Post Punk vs. New Wave

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Jazz Man, May 1, 2020.

Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.
  1. The Pinhead

    The Pinhead KING OF BOOM AND SIZZLE IN HELL

    Good point ! Talking Heads anyone ? Totally new wave, even when they released their debut album in 77.
     
  2. ghoulsurgery

    ghoulsurgery House Ghost

    Location:
    New Jersey
    I always associate the term “new wave” with artists that could be more palatable to the mainstream and “post punk” with the darker, more grim side of that sound. New Wave is brighter, peppier, Post Punk lingers in the shadows. This might be all in my mind, but it’s how I usually separate the two. I also always have a slightly negative view of “new wave” as a term thanks to Dead Kennedys’ “Pull My Strings” :laugh:
     
  3. jas621

    jas621 Forum Resident

    Location:
    NJ
    I think new wave still maintains traditional song structure, whereas post-punk seems to have sounded a lot less traditional. In essence, new wave was based on updating a lot of 60's pop/rock, whereas postpunk drew from a non-traditional band like Velvet Underground.
     
    uzn007 likes this.
  4. Pastafarian

    Pastafarian Forum Resident

    I was there and I don't know the answer, however bizarrely Good Vibrations is a film, which gives a fantastic insight to what Punk was and how it how it played out in Belfast, you even get the Big bad American infection playing a big part. Here's a review, brilliant film.

     
    Last edited: May 2, 2020
  5. Neonbeam

    Neonbeam All Art Was Once Contemporary

    Location:
    Planet Earth
    The Berlin wall??? :confused:
    Absolutely!
    Bauhaus? Are you familiar with "Bela Lugosi's Dead"s intro?
     
    Echo likes this.
  6. evarlam

    evarlam Forum Resident

    Location:
    Athens, Greece
    As stated above, post punk and New Wave are branches of the same tree, UK 76-77 punk scene. These genres emerged while the vinyl of punk records was still warm from the press! Especially, post punk progressed, among other styles of course, into goth rock (The Damned or Bauhaus are very well known examples), while from new Wave/electronic sound, many bands progressed into synthwave, darkwave, coldwave, EBM, industrial etc. (there are many cases that there's a fusion of all that subgenres, collectively adopted by the goth community)
    Two examples of today's darkwave bands, which they're extremely popular among the goth communities in Europe and who carry faithfully the torch of postpunk tradition...if they were around 35 years ago, when people bought records/cd's, now they would be millionaires...)

    She Past Away - Asimilasyon
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2020
    crazy eights and jimhb like this.
  7. Evethingandnothing

    Evethingandnothing Forum Resident

    Location:
    Devon
    Post Punk good. New Wave bad.
     
    ghoulsurgery and jimhb like this.
  8. eclecticfiend

    eclecticfiend wavy air aficionado

    Location:
    New Orleans
    Post punk is for cool kids, new wave is for spazzes such as myself
     
    uzn007 likes this.
  9. jimhb

    jimhb Forum Resident

    Location:
    Denver, CO, USA
    Post-punk is a broader term and incorporates a wider variety of music. It is also seen as “edgier.” New Wave is poppier. Duran Duran, kajagoogoo, ABC, etc are new wave. Joy Division, Bauhaus, Siouxsie, Buzzcocks, the Damned, etc are post-punk.

    When I was a teenager, I considered myself more rooted in the post-punk, goth and industrial scene.
     
  10. Danby Delight

    Danby Delight Forum Resident

    Location:
    Boston
    There is so much wrong with all of this that it's barely even worth trying to sort out.
     
    u2pitnol and Cherrycherry like this.
  11. Neonbeam

    Neonbeam All Art Was Once Contemporary

    Location:
    Planet Earth
    Concerning the term "postpunk"; I'm aware that it was used as early as 1978 but I really don't remember anyone using it back in the day. It was "new wave", "goth", "industrial", "punk" or "New York punk". But keep in mind that in.... say 1984 in Europe the term "New Wave" wouldn't have included acts like Duran Duran. Which would have counted as "pop". Back then "New Wave" referred to something a little more "underground".

    I'm not really sure when the term got more common but I suspect that it was somewhere between 2001 - when interest in that period got reignited by the likes of The Strokes or Franz Ferdinand - and 2005. When Simon Reynolds published "Rip It Up & Start Again".

    The difference between those terms in 2020? "New Wave" sounds old, like chart music from the 80's! :evil:
     
    danielbravo likes this.
  12. Sebastian saglimbenI

    Sebastian saglimbenI Forum Resident

    Location:
    New york
    New wave had a big influence on the bands U.K....."DISCIPLINE" era KING CRIMSON.For the better.......
     
  13. WilliamWes

    WilliamWes Likes to sing along but he knows not what it means

    Location:
    New York
    Oh I love that cold album Secondhand Daylight. Talk about a winter album.
    ----
    I think all those famous synth pop singles can only be described as new wave - it's too far from being post-punk unless you take the term 'post-punk' literally like every single thing released after whatever the person thinks is the end of the 'punk era'. There really needs to be a prominent guitar in there to be connected to post punk otherwise they're probably going to be to light and lacking a punkish attitude. The guitar doesn't have to be the lead instrument but I'd like to simplify it like new wave is pop and post punk is rock - but there's more overlap than that. Then there's someone like PIL that was totally post punk but sometimes the guitar wouldn't be a lead instrument or around at all.
     
    Chrome_Head likes this.
  14. Chrome_Head

    Chrome_Head Planetary Resident

    Location:
    Los Angeles, CA.
    Yeah, just as often on the second and third PiL albums, it was Jah Wobble's bass driving the songs, or the rhythm itself, or Lydon's sneering / chanting. Guitar is almost nowhere to be found on Flowers Of Romance.
     
    WilliamWes likes this.
  15. Svetonio

    Svetonio Forum Resident

    Location:
    Serbia
    Discipline LP sounds dated today as well as all Mr Fripp's "New Wave" stuff of the early 80's. Actually, nothing what Mr Fripp did after Sinfield departure can beat the pure magic of songs he made in Sinfield era King Crimson.
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2020
    Sebastian saglimbenI likes this.
  16. blutiga

    blutiga Forum Resident

    Post-Punk
     
    jimhb likes this.
  17. blutiga

    blutiga Forum Resident

    Post-Punk
     
    Last edited: May 2, 2020
  18. Svetonio

    Svetonio Forum Resident

    Location:
    Serbia
    Post-Punk song from Serbia, 1981

     
  19. Jamsterdammer

    Jamsterdammer The Great CD in the Sky

    Location:
    Málaga, Spain
    Hi Neonbeam! Not sure where you're from but I think most Europeans who where teenagers during that period know what I mean. Besides the economic malaise I was referring to in an earlier post, leading to a lot of anger among young people translating itself into the 'nihilism' of punk, there was the cold war an the ever-present realization that Europe would be the main theater if that war would ever get hot with nukes raining down on us. The deployment of cruise missiles in our countries only added to the feeling that there was "no future". So my reference to the Berlin Wall was to add to the historical context of European punk's emergence. But perhaps it's a bit far-fetched.
     
  20. ralphb

    ralphb "First they came for..."

    Location:
    Brooklyn, New York
    That would be wrong. B52s got together to play at parties in Athens Georgia and their reputation spread. Their aesthetic was formed before they signed with a major label.
     
    ARK, ghoulsurgery and uzn007 like this.
  21. uzn007

    uzn007 Pack Rat

    Location:
    Raleigh, N.C.
    Yep, this. Post-punk is usually "heavier", with lots of reverb, often lots of flanger on the guitar or bass, more of a serious, "doomy" sound. Some other post-punk bands would be Mission of Burma, Theatre of Hate, Killing Joke, et al.

    New Wave covers a very wide range of music, from power pop to synth pop, but it's usually pretty "poppy" in one way or another. Nick Lowe, Talking Heads, Blondie, Paul Collins' Beat, etc.
     
    jas621, The Pinhead and Isitquiex like this.
  22. ralphb

    ralphb "First they came for..."

    Location:
    Brooklyn, New York
    Hell was, like a lot of other people coming to NYC at the time, a person who wanted to be a writer and got drawn into being in a band. His background is literary and a lot of the writers he liked enjoyed a somewhat nihilistic view of things, as did Hell. But I'm not sure he got bogged down in it so much as he was intrigued by it as a device for writing. True, his drug addiction might have been a reflection of that nihilistic leaning, but there was a lot of heroin around in those days and I don't think it was a reflection of a nihilistic bent so much as a desire to just get high.
     
  23. uzn007

    uzn007 Pack Rat

    Location:
    Raleigh, N.C.
    Yeah, it's not like some record exec would have come up with the B-52s' image in 1978. There wasn't anyone else out there like them at the time, at least on a national level.
     
    Achn2b, The Pinhead and ralphb like this.
  24. Isitquiex

    Isitquiex Forum Resident

    Location:
    Texas
    I have a friend who constantly debates whether a band we like is punk, post punk or new wave - I hear the word "angular" used a lot to describe the guitar sound of post punk and I can hear that trait in bands like Gang of Four, Romeo Void and Wire who sound more "rock" to my ears compared to the more playful, pop oriented new wave bands that I love.

    Pylon was one band that straddled what I appreciate about both movements perfectly in their 1979 single "Cool"

     
    uzn007 likes this.
  25. uzn007

    uzn007 Pack Rat

    Location:
    Raleigh, N.C.
    Yeah, "angular" works for me.
     
Thread Status:
Not open for further replies.

Share This Page

molar-endocrine