The New Wave Appreciation Thread

[Jason]

Yes folks, it's time...expound on all your favorite new wave bands. They can be of the synth pop variety (thank you Suicide) or of the new romanticism that Roxy Music pioneered.

[Maybelline]

Sorry to crash the thread, but can anyone recommend some good headphones? I'm presuming I'd have to spend a bit to get the quality..

[the captain]

It made it all of one post...

[Maybelline]

Whoops, now I'm doubly sorry - I meant to post the headphones question in the 'stereo components' thread.  

While I'm here - can I mention Talking Heads for the New Wave theme?

[Jason]

Talking Heads kick ass.

[Maybelline]

I love This Must be the Place.

[Boxer Monkey]

New Wave is p*ssy punk. And no way is Roxy Music "New Wave."

[Jason]

This is the new wave "appreciation" thread, if you have nothing nice to say, why bother posting in here?

You got a better term for Roxy Music? If you say "glam"...

[Boxer Monkey]

I thought defending Roxy Music was pretty nice.

And Suicide is no more New Wave than the Velvet Underground.

New Wave? Try:

The Waitresses
"Armed Forces"
The Police
Post-"Indiscreet" Sparks
Pearl Harbor & the Explosions
The Go-Gos
Adam Ant


sh*t like that is "New Wave."

[Jason]

I thought defending Roxy Music was pretty nice.

And Suicide is no more New Wave than the Velvet Underground.

Let's see....Roxy Music influenced virtually every new wave band, and Suicide influenced all the synth pop. If they influenced, then they must be the first of something, are they not?

I suppose Talking Heads are merda too, eh?

[Boxer Monkey]

Let's see....Roxy Music influenced virtually every new wave band, and Suicide influenced all the synth pop. If they influenced, then they must be the first of something, are they not?

I suppose Talking Heads are merda too, eh?

Talking Heads = second-generation CBGBs band. They were there at the beginning, or close enough for me. And they're wonderful. "New Wave" is strictly coattails-riding sh*t, man, like the stuff I named above, although it has its merits. I mean, groundbreakers: Roxy Music, Bowie's Berlin stuff with Eno and Iggy, Suicide, Television -- ostensibly that is the BEGINNING of something, and that something was diluted into what was termed "New Wave." I mean, if you wanna denigrate great music with a label that was applied to an inferior offshoot (as opposed to, say, "punk"), I guess that's your business.

[Jason]

You mean like calling The Velvet Underground punk, even when they influenced a lot of the punk bands?

[Boxer Monkey]

Huh?

[Jason]

The Velvet Underground, according to most people who know them, influenced a goodly number of the old-school punk bands. Calling them the first punk band isn't a far-out conclusion to some people. Is that considered denigrating the Velvets?

[Boxer Monkey]

Well, yeah, but the Velvet Underground as an influence on punk or calling them "punk" in the sense that the Stooges or Suicide were "punk" -- I don't have any problem with that. But "New Wave" was never a positive label in the sense that "punk" was. That's my point.

[Jason]

I dunno, there's some new wave out there that's of a cerebral type, stuff that makes you think. Gary Numan comes to mind. He may be a synth pop giant, but there's just something intangible about his music and his lyrics that makes him stand out in his own respect from the rest of the synth pop crowd. Same with Soft Cell.

[Boxer Monkey]

See, I'll accept that stuff as New Wave -- and I'm not trying to say all New Wave is bad as I happen to like a bit of it -- I just never would consider Roxy or Suicide new wave per se.

Sorry if I've derailed, but I think some clarification was necessary.

[Jason]

We had a Roxy Music thread in here, I mentioned the same thing about them beating Talking Heads to the punch as the first new wave group....at least one other person was in agreement with me. I dunno, maybe him and I were the minority.

[Boxer Monkey]

Yeah, well, I ain't him. 

[I. Spaceman]

New Wave is a bad tag generally, but if you accept it as a valid genre, as I do, then yes, Roxy qualifies, as they also do in the Glam and Art-Rock genres. Heads as well, as they and Bowie directly produced the first progressive post-Punk albums.

[Boxer Monkey]

Wow! I never thought I'd say this, but YOU'RE WRONG, IAN. No way is Roxy New Wave, any more than Elvis is Wayne Newton.

[I. Spaceman]

If a band invents the template for a style, they are it. And Roxy are THE template for New Wave. Period.

Wayne ain't a style, he's a performer, but if you are saying the style that Wayne does is one shared by Elvis, that would be true.

[Boxer Monkey]

My point re: Elvis/Wayne is you can't blame Elvis for Wayne Newton or Tom Jones or whoever, anymore than Roxy can be blamed -- yes, BLAMED -- for less-inspired crap that drew from them. And this is where we diverge, primarily -- New Wave was never a "valid genre," man, it was a blanket label applied to a whole buncha music as opposed to a single movement, like the New Romantics or something. Now, Roxy Music inspiring the latter -- THAT's something I can appreciate. But -- and you're the same age as me, dude -- remember what New Wave meant in the early '80s? It was, like, Scandal and sh*t like that! That's what New Wave remains to me. It was never a genre, more of a catch-all label.

[I. Spaceman]

I dig what you're saying, man. BUT No Wave was certainly a genre, as was post-punk. To me New Wave was a music that incorporated more pop influence and incorprated synthesizers, was fashion-conscious and an ironic detachment.
Aut, again, I know what you're saying because morons at the time called EVERYTHING New Wave. And, worse that that were the people who called Devo and The B-52's Punk!
I guess post-punk could be used as a cacth-all to describe the post-Pistols era, and Roxy was  the biggest influence on that time, but calling Roxy post-punk when they predated punk itself is pretty damn silly. But it does give a measure of how ahead of their time Roxy was.
Aww hell, the whole thing's foda silly. Forget I said anything. It's all foda rock and roll.

[the captain]

Aww hell, the whole thing's foda silly. Forget I said anything. It's all foda rock and roll.

That's the sort of thread that gets me crucified, bombarded with this or that.