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Calling New Wave Experts

This is essentially a theological question in that a) there's no agreed definition of 'New Wave' and b) there's no way anyone can prove that their definition is the correct one. So, aside from some obvious 'it's not New Wave because it's jazz/disco/metal' exclusions, and a very rough timescale of late 1970s/early 1980s, there's no way of settling the matter. (Some years later, my elder daughter showed that this sort of category war was still going on, when she dismissed some of the bands at a metal festival she'd been to as 'not really metal').
 
Yes. A lot of punks used to follow 'hippy' bands like Here and Now; the music was almost secondary, it was about what those bands appeared to stand for.

This mini doc is well worth a watch.
 
So far I have nothing to disagree about. Rock is full of 'My category/sub-category/sub-sub-category is the most important and why on earth doesn't the other 99% of the world see this, it's so obvious.' And as Seeker_UK say, it's not allways the music that's important...
 
On reflection, I think I have it.

If one or more band member is wearing a skinny tie, they're new wave.
 
Hmm. Teenagers. We were all one once. Some earlier than others.

Is being Hip still a thing? Unintentionally ?

TBH I doubt it given the information overload that is the internet. Where everyone knows absolutely everything about everything these days.
 
PS. I don't subscribe to "Rocks Back Pages" I was there at the time, plus it's FAR too expensive. But. Max Bell. I liked a lot. Back then.

Bio...From there..


"I can't do that self-promotion malarkey. Mine sounds phony to me. But here are some clues. I did write for Nick Logan's NME, and for the Evening Standard, GQ, Arena, Uncut, Vox and the Independent On Sunday etc., but that's so old hat. I have written some stuff for Classic Rock, which is a fine magazine. I did a Doors piece last year which was well received, a kind of detective story on the last days of Jim Morrison. There are others. But my trumpet isn't working.

"Frank Sinatra liked me. He wrote me a letter; or rather he recited one to his stenographer. He invited me to Palm Springs. I saw the Beatles play live when I was 10, and I spoke to John and Paul outside Dick James' office in Gray's Inn the same year. I queued up to get Cilla Black's autograph at the London Palladium in 1965 and she was a complete bitch. When push comes to shove my favourite album is Countdown To Ecstasy. But then it might be Carl and the Passions. Or After the Goldrush. Or Stills' first album. It could be Secret Treaties, though. Or The Trials Of Van Occupanther.

"There aren't any answers. Rock journalism is – short version – hanging out with cool people and catching a contact high. Then you write about it and the pay is laughable. I went for a limo ride with Dennis Wilson to the Lincoln Festival. But I wasn't a music journalist then so that doesn't count. I've swum in a pool with Jerry Garcia. And I can't swim. I sat on the Sphinx with Captain Trips and David Freiberg dosed me with Owsley's finest via teat pipette and eye dropper. I was sitting next to Ken Kesey. I got my own back when I hung out with Julia, the Quicksilver Girl, and the Byrds Girl. Nice girl. I also hung out with Sable Starr and the Turtles and Helen Wheels. I took a lot of drugs with Arthur Lee and John Phillips in the Hollywood Hills. I loved Arthur a great deal. See what I did there.

"Elton John burned one of my articles on stage. That was a highpoint. At university I had a few interesting visitors, like Mike Wilhelm and Cyril Jordan and Sandy Pearlman. All I'd done was compare him to Mrs. Mills. Sparks wanted me to be their rhythm guitarist. Who am I?"
 
When I was 15 -16 yrs. old I liked to describe myself as a Futurist (1980-81 ish)
This was when I shunned music with a guitar etc. and favoured electronically produced music, anything with a synthesiser caught my ear. Kraftwerk, early Human League, Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft, Fad Gadget, Soft Cell etc.
I had problems with Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet and the like as they were New Romantics and had a Pop and softer commercial sound. The frilly shirt thing did nowt for me.
Before my Futurist phase, I was into Ska - Two Tone and had loafers and a pork pie hat, before that I was really into Northern Soul and Tamla Motown.

After a brief time of regarding myself as part of a particular music tribe, and discovering Dead Kennedys ‘Fresh Fruit...’ Fad Pil (still in 1981 but I had left home and moved 200 miles to the Isle O Wight) - I stopped trying to identify with anything particular.
I was a bit Punk, a bit Goth, loved The B-52’s and liked to dance to whatever in Nightclubs.
In retrospect I think I was a New Wave kid, but I wasn’t stuck with any one genre because I had tried soo many. During the same early period I collected Simon & Garfunkel albums... and then I got into On-U Sounds...

I also found 1970’s Punk not ‘punk’ enough for me, Dead Kennedys, Black Flag, SPK had a harder sound which I preferred.

I guess most of what I am describing is now post-New Wave? True New Wave being a tiny bit of time about 1977 to 1979?

Blondie were New Wave.

The Jam - ? Mod revival ? - a bit punky, but not punk. = New Wave

Elvis Costello - spikey, too much tune for punk, New Wave.

Japan - all that make-up and hair business, synths and guitars. Early albums are hard to define. New Wave (?)

Roxy Music - make-up and big hair, synth and guitars, Glam vs. Pre Punk? - New Wave before New Wave was a term?

Bowie :)

it is all rather confusing.

The term I do not like is ‘Synth Pop.’

A-Ha.


edit: I forgot my Rock n Roll/Elvis period.

It’s all Rock n Roll to me.
 
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My very short History of RocknRoll:

Elvis -> Beatles -> Led Zeppelin -> Sex Pistols -> Iron Maiden -> Nirvana.

And, no, I'm not fond of all of them.
 
Sky arts program last night about pub-rock. They mentioned “new wave” as being bands that came out of that dr feel good/ Eddie & the hot rods era, but weren’t punk. Brought forwards by Jake Riviera & Stiff records, so artists such as Costello, Ian Drury etc. So stuff which was spiky/edgy but not straight ahead punk. Stranglers maybe as well. In a way, bands who’s level of musicianship & songwriting was a level or two above a lot ( not all) of the punk era, which to me was more about energy, attitude & simply putting guitars back into the hands of teenagers & giving it a go.
However, I think it goes to show genre labelling of music is so fickle & ultimately a bit of a dead end.
 
So what that means is New Wave = Punk with a tune and possibly a keyboard

edit> and a narrow tie (max width not yet established)
 
Haha, maybe you’re not too far out!
It was what I considered to be “my era” & I liked some punk, some new wave, some synth pop & then even Genesis/ Gabriel stuff, so the labels attached to the bands didn’t mean that much to me.
Joe Jackson, another one with some spiky tunes, great musicianship, plus the keyboards & narrow ties, so you may have a point!
 
Mine also and I'd guess a fair number of fishies too, 1st LP I bought myself with Sat job money was Genesis ATTW3, big fan of Blondie from the get go, Skids, SLF, U2, Cars all sorts bought and swapped at school.
 
I still struggle with the ‘pub rock = new wave’ thing as so much pub rock was just traditional blues and pop structures compressed to basics and given a spiky aesthetic. That’s not saying it wasn’t great, but I view it as an intermediate stage before the past was rejected. As stated above for me ‘new-wave’ (as I understand it) threw those structures away and was largely the thing that emerged from the generation (mine) who had read the ‘here are three chords, now go form a band’ rallying call of punk but had time to experiment despite still having little/no musical training. Much of what I remember about being in bands at the time and later into the ‘80s was very consciously rejecting the structures and cliches of the past. Krautrock was the same mindset, it very consciously and deliberately rejected the formulaic blues/rock/pop structures. I see zero overlap between say Gang Of Four or Wire and Cream or Led Zep.
 
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