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I'd always been fascinated by the story of John Lydon's appearance on Capital Radio in 1977, where he played a whole brace of leftfield music by the likes of Can and Dr. Alimantado. Simon Reynolds uses this event as the jumping off point for an exploration of post punk, loosely defined as the period when punks got experimental. Framing Lydon's Public Image Limited at the center of the scene, Reynolds explores the myriad sounds that developed in punk's aftermath, from punk funk to new pop and ultimately the origins of alternative rock.
This era's music was a huge part of my youth, growing up as I did in the eighties and nineties. At the time, I would have thought of most of this music as either new wave or synth pop (I don't think I'd heard the term "post punk" until I read Reynolds' "Messthetics #1" piece around the turn of the century). Large swathes of the more esoteric music found in RIUSA were unknown to me the first time around.
I loved the way Reynolds ultimately ties the post punk thread into rave, with strong channels linking the two (including industrial, synth and avant funk), as I actually worked my way back from rave into a lot of this music. In fact, it wasn't until getting into electronic music in the mid-nineties that I began to explore the era a bit deeper and became familiar with names like Fad Gadget, Cabaret Voltaire and Throbbing Gristle.
Reynolds has generated such a wealth of information about this era (spilling over into a companion book, entitled Totally Wired, and a blog repository of other miscellaneous data) that it's nearly impossible to cover all of it here. He touches on everything from The Pop Group to the Specials, the Talking Heads to The Fall, Joy Division to Frankie Goes To Hollywood and far beyond. The breadth of what's covered here is truly astounding.
All of the PIL coverage is monumental, Reynolds positions them as one the major catalysts, towering over the entire scene. Beyond that, if forced to choose, my absolute favorite three chapters were as follows:
1. Living For The Future: Cabaret Voltaire, The Human League, and the Sheffield Scene
Great history of Cabaret Voltaire's recondite studio explorations and The Human League's gradual development of their definitive take on the synth pop form. Future music all around.
2. Uncontrollable Urge: The Industrial Grotesquerie of Pere Ubu and Devo
The vivid recollections of David Thomas and Mark Mothersbaugh (of Pere Ubu and Devo, respectively) are priceless history, and Reynolds brilliantly evokes the desolate post-industrial landscapes of Cleveland and Akron.
3. Freak Scene: Cabaret Noir and Theater of Cruelty in Postpunk San Francisco
I loved the singular vision of disparate groups like Tuxedomoon and Chrome, along with Reynolds' rich evocation of the crumbling Mission District during that time. All of these groups truly "did their own thing."
One footnote of importance is that apparently the U.S. version is heavily abridged. I knew that it was missing the chapter on SST (which was helpfully included in the U.S. edition of Totally Wired), but discovered during this last reading that whole sections were apparently condensed and even combined in some instances. I will have to track down a UK version at some point to get the "full experience." However, rest assured that everything that is included here is five-star material and thus gets no less than a five-star rating from me.
