Mission Statement

I first came in contact with harDCore, Washington’s very own version of hardcore punk, approx. a year ago, while looking for a good topic for a paper. Back then I participated in a class that for the better part took place in D.C. and the requirement for the paper was just that it had to do something with that place. Since I already fulfilled all my study requirements back then I thought I could give a somewhat risky popular culture topic a shot. I always regret to just produce tons of text for the lecturer and the institute archive, so I decided to share my insights about harDCore on this blog, knowing it’s a fringe issue even for pop culture geeks, but hoping someone out there might enjoy it. I will summarize the imo most interesting parts (e.g. leave out all the overly scientific babble) and garnish them with some music clips from the beloved youtube. I intend to introduce you to songs I deem worthy of knowing and write a short bibliographic review of the books I used.

Intro – The death of punk and the emergence of hardcore

It is fair to say that the emergence of a small, but highly influential and dymanic punk scene in Washington around 1980 can be considered a miracle. While obviously being the political center, Washington had never been know for any kind of cultural avantgarde. Despite this disadvantage of not being able to built upon an existing local tradition, this small scene spearheaded a sub-movement within punk. In addition to the invention of a particularly fast and unadorned music which later almost paradoxically evolved into a particularly emotional type of punk, this scene created a unique mindset centered around personal integrity, abstinence from drugs, commitment to communal politics and an anti-music industry stance. As a consequence, the punk scene of Washington D.C. developed into a role model for American independent music while retaining an ardent localism.

When punk died on 14 January 1978 at a Sex Pistols concert in San Francisco with Johnny Rotten’s question to the audience  “Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?”, it left behind two almost antithetical children, post-punk and hardcore punk. While post-punk is more a collective term than a genre, including groups like Joy Division, The B-52s and Gang of Four, all of which were at least vaguely inspired by first wave punk, it rejected punk’s musical limitations and experimented with a number of different influences such as disco, reggae or funk, laying also an important fundament for what would become known as world music. In that sense, post-punk is an example of cultural hybridity, transcending boundaries of genre and dissolving traditions.

Hardcore, the other epigone of punk, aspired to revive punk as a pure, raw outlet for anger and frustration lacking any kind of art school sophistication. An important factor in the emergence of hardcore was the social and cultural climate of Reagan’s America, characterized by a combination of (what at least was perceived as) a repressive conservative culture and a lingering economic recession. Hardcore punk became the subcultural home for many teenagers who identified themselves as outsiders in this America, which did not seem to hold the same opportunities for them as it did for their parents’ generation. In the era of preppy-style conformity, kids from the suburbs of pretty much every urban center in the US looked for inspiration to a dying popcultural phenomenon, made it their own and in turn practically reinvented it.

Just to give you a first impression, here’s some footage from a Minor Threat concert, with all the nice typical features of a hardcore concert: screaming, noise, lots of, erm, body contact and audience participation.