Punk is Dead: The Decline of Authenticity

Something very unusual happened to me as I grew up and the years passed. Boy after every boy that has come around in my life, a new genre of music was introduced to me. Jordan taught me about drum and bass, Chase taught me about Soundcloud hip hop, and David taught me about shoegaze. Despite my wide-ranging interest in music, there is one genre of music that dominates my interests that I pioneered my own way through: punk. Growing up, I’d always been intrigued by the idea of the musical outcast. For me, the epitome of that person was the punk listener in the 70s and 80s. Watching Penelope Spheeris’s documentary titled “The Decline of Western Civilization” gave me an insight into the punk culture that was reserved for social outcasts that found their lives hard to endure. The underground punk scene was an escape from reality where they could let loose of all of their pent up energies.

After watching documentaries and listening to the music of the culture that encapsulated my fantasies of a different time, I wanted to know what the punk culture was like right now. I began going to shows at underground venues like Non Plus Ultra, The Smell, and most importantly, random houses in your local neighborhood. Going to these shows was a complete eye-opener and not in a good way.

First of all, punk as a musical genre may still be alive. It can be heard in the likes of Together Pangea, Perfect Pussy, and Ex-Cult. There is already a great debate about whether a genre can actually ever be dead. In an interview with MTV, Marky Ramone says, “People are out of jobs, there's unemployment, there's no money for the city, there's always some kind of problem with [your] boyfriend [or] girlfriend, there's always a worry about what someone's doing in their future, sibling rivalries. War is still going on. It was going on back then. So nothing really changes." What Marky is trying to say is that as long as there is angst and troubled people with a need of an outlet for their frustration, there will be rock and punk.

However, what I argue is that the pure essence of punk is dead. When I went to these music shows to watch local bands play their music, I saw nothing close to what I saw on my computer screen. Rather than kids with mohawks and the amped up angst from a strict society, I saw teen boys and girls dressed in American Apparel and Urban Outfitters bobbing their heads while smoking their American Spirits and drinking from their bottles of beer. Maybe it was my own disillusionment and idolization of the punk era, but it was definitely a let-down. I was not ready for the mohawks to turn into ponytails with cute scrunchies or for the melodic aggression to turn into a slow swaying of bodies in a sea. These teens weren’t dealing with anything besides middle-class boredom. Rather, I see a faux punk culture for those that seek the thrill of looking cool and being “different.” This of course is just a huge generalization that I’ve made from my own knowledge and experience with the people that attend these shows. There are definitely people that go to these shows that have a genuine interest in the music.

Joan Jett in an interview says “things cycle around. Now you’ve got pop music and hip hop and rap and that’s what kids aspire to be now: DJs.”  Aleen Sorejian, an English major at Loyola Marymount University says, “I don’t think it dies. I think the same genres evolves over time into new things, so I guess music is like a cycle.” This theory of cyclic music eras brings a new question of whether music can ever really be dead. Is punk alive, dead, or simply dormant? I’m not necessarily sure, but from what I’ve seen, I’m hoping it’s the latter so I can one day see the essence of punk come alive once again.