ABSTRACT
This claim-from the leader of ABC, the group who (briefly) made gold lamé suits and string sections hip-takes us to the heart of new pop. Back to 1979 and its consensuswhere punk had “failed” was in straying from the “original point”—individualism, discovery, change-and becoming new orthodoxy, a tradition. This positive, constructive redefinition of punk ignored and erased crucial elements in punk’s heterogeneity (rage, aggression, nihilism, chaos, outrage), rationalizing it to little more than the idea of “progression.” Punk had been apocalyptic; there wasn’t meant to be a day after. But here one was, in the future-what to do but “flee to the edges,” finish the “incomplete revolution”—make modern (ist), eighties music (using new inputs like jazz, European avant-garde, dub, disco); demystify and decentralize the means of production (independent labels). The years 1978-79 saw the creation of a “space for growth.”
