The Ongoing History of New Music, episode 894: The history of punk-punk, part 2
Here’s a list of words that should not go together:
- Alone together: How many times have you heard that during the pandemic?
- Deafening silence: I know what that means, but when you think about it, the juxtaposition is strange.
- Definitely maybe: A good title for a Britpop album, but an odd colloquialism.
- Walking dead: A TV show, yes, but zombies aren’t real. Are they?
- Pop-punk: Wait–what?
I know you know what I mean by “pop-punk.” It’s a universally accepted descendent of the original punk rock of the 1970s. But those words should not go together any more than “jumbo shrimp.” Back in the day, punk was created as an attack on pop music. So how did we make the jump from a band like The Dead Kennedys doing songs like “Holiday in Cambodia” to Simple Plan singing “Shut Up?”
As weird as it seems, those two bands are related. Do a DNA analysis and it’ll come back positive. That’s because over the decades, pop and punk have merged into a hybrid that’s responsible for selling hundreds of millions of records and concert tickets and t-shirts.
How did this happen? That’s what we’re looking at. This is part two of a history of pop-punk.
Songs heard on this show:
- Green Day, Walking Contradiction
- Green Day, Longview
- Bad Religion, 21st Century Digital Boy
- Rancid, Salvation
- Offspring, Gotta Get Away
- Goldfinger, Here in Your Bedroom
- Offspring, Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)
- Blink-182, What’s My Age Again
- Sum 41, Fat Lip
- Green Day, American Idiot
Eric Wilhite has created this playlist for your listening pleasure.
The Ongoing History of New Music can be heard on the following stations:
- 102.1 The Edge/Toronto – Sunday at 7 pm
- Q107/Toronto – Sunday at 9 pm
- Live 88-5/Ottawa
- 107.5 Dave-FM/Kitchener – Sunday at 8p pm
- Big Kingston – Saturday and Sunday at 11 pm
- The Wolf, Peterborough – Sunday at 8 pm
- FM96/London – Sunday night at 7, Monday night at 11
- Power 97/Winnipeg – Sunday at 8 am
- Sonic 102.9/Edmonton
- The Zone/Victoria
- The Fox/Vancouver – Sunday at 11 pm
- WAPS/WKTL The Summit/Arkon, Canton, Cleveland, Youngstown The show runs at 11 am Sunday. This, by the way, is a great option for American listeners who are prevented from listening to the show live because of geo-blocking,
We’re still looking for more affiliates in Calgary, Kamloops, Kelowna, Regina, Saskatoon, Brandon, Windsor, Montreal, Halifax, Charlottetown, Moncton, Fredericton, and St John’s and anywhere else with a transmitter. If you’re in any of those markets and you want the show, lemme know and I’ll see what I can do.
If you ever miss a show, you can always get the podcast edition available through Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your on-demand audio.
