All right, so this is the followup to last weeks thing on the American punk underground during the 80s... This time focusing on the no-wave movement of the late seventies and early eighties. So anyway...
WHAT IS NO-WAVE? 
^ Various no-wave musicians and artists.No-wave was a sort of weird mutant offshoot of punk that popped up in New York, created some of the weirdest and most unhinged records of all time, and then swiftly self-destructed, all within the space of a few months. Nowadays the term has come to mean just dissonant post-punk, but the original no-wave movement was far more interesting and difficult to classify… It was an attempt to create an entirely new form of music, ditching the “recycled Chuck Berry riffs” of punk while keeping its aggression and experimental spirit. There were still some typical elements of the no-wave sound, though: angular, dissonant guitars, tribal drumming, noise tendancies, and a stripped-down, minimilist sound, among other things. So yeah, here are some of the different groups that came to make up that movement.
Theoretical Girls:One of the first No-Wave bands, and arguably the most musically interesting and diverse, Theoretical Girls is now mostly remembered for starting the career of experimental composer Glenn Branca. Don’t think they were just some anaemic gallery piece, though: their recordings had a sense of raw power and energy which combined with black humour and perverse experimental urges to thrilling effect, making their records sound in retrospect like a direct link from 70s punk to the noisy weirdness that was to follow. They never released a proper album, but the ‘Theoretical Record’ compilation is still one of the most interesting and accessible records to come out of the whole scene.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjLKO1tVzlY and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXmQy8dCU2s .
Rhys Chatham:Along with fellow composer Glenn Branca, Rhys Chatham was one of the pioneers of the no-wave sound… Experimenting with the open-tuned guitars and drones that would later help define the sound of bands like Sonic Youth and Band Of Susans. Musically, think a minimalist, stripped-down postpunk with some classical influences:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrlfE2zhwhQ&feature=related .
^ Glenn Branca of the Theoretical Girls in actionTeenage Jesus & The Jerks:Teenage Jesus & The Jerks were possibly the most viciously, terrifyingly abrasive and fucked-up band to come out of anywhere, ever. Ditching most of the artsy pretentions of no-wave, they took punk rock to its logical conclusion: if punk was three chords and aggression, TJ&TJ were what was left if you ditched the chords entirely and pumped the aggression as high as humanly possible: a violently unpleasant racket, the sonic equivalent of a kick in the teeth, with screeching, jagged lines of slide guitar meshing with 17-year-old(!) Lydia Lunch’s frenzied, unearthly howls. Check them out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRoVTJzmyW0 and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLUUDZdKxuA .
Ike Yard:Minimilist electronica-type stuff, with some heavy ambient and krautrock influences, which still sounds strange and eerie even today. Definitely worth a listen:
http://www.myspace.com/ikeyardSonic Youth:Well, their early stuff, anyway… The ‘Confusion Is Sex’ album in particular still ranks as one of the high points of no-wave, mixing visceral guitar mangling and noisy punk attacks with eerie, mesmerising spaced-out drones to astonishing effect. One of the reasons it works so well is that they’re actual songs, instead of just pure noise: weird, fucked up songs, sure, but still songs, which makes the album a good introduction to anyone who wants to get into the no-wave sound.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxR94tD6OXM&feature=related and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oKo4y1DUaE8&feature=related .
Ut:One of the longest-lived no-wave groups, Ut made tightly-wound, angular and skewed yet strangely melodic guitar pieces which were every bit as thrilling as anything by their better-known contemporaries. ‘In Gut’s House’ is probably their best, with harmonica and violin thrown into the mix to make some great, atmospheric, richly-textured skronk. Check ‘em out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PqdAhOKn8g .
^ Group shot of UtCertain General:One of the poppier groups here, Certain General mixed new wave with dance and no-wave influences to make a kind of poppy mutant postpunk. Still, in ditching abrasiveness for hooks, their music has managed to age pretty well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zzhg2xHKdRk&feature=related Mars:One of the very first no-wave groups… Listen to these guys and you can hear everything from Suicide to the Theoretical Girls to Wolf Eyes in their sound. They still hold up fairly well today, partly because they prefer to create an atmosphere of dissonance and dread rather than just make hostile noise or whatever. They were also bizarrely catchy at times, too, with the occasional actual song lurking behind the experimentalism.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ReyhyGzlt4 .
Red Transistor:To be honest, Red Transistor’s sound was always a bit too starchy and uptight for me to ever get into that much... All the single-note guitar playing and repetitive drumlines kind of do my head in. They’re pretty good in small doses, though.
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=106237939 .
DNA:DNA are basically what Captain Beefheart would sound like if he grew up listening to Mars and world music and ditched acid for speed… An unearthly, clanging, primitivist racket, with tribal drumming, skronky chickenwire guitar, stomach-curdling bass, and the occasional burst of metallic keyboards. It really has to be heard to be believed, but DNA are one of the most uniquely bizarre and fascinating groups of all time and are definitely worth checking out.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZctJ3xhNFlw&feature=related , and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laQjL_IDMkI .
^ A group shot of DNA8-Eyed Spy:Another one of Lydia Lunch’s groups… More accessible than Teenage Jesus, with more of a pop and blues influence, but still pretty damn fucked up and weird. What I like about this band is because there’s actually a sense of fun to their music: while many no-wave bands had a more solemn, artsy sensibility to their noise, 8-Eyed Spy just sounds like a bunch of teenagers getting drunk and thrashing out malformed blues songs on instruments they can’t play. Check out their take on Captain Beefheart’s ‘Diddy Wah Diddy’ to get a sense of their sound:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzF-UCP7YHI .
The Del-Byzanteens:Not really no-wave, but I couldn’t think of any other real way to define these guys and they’re seriously pretty awesome. Think a sort of malformed, artsy, ridiculously catchy new wave with some experimental influences, I guess. Also notable for featuring a young Jim Jarmusch among its members. Listen to ‘War’, anyway, and pick up their album ‘Lies To Live By’ if you get a chance:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=147459157 .
Swans:Big Black before there was a Big Black, Swans mixed repetitive, pounding percussion (hammered out on sheet metal) with screeching noisy guitars and Micheal Gira’s deranged howl to make some of the most aggressively punishing records of all time. However, once you get the hang of it, their music actually feels more accessible than most other noise groups: they rely more on rhythm than just abrasive guitar textures, and their music has a sort of weird, lopsided groove that kind of sounds like Can being raped by Einsturzende Neubauten.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWkNlkyT2yE .
RECOMMENDED ALBUMS:DNA on DNA - DNA
Everything - Teenage Jesus & The Jerks
Theoretical Record - Theoretical Girls
78+ - Mars
Confusion Is Sex - Sonic Youth
In Gut’s House - Ut
Or, for people looking for a single album,
No New York - Various (the original Eno-curated no-wave compilation)
So yeah, that’s it. Next week:
dance-punk, no-wave’s slightly hipper cousin!
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The US Punk Underground, Part II: No-Wave