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The Minutemen are the least "punk punk punk" thing on earth, more like hardcore with heavy funky influences. I have no idea how you could compare Social Distortion with the Minutemen; right from the first listen, they're totally different things.

The distortions of Sonic Youth *do not come* from Hendrix; Hendrix's distortions are functional to melody, while those of Sonic Youth are the exact opposite, aiming to eliminate melody to the point of arriving (especially in their early days, those of Bad Moon Rising and various Stooges covers) at *non-songs*. The early Clash, the ones from the self-titled album, have aged horribly; they are not mold, they are rust. This happens with every band that is completely a child of its time; the Clash were a '77 band that spoke of '77 and were tied to '77. You may not have read it, but I’ve said it a billion times in the Clash reviews (getting the "but you haven’t listened to them" retort, just to change things up). The Pistols defined the standards of the genre; musically, it’s not even the punk punk punk you talk about, it’s speeded-up garage. The importance of the Pistols is aesthetic (a fairly important factor in art) and philosophical: what you see as "teenage protest" is and wants to be an unrealizable and superficial form of protest; the so-called "no future" is precisely about making the protest less credible. Others will come later, in America, to partially eliminate these idiosyncrasies and to prevent punk from ending up like it did in England (because that's why from a certain point onward no one in England cared anymore). Mohawks and spitting have always existed, but they are more an attitude of the listeners than of the bands. It was that bunch of fools, the Exploited, who introduced the "Mohican," the only thing for which they deserve to be remembered; I've never seen a single punk band, the ones that appeal to me, sport mohawks. Not the Dead Kennedys, not the Avengers (another '77), not Husker Du; the Clash and the Pistols never had one, nor did the Buzzcocks (another '77), nor the Stiff Little Fingers. The X-Ray Specs had a drummer with a mohawk when they were already finished; before that, there was only the stunning Poly Styrene styled like Siouxsie, until '80 or so (another '77 group). You're way off about the Buzzcocks - I get that you don't like them, fine, but they were the first to incorporate pop into punk. The sound has been inflated by the fact that they are the major inspirers, along with the Adolescents, of all the Green Day/Blink/whatever fluff of the last 10 years. And I am proud to have been a punk when punk made sense; if you take today’s kids, I really don’t know what you expect. If I took Dream Theater fans to judge prog, you might just laugh.

Ah, scattered clarifications, the Ramones are not punk: they are not musically, aesthetically, or philosophically; they didn’t revolutionize a damn thing. If you really want to look for it, the "revolution" started with Richard Hell and the Voidoids. The song you call "sad erection," but which is actually called "mi ami," is nothing but "frammenti di un discorso amoroso" by Barthes, translated and punkified. You might find Barthes to be a "drunken Orietta Berti," that's fine, I can't stand d'Annunzio either, just so you know. Of course, if you don't see differences between Barthes and Vasco, maybe the problem lies at the roots, for instance, the lyrics; after all, you don’t really know them: have you ever heard Vasco talk about love as something that "rapisce la quiete, svela i conti in sospeso accarezzati in sogno in un tempo spezzato" (which seems to me quite explicit and understandable, beautifully so in my opinion, but I appreciated Barthes long before the CCCP did a song about it, maybe that's it).

Yes, I understand from 20 lines that are perfectly explanatory. For instance, Sonic Youth wouldn’t take from punk, but from Hendrix. Where can I even begin to rebut such nonsense? I mean, is there really a need? Do you know what you’re talking about or are you shooting in the dark trying to take a shot at us? Never heard of "No New York," a compilation put together by someone named "Brian Eno"? Good job, Sonic Youth is all there, No New York and Flipper. The argument you’re making is akin to saying “the first to use the electric guitar were the Shadows, so My Bloody Valentine takes from the Shadows”: ridiculous. Since I don’t consider you an idiot, I deduce that a) You don’t know a damn thing about punk, but you’ve heard the Pistols to some extent. If you want, I can start discussing prog after listening to Dream Theater, but I don’t think that would be productive b) you have a totally distorted view of post-‘77 music. Does punk make you sick? Okay, no problem for me, whatever. It’s this constant phallic measurement that’s quite annoying, it feels like a search for certainties when there are none to be found. All punk sounds the same? Sure. Give me an example, since you’re talking about '77: do the albums by the Pistols and Wire seem the same to you, like "Pink Flag" that came out in '77? The Clash and the Germs? What a pity, because you won’t believe it, but many punk records or those influenced by punk have actually taken influences from prog, and a person with an open enough mind (not like you, who I think is a bit too focused on the sound of your own voice) can appreciate a 154 by Wire regardless of the team they’ve chosen to support (but clearly you know one of the absolute masterpieces of the late '70s, I had forgotten). My interest in any prog is all there, since you ignored my "in general." I like some prog records just like I like some Hip Hop stuff, and I’ve always been a fan of The Smiths, who have nothing to do with punk; some tend not to crystallize in just one genre. Claiming that an entire genre hasn’t produced anything good is childish, first of all because you can’t have listened to everything (unless you’re Scaruffi, that’s another story), and secondly because we are talking about a genre that has heavily influenced music, starting with the post-rock that gets so much attention, slowcore, shoegaze, certainly all the wave and all the dark (but again, Joy Division couldn’t hold their instruments, I guess they’re crap too). In any case, for a serious discussion there need to be prerequisites, if you haven’t listened to a damn thing about the genre you want to (over)talk about, it’s pointless to waste time; the impression you give is that you’ve decided _a priori_ that punk sucks, and since I’ve regained my natural hair color for twenty years now, I have no great motivations to share my opinion, seeing that every one of your posts screams “I won’t change my mind.” And as you can see, I’ve practically cited only English bands (except for the Germs). The reason why American bands often come up is very simple; as anyone with even a superficial understanding of the phenomenon can confirm, punk after ’79 ceased to exist in England, and everything flowed into Dark and New Wave (Siouxsie, Joy Division, Killing Joke, just to name a few with clear punk roots), while it continued in the United States with various *core. There are many reasons, but I doubt you would be interested, especially since we should historically contextualize the phenomenon, something apparently totally foreign to your way of thinking.

Let me speak as someone who lived through punk from the very beginning, having gone to the United States in '80 and returned in '89 (and bullshit that punk died in '79). You not only have no idea what you're talking about, but you haven't even shown that you know at least the basics of the genre you’re rambling about, from the fundamental records to the "meaning" of it all. It seems you've grasped a generic idea of "they had mohawks and spat," so you throw insults left and right, interspersed with some barely touched concepts. I find progressive music in general boring, pompous, verbose to the point of nausea, and pretentious. But I don't go around reviewing the Clash by shitting on pop bands; I just carry on, "not my cup of tea," and that’s that. It's a shame; I would have liked to read something about this album since I don’t know it.

I would add that all these "ueiver de noantri" are very convenient groups: it's easy now to take the most palatable sounds of the "ueiv" and feed them to the kids; these are sounds digested over the decades.

Yeah, punk, with 4/5 good bands but the rest are all copycat bands. I mean, from the 4 to Franz Ferdinand, how can you long for a decline? Come on...

I'm punk. I'm not even that snobbish, which says a lot :D
Definitely not hardcore, that's for sure. I don't have that, the previous one was enough for me :)

I like both Blur and this album in particular. Maybe just "Tender" is a bit of a mush...

If you love the Clash so much, you probably appreciate Stiff Little Fingers more than the Buzzcocks. Like Hanx!, the live album, is one of the best live recordings I’ve ever heard.