Punk-mettaler clashes

I havent been into metal for that long,(since around 2005) but why is it that punks and metalheads never could get along? I have a friend that is much older then me that grew up during the punk explosion in the late 70's early 80's and always makes fun of me for likeing thrash and whatnot. He sometimes calls me a "longhair" or says the only way to participate at a show is to skank, like those terms mean anything anymore. It seems to me that both these personalities have more in common then some may realize. Aggression is a key component among others that is shared by the two. My friend has told me before that he knew punks that would rather have a blues rock friend then a metalhead.

The only time I have heard of punks and mettalers coexisting is in reading about Steve Rowe's church in Australia that was an outreach to both of those groups. Then you see crossover bands like D.R.I, and groups like Nuclear Assault that have obvious influences from punk music.

Any Ideas why there were so much hostilities?

Back in my high school the punk & metalheads clashed all the time. I think it was mostly because (and I'm generalizing here) most of the metalheads were pot-smoking dopey morons while the punks thought they were more intelligent and superior. While this may not be true everywhere, that was my experience. And while I may have imbibed in the wacky-weed from time to time, I can say that yes indeed, most of the metalheads at my school were dope-smoking morons. While there are a coupla guys that I still hang with this day, I can only imagine what the majority of them are up to these days. By the time I reached college, most of the hostilities between the punks and metalheads were gone. So maybe it's just a maturity thing?

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Back in my high school the punk & metalheads clashed all the time. I think it was mostly because (and I'm generalizing here) most of the metalheads were pot-smoking dopey morons while the punks thought they were more intelligent and superior. While this may not be true everywhere, that was my experience. And while I may have imbibed in the wacky-weed from time to time, I can say that yes indeed, most of the metalheads at my school were dope-smoking morons. While there are a coupla guys that I still hang with this day, I can only imagine what the majority of them are up to these days. By the time I reached college, most of the hostilities between the punks and metalheads were gone. So maybe it's just a maturity thing?

All of us punk/metalhead kids at my school smoke weed. It must be a maturity thing.

Back in High School, 3 of my thrasher buddies and I only hung out with the punkers. There was never any clash with us. That was from 1987-1990 though. We completely converted one guy to strictly thrash!

Anyways, I never seen any clashes with punks and metalheads. I seen clashes with Skinheads, Suicidals, and others clashing with metalheads and that was pretty crazy!

Stender wrote:

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Back in my high school the punk & metalheads clashed all the time. I think it was mostly because (and I'm generalizing here) most of the metalheads were pot-smoking dopey morons while the punks thought they were more intelligent and superior. While this may not be true everywhere, that was my experience. And while I may have imbibed in the wacky-weed from time to time, I can say that yes indeed, most of the metalheads at my school were dope-smoking morons. While there are a coupla guys that I still hang with this day, I can only imagine what the majority of them are up to these days. By the time I reached college, most of the hostilities between the punks and metalheads were gone. So maybe it's just a maturity thing?

All of us punk/metalhead kids at my school smoke weed. It must be a maturity thing.

I suppose the punks could have been weed-smokers too, but our group of metalheads was like Otto the Bus Driver from The Simpsons, only not as cool.

My high school didn't have any punks. You were either a metalhead, or you were one of those "black-floor-length-coat" types with eyeshadow and funny hair that listened to The Cure.

I didn't see any punks vs. metalhead clashes till the first time I saw Suicidal Tendencies when I was in college. Holy crap-a-moley that was the scariest crowd/pit I ever saw. All through the show, the floor looked like one of those big battle scenes from "Braveheart," where the two sides (skins and longhairs in this case) would line up on opposing sides of the room, then rush each other and slam together. I saw a lot of bloody noses, bruised heads, etc. I myself hugged the back wall and tried not to make eye contact with ANYBODY for the entire gig. To this day I'm still kinda surprised I got out of there in one piece.

Here in Spain the metalheads see PUNKS more like dirty street creatures. Most of the punks in the big cities realy live on the streets like homeless people or at houses that are empty. They walk around with their dogs, tape recorder and calimocho(cheap red wine with coca cola) and to be honest we dont have contact with them. We think we are better then them and they think they are better then us. We have our long hair, our spikes, our t-shirts etc...and are proud of it, still in 2008(because to me behing a metalhead is timeless and you can be one forever even if you started listening to this music last week, you dont have to come from the 80s of course) and we like to show our city that we are still alive in 2008 and the only way we can do that is to walk like we did in the late 80s/early 90s. Pure f ucking metal.

Also an other different is that punks are all about anarchy and totaly caos (with no police that protect their mothers from being raped) and we are a lot more inteligent, we just want total destruction

Must be a location thing. The punks and metalheads in Minneapolis usually always got along, partied together, kicked skinhead ass together, etc. But we had some groundbreaking bands in the scene back in the 80's, where it didn't matter if you were punk or metal, as they appealed to both: Husker Du, The Replacements, Soul Asylum, Run Westy Run, Urban Guerillas [all these bands were HC-leaning in the early years]. I think it really stemmed from our collective despisement of the nazi's. There was even a sub-group of punks called "the Baldies", that cut their hair as short as it could be. They hated the skins more than anyone, so they dressed liked them, skanked like them, lifted weights and all that, just as an anti-statement. Man, when they turned up, you knew there was gonna be some action!! Some of the coolest dudes ever!!

We all got along as well. The musical intersection for us was Bad Brains, early RHCP, Public Enemy, Suicidal Tendencies, and Anthrax. The only clash that ever came about was sometimes at those D.C. punk/hardcore shows the SXE types would clearly look down on us. But I think it was more the fact we were having fun than anything metal-related. And honestly we kind of liked provoking them.

And like Saxon, we also hung with a crew of "sharps". Those guys were the most loyal and fun guys to be around. And did they ever love to fight.

Sharps = baldies?

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Sharps = baldies?

Yeah I believe so. Sharps came from the Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice movement which I think started in England in reaction to the aryan skins.

Interesting. Thanks for that, Jstate. They just called themselves "Baldies" over here. But sounds like the same mindset.

I've been a punk/metalhead forever. Always been heavily involved in both scenes. I've had mohawks and I've had long hair. Around here punks and metalheads haven't clashed since the early 80's. The scenes are actually pretty intertwined now days. Jocks and rednecks were and are the despised. Sad that you have two groups of very similar people clashing. Maybe you're thinking of pop-punkers? They are disliked by both metalheads and real punks.

7thSecond wrote:

I've been a punk/metalhead forever. Always been heavily involved in both scenes. I've had mohawks and I've had long hair. Around here punks and metalheads haven't clashed since the early 80's. The scenes are actually pretty intertwined now days. Jocks and rednecks were and are the despised. Sad that you have two groups of very similar people clashing. Maybe you're thinking of pop-punkers? They are disliked by both metalheads and real punks.

That was my experience. I had a mohawk for awhile in HS, and my sister was a punk. Everyone seemed to get along just fine, even though not everyone could get into all of the bands. The jocks and the rednecks were who we mostly clashed with as well, although even there, most people were pretty cool. I don't really recall any antagonism with anyone, just a few sarcastic remarks now and then.

7thSecond wrote:

I've been a punk/metalhead forever. Always been heavily involved in both scenes. I've had mohawks and I've had long hair. Around here punks and metalheads haven't clashed since the early 80's. The scenes are actually pretty intertwined now days. Jocks and rednecks were and are the despised. Sad that you have two groups of very similar people clashing. Maybe you're thinking of pop-punkers? They are disliked by both metalheads and real punks.

Nope, I was talking the oldschool, hardcore black flag, circle jerks, suicidal tendencies, Dead kennedies punk, no pop-punk.
I agree with you that its not like that anymore. I hang with punks often enough and some of the members of that new band I made a post about called "Abandon the shore" are 90% old punk members. Thats why its interesting to me because for the most part we get along great. Its just the older guys like my other friend I mentioned that have beef for some reason.

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Its just the older guys like my other friend I mentioned that have beef for some reason.

SOLUTION

What? No one thought that was even a little funny?

SAXON1500 wrote:

What? No one thought that was even a little funny?

Too long. I watched for a minute without any payoff. Can you give us the Cliff Notes-abbreviated version?

SAXON1500 wrote:

What? No one thought that was even a little funny?

All I get when I click "play" is "We're sorry, this video is no longer available." Which is funny I guess, but not ha-ha funny.

Hmmm - still works when I click it.

It is Avenger of Blood [Lurideth's band] doing "PoserSlaughter"

SAXON1500 wrote:

Hmmm - still works when I click it.

I get that "video is not available" a lot when I try to watch vids on my work PC, then the same exact video will work fine if I play it @ home. Dunno why.

Stender wrote:

Nope, I was talking the oldschool, hardcore black flag, circle jerks, suicidal tendencies, Dead kennedies punk, no pop-punk.
I agree with you that its not like that anymore. I hang with punks often enough and some of the members of that new band I made a post about called "Abandon the shore" are 90% old punk members. Thats why its interesting to me because for the most part we get along great. Its just the older guys like my other friend I mentioned that have beef for some reason.

Oh well that's easy then, he's a poser that needs to be slaughtered. Seriously though some people like to keep things divisive I guess. Don't sweat it, he's probably in the closet right now listening to New Kids on the Block on his Walkman.

I know a few metalheads around here around 3 , and we get along with real punkheads. But we don't get along with POP-Punks, Black-metalheads(I call them posers, beacuse they only care for the satanic message), and Hip-hop dudes

Quote :

My high school didn't have any punks. You were
either a metalhead, or you were one of those "black-floor-length-coat"
types with eyeshadow and funny hair that listened to The Cure.

This is exactly how it was at my High School. I called them "Cure People". All pale, trench-coaty, pretending to be vampires and hanging out in cemeteries.

I generally avoided them for the most part, but a couple were cool folk who just liked that look/lifestyle. (On a side note, my one Death-Metal buddy nailed one of the goth/Cure People chicks on a gravestone so I guess there was some cross-over there!)