Harborfields High School - Harborlight Yearbook (Greenlawn, NY)

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SOU D and ST LE Roughly ten years ago a new genre of bands started hitting the clubs in England. These bands were considered by most of the public to be outrageous, obnoxious, and thorough- ly untalented. They presented radical social views such as anarchism in a very blunt and sometimes rather crude way. The music was soon branded as f'Punk and the press ate it right up. Punk was a new way for youth to rebel against society, not entirely unlike the greasers of the 1950's or the hippies of the l960's. Arguabley the most infamous band to emerge in the 1970's was the Sex Pistols . Their leader was Johnny Rotten. He shocked England with his outrageous appearance and lyrics that seemed just about anti- everything.He became a cult hero. Soon there were young people wearing tattered clothing held together with safety pins and leather jackets covered with buttons of their favorite band. Punk had developed a sort of fashion all its own with the help of the Sex Pistolsw and many other Punk rock pioneers of the l970's. Other forefathers of Punk were the Velvet Underground whose lead singer was none other than Lou Reed, Generation X whose lead singer was the now famous Billy Idol , and The Damned who were the first Punk band to record an album. The Clash at this time were also contributing to the newly bom Punk scene. Meanwhile back in the states we were having a Punk revolution of our own. The most notable of the bands to come from it were the Ramones and the 4'Dead Kennedys? By the time the Sex Pistols toured America, Punk was very big. Kids with Mohawks or completely shaved heads could be seen in almost every major city.The Punk rock bands played in small clubs where spitting and hurling bottles at the sight of a stage replaced applause.Slam dancing became popular in these clubs. Slam dancing is a sort of en- ergetic explosion of a group of punks in which they jump up and down and hurl themselves into one another. Its all meant to be friendly athletisism but there is always a very real possibility of violence. I would have to say that one must see slam dancing to understand it completely. The idealogy of Punk is very difficult to explain. Especially since just about everyone thinks of it a little bit differently. Everything about Punk rock is a hit below the belt to conformity. Everything about Punk spells different',. That is one of the reasons why looking outrageous is a Punk speciality. Punk is also against commercialism, big ego's, selling out and that sort of thing. One of Punk's biggest attributes is its shocking power. With names like 'flimmy Gestapoi' or' Sid Vicious these Punks are getting a message across to people through pure shock value. Whether it be anti-fascist, anti-war, or anti-govemment, one is almost slapped in the face by the singers ideas. Doing your own thing is probably the biggest part of Punk Rock's sketchy philosophy. With the death of Sid Vicious in 1979 Punk seemed to come to a grinding halt. Not much came on the Punk scene for quite sometime and it seemed to dissapear as quickly as it appeared. Then almost ten years after its birth Punk was rebom or at least came back in the public eye. Hardcore as Punk is referred now is very much alive and filled with vigor. The scene seems to be growing and branching out in many directions. The first of which is sort of cross between Punk and the music of heavy metal. This new branch of punk called Speedmetal or Metalcore,' has un- fortunately oozed in to the scene. The music may be similar to some hardcore punk but the idealogy is completely different. Heavy metal consists of everything that Punk shouldn't stand for. I sincerely hope this is just a passing phase in the Punk scene as the world already has more egotistical and satanist people than it can deal with. Some of the more creative branches are the physicedelia revival we have recently seen among some groups such as Jeses and Mary Chain and the Cult . But for the most part Punk remains fast and loud and an always new and exciting altemative to mainstream music. Joel Rodger ff' . 'I 1,1-I., ' il ' V ' 2 '-1 f:'.f..:-zach ., 2: 1 'f ' I 5- , . . ,,f-A , 5,4 51.-gig.-fi-'f-.',g,.,5-.af ,ve ,. . 'z1g.f,e.g i7'Ff -194' ' 1. -f f f.z5i2'f.wf 112 Ti'E2125129.35?Z2?'7'i?i -52445 'ff' - ' A! '4 ff' 1 22' -1::ff:Z ' 'U-':f'1f'ffL1i1'?' I . v 1 f.1'fI+5-.z': ':.f.-4:44-'iz-fpefwl .vi A. 4.11 I ff f 96 .SOUND AND SYYLE 1

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. 1 1 N ' v ?':.!-sixcsq ir if !,f 'CKE Mss Ass Y Q . E 5' , J- if slii, ne w V . ...f . N Junior Chris Hawkins with spiked hair, a popular hair style brought about by the new trend in music. 49 g,V1 Senior Rachel Winfall shows off another radical hair style brought about by the influences of punk music. 135' Senior Joel Rogers in typical punk attire complete with combat boots, leather jacket, safety pins and a chain. ' t lf- ,. A I if f y ? I tx. , Q t 1 Q ' i if l ' T7 At A , .5-H . p, i,- x If -A tv.,-Ay . - g, l I I V I I I I Seniors Sean Cavanaugh and Sue Sullivan, long time fans of punk! new wave music, take a break from art class and show us that Mod and Rocker can peacefully coexist.