I've been pondering this, and after much thought, I've decided you're entirely correct.
I'm still interested in where that punk rock, anti-establishmentarian impulse went to, with what happened now that the original punks are hitting their 50s and the youngest of those days (like myself) are in their mid-30s. Because there was something valuable there, just like there was something valuable at the core of the hippie movement.
In "Our Band Could Be Your Life," Mike Watt of the Minutemen talks about the hippie movement, and how Nixon finally killed it by ending the war. Punk didn't have that sort of moment, per se. People just got older, and their actions and impulses changed. I'm fascinated by that, as I don't know if anyone's really stepped back and looked at what happened afterward. Not at the stars -- we can find them easily enough -- but at the people in the audience.
I think, socio-politically speaking, it would be fascinating to step up and track that, to start looking at things like what they do for a living, how they vote. (This is the sociologist in me.) There's been a lot of work done on "Generation X," and on the hippies and the Boomer Generation, but not so much on the people in the punk movement.
Sure, I know probably hundreds or more myself, but by and large in cultureal sociology, they've disappeared into the statstics, often buried beneath the baby boomer's immense demographics.
It is really fascinating--for a wide range of demographics--and I keep hearing good things about that book, so I guess it's now on my list.
I've had the moment of being in a very un-glam grocery store, and Mott the Hoople plays on the Muzak and I look around at my fellow customers and wonder which of them embraced that aesthetic when they were 19, and how they feel now, hearing that music as they are doing their domestic chore...
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timeasmymeasure
Re: ps
Date: 2006-05-10 07:32 pm (UTC)I'm still interested in where that punk rock, anti-establishmentarian impulse went to, with what happened now that the original punks are hitting their 50s and the youngest of those days (like myself) are in their mid-30s. Because there was something valuable there, just like there was something valuable at the core of the hippie movement.
In "Our Band Could Be Your Life," Mike Watt of the Minutemen talks about the hippie movement, and how Nixon finally killed it by ending the war. Punk didn't have that sort of moment, per se. People just got older, and their actions and impulses changed. I'm fascinated by that, as I don't know if anyone's really stepped back and looked at what happened afterward. Not at the stars -- we can find them easily enough -- but at the people in the audience.
I think, socio-politically speaking, it would be fascinating to step up and track that, to start looking at things like what they do for a living, how they vote. (This is the sociologist in me.) There's been a lot of work done on "Generation X," and on the hippies and the Boomer Generation, but not so much on the people in the punk movement.
Sure, I know probably hundreds or more myself, but by and large in cultureal sociology, they've disappeared into the statstics, often buried beneath the baby boomer's immense demographics.
Re: ps
Date: 2006-05-11 08:03 pm (UTC)I've had the moment of being in a very un-glam grocery store, and Mott the Hoople plays on the Muzak and I look around at my fellow customers and wonder which of them embraced that aesthetic when they were 19, and how they feel now, hearing that music as they are doing their domestic chore...