the day punk broke... wind
in the early 90s there was a phenomenon called "grunge." it was thrust upon young music listeners as the saviour of the boring old rock and roll. at around the same time "grunge" was coming into being, there was another phenomenon called "rave." the 2 movements couldn't have been more different. one was formulaic and traditional in that it was guitar based, straight, white, male, angst driven, radio and record label accessible as it was more familiar to record executives' ears than the odd, otherworldly and at the time, still far too gay influenced sounds of electronic dance music of the time. the music format of rave was completely unlike anything these old fogies at atlantic and capitol records had heard before. and was not compatible with the existing business model. the songs were "tracky" as opposed to song based songs, with a beginning, middle and end. tracks were made to be pressed onto vinyl and used by dj's to add to their sets and weren't meant to be listened to as single entities, with the exception of a few english acts at the time like the orb, leftfield and a few others.
i entered the electronic music scene through "rave" around 1990 and watched electronic dance music progress through it's many incarnations and finally to it's inevitable demise.
los angeles' rave scene in the early years was very, very strong. one of the best in the world, with thousands upon thousands of potential party spaces, i.e. warehouses with it's massive industrial base and tons of kids wanting something to do. it was and still is home to a large chunk of the record industry. at some point some record executives took notice of this new phenomenon and tried to figure out how to make dollars off it.
i remember major labels making stabs at signing electronic acts like dee-lite and madonna trying to co-opt house into her repertoire with "vogue", but they just couldn't figure it out. this new idiom was incompatible with the existing business model. the continuous mixes allowed no time for radio commercials and even the obligatory station identification. most major radio stations were no longer using turntables and were instead using cart cassettes. the synth sounds were too alien for the vast majority of americans. people didn't want to listen to anything without vocals and the tracks that did have them were typically done by divas.
england, on the other-hand has always had a music listening populace with an insatiable appetite for new and inventive forms of music as is evidenced by the absolutely insane number of sub and sub-sub genres of drum and bass that would come out every month. england has always had a major interest urban, black american music and had much more connection to it than the vast majority of americans. at the time, most americans not involved in the scene thought that all this music came from england and probably still do think this. in the late 80s it was "acid house" that took england by storm. what had happened was that the english essentially took chicago house, and presented it to the world as it's own invention.
the rest of europe was a little slower at catching on and for obvious reasons. house music was vocal and as such there was a language barrier for non-english speaking european nations, that is until techno came along. techno was grittier and dirtier than house and more importantly rarely had vocals, with the exception of projects like inner city. with the vocals removed, suddenly this music was potentially accessible by anyone, anywhere. all you needed was a 909 and dx100 and you could make this music. you didn't need an american diva. you could make a track and have it be universally played and accepted. it was music's analogue to christianity - anyone could be a member. techno took over continental europe by storm.
an early attempt to corral the rave scene into more established channels in the u.s. was for "legit" club owners to report illegal parties to the police, who would show up at parties, en mass and shut them down, thrusting thousands of ecstasy addled kids out onto the streets in often unfamiliar and dangerous neighborhoods. after rave culture had exploded here, no-one wanted to deal with clubs and their limitations anymore and these club owners were pissed that kids were making thousands of dollars per party while their venues lay empty. so they fought back, using the cops and fire marshals.
it was depressing and fucked up and sad. and it killed the culture by forcing it back into these traditional venues, where you weren't allowed to bring in your own water and were forced to buy it at outrageous prices as the clubs were trying to make up for lost booze revenue.
so anyway... at the same time that rave culture was blowing up in the u.s. and around the world there was a band - the holy grail of the "grunge" scene. the last chance for straight white males to not have to listen to music made by gay black men. the name of this band was nirvana. the record industry hailed this moment as "the year that punk broke." now, let's get one thing straight - punk was the bastard child of the times of the late 70s and early 80s. the kids of this generation inherited a world that the hippies ultimately couldn't change. reagan was in the white house. there was el salvador, nicaragua, grenada, afghanistan, south africa, etc. everything was hopeless as was evidenced in the music of that era - throbbing gristle, discharge, christian death, post-work for love ministry, einsturzende neubauten, non, etc. punk "broke" in 1976 in the u.k. by the sex pistols. it never "broke" in the us, ever. anyone who lived through that era knows that. punk was dead. this was only a marketing ploy employed by the labels. this was the early 90s. the 80s were over. done. dead. there was absolutely no need for this attitude anymore. this was a vestige of cold war mentality and the cold war was over. the berlin wall - the ultimate symbol of the cold war had fallen, there was major momentum to end 10 years of republican rule, that ultimately did with the arrival of bill clinton. people had hope for the first time in probably 15 years or more. the rave scene was the embodiment of this new hope.
but the recording industry, alarmed by this alien music and it's inability to harness it and obviously in decline even this long ago needed a new marketing ploy. so they found it in this bullshit genre of dead attitudes. they had their white knight. a depressive boy, who's band could play more than 2 notes and who was married to a complete disaster. what a winning combination.
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