the damned

From Joy Division’s Peter Hook to Green Day’s Mike Dirnt, these are the 20 greatest punk-rock bassists of all time. See if your favorite made the list.

“Let’s have a war ⁠— blame it on the Middle Class!” The guitar emerges in a blur. The outburst only lasts a second or two before the rest of the band kicks in as abruptly. Someone calls “Out of vogue” repeatedly, as lead singer Jeff Atta responds, “We don’t need no magazines/We don’t need no […]

To the outside world, punk rock was initially believed to be an English invention. Blame this on the Sex Pistols’ precocious ability to garner national and international headlines mere months after forming. The truth was, punk began in the early ‘70s with the off-center, jagged rock ‘n’ roll efforts of bands such as the New […]

I Put A Spell On You: Horror-punk roots Horror punk? Well, the cheapest, tackiest horror films have always been part of the cultural detritus that’s informed the punk aesthetic. Think of Ramones’ ode to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, “Chain Saw.” Remember the bloody, dripping creature feature font adorning Iggy And The Stooges’ Raw Power […]

D.O.A. are the longest-running survivors of Vancouver, BC’s late ‘70s punk scene, as well as one of the architects of hardcore. It was begun in 1978 by singer/guitarist Joe Keithley — who operated for several years under “Joey Shithead” — out of the ashes of the Skulls, which also spun off the other great Vancouver […]

As long as there’s been a punk scene, its denizens have argued as to which city invented it — New York or London? Truth be told, it was neither because history’s first proper punk band was the Stooges from Ann Arbor, Michigan. Which would make Detroit punk’s proper birthplace. But if much of the sound […]

One of punk rock’s original goals was “the destruction of rock ‘n’ roll.” While that didn’t happen, most early punk musicians were rock fans, in spite of their espoused rhetoric. Hence why most early pogo soundtracks were basically Chuck Berry with a Marshall amp. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But this is hardly […]

There are a lot of people out there who know what punk rock is but have no idea how to explain it to a novice or an outsider. It would seem simple enough to define it as “three-chord teenage rebel music,” but what about all those songs that have four or more chords? Or all […]

“People were commenting about this one photo I took of Marginal Man that was in the inner sleeve of their record [Identity, Dischord Records, 1984],” mused veteran Washington, D.C. punk/alt-rock photographer Jim Saah via telephone. He was reflecting on an exhibit at D.C.’s Lost Origins Gallery celebrating his new book In My Eyes: Photographs 1982-1997 […]

“You’re only as good as your drummer,” Clash singer/rhythm guitarist Joe Strummer lamented in their documentary Westway To The World, as he recounted Nicky “Topper” Headon’s firing ahead of 1982 breakthrough LP Combat Rock’s tour. “Drumming…like nailing a nail into the floor,” he continued. “It’s so precise—the beat has to be there!” Mind you, the […]

Boston, Massachusetts, Sept. 25, 2021: The 1965 Mosrite Ventures II electric guitar played by Johnny Ramone on every Ramones album from 1977 onward and at 1,985 of their live shows sold at auction for $937,500. Not bad, considering the punk guitar architect paid $200 for it, after his original one he bought for $50 in […]

Top 15 punk albums of 1998? You’d be forgiven for thinking that there weren’t any in the year the Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal dominated the news. A quick perusal of Billboard’s Hot 100 singles of the year sees domination by several R&B (Destiny’s Child, Janet Jackson, Usher, Mariah Carey) or hip-hop (Puff Daddy, Master P, […]

When Leeds, U.K. post-punks Gang Of Four first appeared on American shores in 1980, they were simultaneously startling, exciting, fierce, warm, familiar and yet shockingly new. They were clearly unthinkable without punk, yet they didn’t play standard-issue Ramones–isms in a leather jacket. They were as angry and leftist in their politics as the Clash, but […]

This past March 5, the French punk label Guerilla Asso quietly slipped a genius album into the marketplace: Rocket To Kingston, credited to Bobby Ramone. The melding of the isolated vocal tracks from nine of Bob Marley’s most deathless classics to edited Ramones backing tracks, it sounds like a joke on paper. The cover even […]

Alternative Press is resurrecting the Alternative Press Gallery, our section dedicated to the world of music photography. With each issue, we’ll take a look into the archives, highlighting some of the most iconic photographers and memorable shoots from the history of the magazine and beyond. Along the way, we will explore the great moments that […]

Rock ‘n’ roll had, for the most part, lost its “roll” by 1970. It became rock music—self-serious, dour, pompous, filled with pretensions to being “art.” It ceased being fabulous teenage noise, filled with Chuck Berry’s playful swagger and Elvis’ hypersexualized pelvic thrust and rebel sneer. Kids wanted something loud and flashy, full of energy, something […]

Nashville songwriting great Harlan Howard once defined country music as “three chords and the truth.” Many have said that definition could also be applied to punk rock. Therefore, it stands to reason that the figure writhing behind the mic stand might be the most essential member of any punk band. After all, it isn’t the […]

Though all but forgotten by this point—save for documentary films like excellent Vancouver overview Bloodied But Unbowed and recent Teenage Head retrospective Picture My Face—Canada once boasted one of the world’s best punk scenes. The quality/quantity of Great White North pogo-rock acts, plus their music’s sheer ferocity, belied our neighbors’ more mild-mannered and civilized reputation. […]

When the ball dropped in New York City’s Times Square at the stroke of midnight Dec. 31, 2009, punk rock had been around 35 years. (Or 33, depending on if you date the subculture from when the Ramones began playing gigs or from the mythic Punk Year Zero of 1977.) It was well into its […]

“Goth-punk,” eh? Not as far-fetched as you might believe. Goth was essentially an offshoot of punk, especially its darker early bands—the Damned or Siouxsie And The Banshees, anyone? But basically, anyone playing chainsaw punk rooted in the artsier end of glam a la Bowie and Roxy Music, a fondness for Hammer horror films, macabre literature […]