Punk rock is a music genre that emerged in the mid-1970s. Rooted in 1950s rock and roll and 1960s garage rock, punk bands rejected the perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock music. They typically produced short, fast-paced songs with hard-edged melodies and singing styles, stripped-down instrumentation, and often shouted political, anti-establishment lyrics. Punk embraces a DIY ethic; many bands self-produce recordings and distribute them through independent record labels.
Glenn Branca was an American avant-garde composer, guitarist, and luthier. Known for his use of volume, alternative guitar tunings, repetition, droning, and the harmonic series, he was a driving force behind the genres of no wave, totalism and noise rock. Branca received a 2009 Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.
Bad Brains are an American band formed in Washington, D.C., in 1976. They are widely regarded as pioneers of hardcore punk, though the band's members have objected to the use of this term to describe their music. They are also an adept reggae band, while later recordings featured elements of other genres like funk, heavy metal, hip hop, and soul. Rolling Stone magazine called them "the mother of all black hard-rock bands", and they have been cited as a seminal influence to numerous other subgenres in addition to hardcore punk, including various subgenres of heavy metal, such as thrash/speed metal, alternative metal, and funk metal. Bad Brains are followers of the Rastafari movement.
KC and the Sunshine Band is an American disco and funk band that was founded in 1973 in Hialeah, Florida. Their best-known songs include the hits "That's the Way ", "(Shake, Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty", "I'm Your Boogie Man", "Keep It Comin' Love", "Get Down Tonight", "Boogie Shoes", "Please Don't Go" and "Give It Up". The band took its name from lead vocalist Harry Wayne Casey's last name ('KC') and the 'Sunshine Band' from KC's home state of Florida, the Sunshine State. The group has had six top 10 singles, five number one singles and a number two single on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.
SNFU was a Canadian hardcore punk band formed in Edmonton in 1981, relocated to Vancouver in 1992, and disbanded in 2018. They released eight albums, two live records, and one compilation amid many lineup changes and several temporary breakups. Vocalist Ken Chinn led the group, which included twin-brother guitarists Brent and Marc Belke for much of its career.
Initium is the 1984 debut album by American deathrock band Samhain, released on lead singer Glenn Danzig's independent record label Plan 9. In various interviews, Danzig stated that the album's title, which translates from Latin to English as "beginning", represents his new start after disbanding his prior band, Misfits, in 1983. Most of the final track, "Archangel", was actually recorded in March 1981 with Jerry Only, and was originally meant to either be a Misfits song featuring Dave Vanian or a track for the band the Damned. The track "Horror Biz" likewise dates to Danzig's Misfits era, as it is a new version of "Horror Business" with different musical arrangements. The album was recorded at Reel Platinum studio in Lodi, New Jersey, excluding the introduction which was recorded at Eerie Von's home on a four track cassette.
Trans Am is a three-piece American band from Bethesda, Maryland, that was one of the originators of "post-rock" in the mid-1990s. Their work combines elements of Krautrock, heavy metal, hardcore punk, synthpop, electronic music, and folk music. Since their inception, the group has toured with Tortoise, Pan Sonic, The Fucking Champs, and Tool.
The Wire is a British music magazine publishing out of London, which has been issued monthly in print since 1982. Its website launched in 1997, and an online archive of its entire back catalog became available to subscribers in 2013. Since 1985, the magazine's annual year-in-review issue, Rewind, has named an album or release of the year based on critics' ballots.
Eerie Von is an American musician best known as the original bassist for the heavy metal band Danzig. His preferred bass is the Fender Jazz Bass.
Die Kreuzen (/ˈdiːˈkɹɔɪtsn̩/) is an American rock band from Rockford, Illinois formed in 1981. Shortly after, they relocated to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The name, which was taken from a German Bible, is grammatically incorrect German for "the crosses." They began as a hardcore punk group and evolved musically to alternative rock.
Paranoid Time is the debut EP by American hardcore punk band Minutemen. It is also the second ever release by the SST record label, founded by Black Flag's Greg Ginn and Chuck Dukowski. The album cover is a drawing by the American artist Raymond Pettibon.
The Kentucky Headhunters are an American country rock and Southern rock band originating in the state of Kentucky. The band's members are Doug Phelps, Greg Martin, and brothers Richard Young and Fred Young. It was founded in 1968 as Itchy Brother, which consisted of the Young brothers and Martin, along with Anthony Kenney on bass guitar and vocals. Itchy Brother performed until 1982, with James Harrison replacing Martin from 1973 to 1976. The Youngs and Martin began performing as The Kentucky Headhunters in 1986, adding brothers Ricky Lee Phelps and Doug Phelps to the membership.
Kousokuya is a Japanese dark psychedelic rock band. This rock outfit, founded by guitarist Jutok Kaneko in the late 1970s, has released only a handful of recordings internationally, and scant more in their local Tokyo underground scene.
Murphy's Law is an American hardcore punk band from New York City, formed in 1982. While vocalist Jimmy Gestapo remains the only founding member of the band, the line-up has consisted of numerous musicians who have performed with a diverse selection of musical acts across multiple genres, such as Skinnerbox, Danzig, The Bouncing Souls, Mucky Pup, Dog Eat Dog, Hanoi Rocks, Agnostic Front, Warzone, Cro-Mags, D Generation, New York Dolls, Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, The Slackers, Thursday, Skavoovie and the Epitones, and Glen Campbell.
Silkheart Records is a Swedish record company and label dedicated to improvised music and free jazz.
Byron Coley is an American music critic who wrote prominently for Forced Exposure magazine in the 1980s, from the fifth issue until the magazine ceased publication in 1993. Prior to Forced Exposure, he wrote for New York Rocker, Boston Rock, and Take It! Coley is one of the first writers to have extensively documented indie rock from its inception to the present day. Coley was a contributing writer and the Underground Editor at Spin in the 1980s and '90s, and currently writes for Wire and Arthur with Thurston Moore. He has also run Ecstatic Yod, a record label and shop based in Florence, Massachusetts.
The Proletariat are a punk rock band from Southeastern Massachusetts, whose heyday was during the 1980s, when they were active in the early Boston hardcore scene, sharing the bill with many of the best punk and hardcore punk acts of the time, despite their recorded output having a decidedly non-hardcore aesthetic; the Proletariat show more strongly the musical influences of early British post-punk bands such as Wire and the Gang of Four in their fractured guitar sound and Marxist-themed lyrics.
Sea Changes & Coelacanths: A Young Person's Guide to John Fahey is a compilation album by American fingerstyle guitarist and composer John Fahey, released in 2006.
Soma Holiday is the second release and the first studio album by American punk rock band the Proletariat. It was also the debut output for Radiobeat Records.
Dan Ireton, known professionally as Dredd Foole, is a vocal improviser and songwriter based in New England whose various collaborative backing bands have been known as The Din.
