Rock Eras - by which I mean a period of time in which rock and roll music is dominated by certain artists/performers/trends - are funny things. They seem to contain themselves neatly in decades. They fall and rise with the turn of the calendar.
You had the 50's, the first rock era (there being none prior). Distant rumblings till around mid-decade, then an explosion of major artists. Then, c. 1958-1959, you're left in the doldrums as Elvis is in the army/Hollywood, Chuck Berry's in the slam, Jerry Lee's in disgrace, Little Richard's in the church and Buddy Holly's in the ground. There is still rock and roll, but the big guys are absent.
The 60's kick off slow with The Beach Boys, surf music, soul and frat rock. But it's the mid-decade arrival of The Beatles, and the British Invasion in tow that marks the decade. And when the fab four call it a day in 1970, the dream is over for sure. Right around the same time, Hendrix dies, The Doors die, The Velvet Underground (unpopular but influential) splinter, and Bob Dylan is transforming into something quite other. So too, even The Who and the Stones are evolving into a different form that will carry them into the next decade.
The 70's see the rise of big rock acts, most of them rooted in the previous decade, solidifying into a regrettable status quo. Against that grain come new artists like David Bowie, Alice Cooper and the now-solo Velvet Lou Reed. But mid-decade, things are stirring in NYC and London (and, less visibly, in other places). "Punk rock", they call it, and it splits the rock audience into camps: those who love it, and those who loathe it.
But by decades end, the new groups have fallen away. Several Great White Hopes have failed to make the commercial landing some had hoped for (Graham Parker, Elvis Costello). Patti Smith is retired. So's Richard Hell. The Sex Pistols have sundered. As have Television. By 1980, The Ramones have peaked; Blondie is almost finished with their string of hits. Sound familiar?
Yeah, 1980. By now all the "new" sounds are coming out of the UK. Most of its either arty, noisy avant-garde type stuff, ala John Lydon's new band (or corporate entity?) Public Image Ltd., or doomy bands with names like Killng Joke, Throbbing Gristle, Bauhaus. Or its bouncy, silly stuff the call "new wave" - aimed mostly at teenyboppers.
And it don't satisfy.
Me, I was disappointed. I was glued to the earlier rock eras - the British Invasion, the 50's, the "proto" punks of the late 60's and early 70's, and aforementioned "punks" of the later 70's. But it was the past. I wanted my own rock era.
I got one.
I guess other folks felt that way, cause suddenly bands just kept springing up, coast-to-coast, decade-long. All over. And they rock. Some of them are called "punk", or "hardcore". Some "independent" or "underground" or later "alternative". These labels don't mean much. They ranged from hardcore to 60's-influenced psychedelia, or retro-60's garage rock, or rockabilly, or throwbacks to Dolls-style raunch and roll, or amped-up country music or any number of new and less definable styles. Some hit the road, criss-crossing the country in a network of venues that would play host to them. Many produced records on their own or others' local labels. Some managed to get records distributed and build followings across the country, and even overseas. Others never made it out of their hometown.
For awhile it was the most exciting thing that ever happened.
Then it was over.
By the end of the decade, the bands were disappearing. The next wave of bands coming in were less inspiring, more derivative, less interesting.
And more popular than ever.
When Nirvana hit it big, a whole generation saw it as the beginning of something new. But not me. I knew it was the end. A headstone on the grave of my rock era. Like every disappointed veteran of the previous, I just didn't like this new stuff.
This blog is the result of my long-standing, now-being-realized attempt to build a private collection of the music of this particular rock era - call it indie, punk, what you will. What was impossible at the time is now highly-do-able thanks to the availability of information and even music on the web. And so this...
My goal is to present a bit about many of the bands I either followed at the time or have discovered since. It isn't all of them. There are many I can't find info on and many I just plain don't like well enough. I've mostly ignored metal, since it's such a huge sub-genre you could easily devote an entire resource to it. Likewise I've ignored the Minneapolis Prince-led funk scene, deserving though it is, and hip-hop, since that too is a story big enough for its own book, so to speak.
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