic punk! Haha. Quite an album, if you ask me.

And yeah, The Offspring are great. But I posted their new video on Facebook yesterday with a well-placed "What the hell is this crap?" preceding it. Haha.



I'll just quote myself: "I know that this band, like Eminem, has achieved so much success by releasing goofy lead-off singles which haven't been representative of the albums they came from, but this track is just...annoying. And not good. Blah!

Hopefully the rest of it isn't as bad."

Speaking of Green Day's ambitiousness, they're also releasing three new albums--¡Uno!, ¡Dos!, and ¡Tré!--on September 25, 2012, November 13, 2012, and January 15, 2013, respectively.

Can't wait!

Eyesore wrote:

I still love Green Day. I don't think they really cater to anyone; they're simply far more ambitious than most punks bands--or bands, for that matter. American Idiot had two nearly 10-minute-long punk songs. Epic punk! Haha. Quite an album, if you ask me.

And yeah, The Offspring are great. But I posted their new video on Facebook yesterday with a well-placed "What the hell is this crap?" preceding it. Haha.



I'll just quote myself: "I know that this band, like Eminem, has achieved so much success by releasing goofy lead-off singles which haven't been representative of the albums they came from, but this track is just...annoying. And not good. Blah!

Hopefully the rest of it isn't as bad."

I have never really been a hardcore fan of Green Day, more of a peripheral fan. Let me take a moment to back up. Green Day are a talented band, but unlike the Offspring, I think that they have forgotten that part of the formula that made their music just a little ridiculous and fun. The Offspring have their serious songs as well, but most are tongue-in-cheek observations of the dumb crap in society. I think they are the musical version of Christopher Titus or George Carlin. Their agenda seems to be to get people to think rather than follow along blindly with society's trends.

In my limited experience, hot-topic punks only follow the trendy bands of the moment and are clueless about any given bands history. I don't begrudge Green day their popularity, they have done the time and earned it the hard way. I should have phrased that a bit more clearly.

I am going to give that song a few plays. I think the lyrics are hilarious but the music is kinda... I don't know. Lame? It reminds me of Bowling For Soup's "A Really Cool Dance Song." As stated previously, The Offspring usually have some really off the wall song as the single but the album as a whole is strait up punk. It's actually a really smart marketing ploy. You give the hardcore fans what they want and draw in the radio friendlies along the way. I hope that this album is better than Rage and Grace. I will say that I did not like Splinter at all when it first came out but I listen to it more than the others now.

I really like the old-school punk bands, and alot of the 'crossover' bands from the 80s.


The thing is, much like when metal was relatively new, when punk rock was a new thing it has a VERY broad definition. Punk rock, at least as far as America was concerned, pretty much meant any offbeat band that played at places like CBGB's. Yes, this included the bands like The Ramones and Fear. But it also included artsy bands like the Talking Hands, pop-ish bands like Blondie, and even the syth-only groups like Suicide. You also had the Dictators, which basically straddled the line between punk and metal. Some journalists even referred to KISS (of all people) as a punk band.

But modern punk rock fans can be a very narrow-minded group, and experimentation outside of the approved formula tends to anger them. That's by this variation is so much more rare in the subculture these days.

I do not like Green Day. It has nothing to do w/ how "Punk" they are or are not. It has everything to do with I just do not like their songs. On the surface, you'd think I would...it's catchy, pop-laden Rock/Punk/whatever...I just don't like it.

Angelcake Adonisus Fox wrote:

I really like the old-school punk bands, and alot of the 'crossover' bands from the 80s.


The thing is, much like when metal was relatively new, when punk rock was a new thing it has a VERY broad definition. Punk rock, at least as far as America was concerned, pretty much meant any offbeat band that played at places like CBGB's. Yes, this included the bands like The Ramones and Fear. But it also included artsy bands like the Talking Hands, pop-ish bands like Blondie, and even the syth-only groups like Suicide. You also had the Dictators, which basically straddled the line between punk and metal. Some journalists even referred to KISS (of all people) as a punk band.

But modern punk rock fans can be a very narrow-minded group, and experimentation outside of the approved formula tends to anger them. That's by this variation is so much more rare in the subculture these days.

To a certain degree, I fall into this category. When I want to listen to punk rock, I don't want proggy influences taking over, I want simple stripped down sped-up rock n' roll.

But there are some punk bands that have mixed things up and done it well:
Take some punk, add in a healthy dose of reggae, mix in some horns and presto! SKA
Rancid has a HUGE reggae influence in their albums
Social Distortion has successfully mixed in elements of old country and classic rock
The Dropkick Murphys, Flogging Molly, and others bands mix in large sections of traditional Irish music and instruments to achieve their sound.
Authority Zero has been experimenting with the reggae sounds as well as their 2 live-unplugged albums.
AFI has been messing with progressive elements for their last couple of albums. I think the end result sucks, but one of my brothers loves these album so...

I am sure that there are many more examples of this that I have no knowledge of. So does the musical direction add or subtract from the overall flow of the album, and more importantly... Do I like it? Depends on the album, I am the one paying for it.

Angelcake Adonisus Fox wrote:

The thing is, much like when metal was relatively new, when punk rock was a new thing it has a VERY broad definition....

...But modern punk rock fans can be a very narrow-minded group, and experimentation outside of the approved formula tends to anger them.

When a new sound starts, it's almost always the best era. Before the magazines & labels figure out how to narrowly shove the groups into sub-categories and limit the "sounds" that actually apply to the genre. When the musicians are free to just create the music they feel.

Then once sub-genres emerge (and the copycat bands soon follow) it tends to fragment the fanbase, limit people's perceptions of what the genre meant in the first place and causes endless pointless arguments on internet message boards.

When I was a young OCI I wanted to have the head 'o braids that Dexter from the Offspring had at one time. I plan to still achieve this goal at some point.

For me one of the best elements of punk rock is the way that each region cultivated their own sound and scene. D.C. punk was very different from the SoCal stuff. Their is an awesome book called American Hardcore that breaks down each area's history and bands. One of my favorite music books.