The Rise of Punk in 70’s Britain.

hDuring seventies Britain, life was a picture of austerity and hardship for m each members of the mankind. The country was facing the pommel economic recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s and large come of the electorate were quickly beginning to grow tired of the failing policies being touted by both Labour and Conservative minority regimens. The experience of Britain for m any in the 1970s was one of drawn out decline and decay, the consensus politics of the 1960s was dropping apart and Harold Macmillans notion of Youve never had it so good couldnt stomach been further from the truth.It could be argued that the aforementioned factors played a place of importance when assessing the largely spontaneous emergence of the squalid movement into British society. Economic recession, not only in Britain nevertheless in other major world nations, was ever increasing, mainly collect to the 1973 petroleum crisis which last cost heathland his post as prime minister and paved the way towards The Rise of Thatcherism.The crisis was repayable to the Arab members of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), announcing, as a result of the ongoing Yom Kippur War, that they would no longer ship oil to nations that had supported Israel in its conflict with Syria and Egypt. These nations included the United States of America and their associate in the shape of Britain and Japan.British industry suffered a neat require due to the lack of oil being imported into the country, Britain began to face major disputation from other major economies, much(prenominal) as Japan and the USA, in certain(prenominal) sectors such(prenominal)(prenominal) as manufacturing, which had previously been a large and consistent field of operation of income. With the flight of capital in the face of increasing prevailing family line militancy, it soon became clear that Governments in the industrialised economies could no longer fuck off a commitment to full employment.As factories at samplet these refreshedly competitive industries were laboured to close due to falling sales, it consequently had the effect of rising unemployment. By the mid 1970s unemployment had reached well over a million community and did not show signs of ceasing at any point soon aft(prenominal)ward on. The electorate began to begrudge the emergence of mass unemployment as it had not played any accepted part deep down British politics since the long age shortly sideline the end of World War I, a period of British score which the British public would not look back on with any great affection and certainly would not want to revisit.Considerable amounts of workers who had been recently pull redundant began supporting trade unions on a more uninterrupted and meaningful basis. The out of work became aggrieved with the failing British economy and felt diamond that they deserved better support and welfare than they were currently receiving due to th e governments current inadequacies. Now that the trade unions had a more great support, albeit in unfortunate circumstances, they began to put increasing pressure on Heaths conservative government to pass legislative measures to aid the unemployed in their hour of need.Workers from al or so all of the countries key industries such as mining, ship building and car manufacture went on strike to raise their frustrations and vent their anger towards the incompetence of the Tory administration. The refusal by either party to make compromises on their respective arguments only furthered the problems and deepened the mire which Britain was steadily descending into.Due to the drawn-out strikes by the mining community which sucked on the 10th February 1974 and lasted until 7th butt against of the same year, Britain found herself being exceedingly stretched to the point of what resources they had left circa the afore say(prenominal) strike action. Electrical power was deemed to be being consumed at besides much of a prompt pace and under the rule of Edward Heath, the Conservatives discrete on the introduction of the Three daylight Week. The Three Day Week was a policy in which commercial economic consumptionrs of electricity would be limited to a quota of three specified conse tailor-makeive days use in a week long period.General members of the public also had to deal with the consequences of the striking populations actions. Ministers solemnly urged the populace to share baths and brush their teeth in the dark. Television, which by now was one of the nations favourite pas measure, was brought to an untimely end at 10. 30pm each evening. Heath had promised tomorrow would be better than today, but he couldnt even keep the lights on. An image synonymous with the mid to posthumous 1970s was that of piles of rotting rubbish collecting on pavements end-to-end the country.Waste centres were closed and emergency refuse sites were opened in town streets subsequently stash awaymen joined in months of strikes. This only became a further irritant to the British electorate who were becoming increasingly restless waiting for the government to develop new strategies in order to tackle the ongoing disrepute between themselves and Britains workforce. The social and economic problems of Britain, however, could not be solved simply by government legislation. Unrest was caused by much more than Heaths perceived shortcomings as a Prime Minister. The problems of society ran far deeper than that.A work out of fallout from the 1960s had exceedred a sizeable part of the generation born at the end of the late 50s and early 60s were coming into maturity and most were without the set about of a job, economic stability and a sense of community. The younger generations within Britain began to feel alienated from their peers and it could also be argued that some may deport wished alienation upon themselves to escape from what was fast becoming a dire relieve for a society. The youth of the time were on the lookout for an escape from their lives of conservatism, compliancy and control.This accumulated feeling of resentment towards the authoritarian government manifested itself in the make of the Punk movement. From late 1976, kids started to appear on Britains streets in grind away which shocked the everyday British citizen. Ripped t-shirts with hastily drawn dress circle logos, asylum pins, bin liners and spiked hair defined a new image. Since the mid-sixties any diversity became a wagon to jump on any harmony, fashion or ideologies that were incorporated within the free love slam were no longer something that the uninspired youth of the 70s aspired to be part of.Mods, rockers and Hippies were all fast becoming sub-cultures that were deemed to be cliched by the nations youth. The 60s scene had been entirely commercialised by the nerve and had been turned into areas of profit by large reputation companies. These record labels however also were not putting any interest or assurance into anything new in the music industry, they valued to stick with what had brought them so much profit and it seemed zero point would be able to shift their if its not broken, fag outt fix it mentality.The establishment of the 1960s-70s did not want their youth creating counter-cultures, thus the average youth felt the need to rebel and so the DIY culture exploded. Although punk never reached the fore face in the 60s, the ill-affected ethos of the movement was beginning to show, mainly in American acts and specifically within the New York rock scene. Teenagers influenced by the RB styled groups of the decades earlier years began to form their own garage sets across the United States. Various trends and events would occur at the inception of the 1970s that would be helpful in advance the music ndustry and working towards the growth of punk rock, namely the deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison which seemed to have bro ught the usual music lovers into a state of uncertainty and would now mean music journalists would have to find new acts to write about. In Great Britain, quite a littles and artists such as David Bowie had started to refine their sounds in hope of reviving their careers. The result of this was the so called glam movement, which saw artists wish well T-Rex and Roxy Music beginning to blend pop strain structures with harder edged guitar based material.Back in the New York Scene, a trashy up-to-date orientated version of glam was starting to surface. A band eager to wear to the throne of this was the New York Dolls. The Dolls, and later, The Ramones would serve as somewhat of a prototype, from which later came the Sex Pistols and umteen other of Londons punk bands such as The Clash, The Jam and Siouxsie and The Banshees. By the mid 70s many music lovers had demoralize going tiresome towards the industrys run of the mill rock that the public were being force-fed. Members of the public began to see rock and roll acts as nothing more than that acts artificial, manufactured and uninspiring.The world of rock had hold out a tightly controlled, billsmaking machine in which record sales and supremacy held anteriority over any passion or true emotion. Essentially race yearned for a rock and roll that was innovative and fun again. On declination 1st 1976 an infamous event occurred that made sure that anyone who was not informed of the emergence of punk was now fully conscious of its presence. The Sex Pistols appeared on the Today show as a last minute replacement. The band was interviewed by Bill Grundy who naively on his part, proceeded to provoke the band to register something outrageous.For Mick Jones in particular, he took this as an open invitation and cause with a barrage of expletives, which not surprisingly, shocked the early evening audience. The pastime day the front page of various national newspapers contained pictures of the band on the sho w and a summary of their antics. The older generation of Britain, needless to say, were in outrage. This however was exactly the kind of reaction the band had dreamed of. It gained them tower inches and further made the public aware of their existence. Whilst in the public pip the band released arguably their most famous single, God Save The Queen.The vocal music came at a time when opposition to royalty was still seen as treasonous and frowned upon by the majority of British people. The record was quickly refused airtime by the BBC whose station, Radio 1, dominated the b waycasting of music at the time. Only DJs such as John Peel dared to play punk in term to other popular music hits of the era. Nevertheless, during the week of Queen Elizabeth IIs silver jubilee, the single officially reached number two in the UK charts although many large record stores knew that God Save The Queen was outselling Rod Stewarts I Dont Want To Talk About It by four to one.Unbelievably, the charts h ad been rigged so the music industry would not be red-faced by such a spectacle. However this did not deter the band from putting out further material. Pretty unoccupied and Holidays In The Sun were released to promote the Sex Pistols first and only full duration album, Never Mind The Bollocks Heres The Sex Pistols, which was released in November and subsequently went straight to the top of the album charts despite many stores refusing to pedigree it.After another piece, this time held in secret to avoid bans, The Pistols final lance took place at Ivanhoes in Huddersfield on Christmas Day 1977 in front they took off for the ill-fated U. S. tour in January 1978. They had originally been scheduled to start the tour in December 1977, beginning with a performance on Saturday Night Live, but due to the bands run-ins with the law, were unable to flap under ones skin their passports in time, so Stiff Records band, Elvis Costello and the Attractions, went on in their place. The eig ht show tour of the U. S. was a badly planned and dispiriting experience for all concerned.Sid Vicious, the bands bassist, was beaten by the bodyguards who were hired to protect him, Johnny icky was ill and the bands performances were destroyed by awful sound and hostile audiences. On the final date of January 14th at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, ill-smelling quit, famously asking Ever get the feeling youve been cheated? before pass off. Punk bands continued to play the usual haunts roughly London, but never again did anyone come close to causing the outrage or having the success which the Sex Pistols had experienced.I went about organising a question and answer session with my flummox Martin, who was in his teens during the emergence of punk and also followed the movement with great interest. with summarising the feedback I gained from the aforementioned interview I was given a great personal viewpoint on the society of the mid 1970s as well as his own personal experiences of the same period. Through the 1970s the news was all about strikes, economic downturns and lost opportunities.As a stripling I can recall the 3 day week when places of work closed to save energy, my protactinium would be at home on reduced pay (he worked for the GPO now BT) and the newspapers would print schedules showing when your area would have power cuts, which were a regular part of life. I remember my dad taking my sister and me for a drive in the car to Falkirk to get out of the house and keep warm rather than sit in the house with no power. TV stations shut down after the news at 10. 30 in the hope that people would unsloped go to bed and save electricity.A mate of mine bought packets of candles from the market in Glasgow and made a decent addition to his pocket specie by selling them round the neighbourhood where he lived. Also the entitlement to dole money for school leavers had been confirmationped which meant that you couldnt sign on and get money str aight away, you had to wait for a number of weeks before youd get a Giro. Unemployment was making the headlines in the papers and for the first time in years people were leaving school believing that they wouldnt get a job, or at least wouldnt get one that was worth having as the factories and shipyards which traditionally paid well were closing.I started to become aware, mainly through the pages of the NME, a number of bands from London who were playing music inspired by early Iggy Pop and The Stooges as well as The Ramones. The latter had made front page headlines in The Glasgow Evening Times, which had got itself in a state of moral outrage over the song Sniffin gum tree arguing that the number of kids dying from glue sniffing could be increased due to the song. Bearing in mind how few copies it sold, it was nonsense.John Peel once said of the punk era You dont know youre bored, until you stop being bored. I was 17 in 1976 and probably the only band I was currently into was Dr Feelgood. They were a band playing Chuck pluck influenced songs, wearing bad suits The prevailing music of the time was bland, inconsequential, middle of the road rubbish by Rod Stewart, The Eagles and Queen. I still remember vividly the moment I first actually heard the Sex Pistols in November 1976.My friend Davie had borrowed a copy of Anarchy in the UK from his friend in school and we played it in my bedroom. I can remember us both laughing out loud at how different it was and how winded away we were by it. We must have played it 10 times in a row. Looking back, I think we felt like we were part of a privileged few who had heard the song as it was subsequently banned by all radio stations at the time, this is hard to imagine now. The 3rd single released by the Pistols, Pretty Vacant, could only be played on Radio 1 after 10pm.If anything, it only reinforced the Pistols credentials as the band you most wanted to be associated with. We started to see and hear of people dressed as punks round the city, though what constituted the punk look was very difficult to describe. It could be anything from old school jumpers ripped and worn inside out, t-shirts torn or cut and held together with safety pins with band names scrawled on in ballpoint or marker pen or even t-shirts made from bin liners.For girls the look was heavily based on Jordan (Pamela Hook) and Siouxsie Sioux short skirts, fishnets, and heavy pith make-up. . Glasgow District Council decided to withdraw licences of any venue which had booked punk acts, effectively banning punk in the city. Occasionally youd hear of a secret gig being played somewhere in Glasgow and you had to meet up to be told where it was. By the Summer of 1977 Id left school and got a job in an independent record shop and remember the clamour when the first Pistols album came out.People were waiting around in the shop for it to be delivered. Every box that arrived, wed be asked if that was the album. First one out of the box went onto the sound system at maximum volume and we couldnt keep up with people shoving to the front of the queue. Eventually the council lifted the ban and loads of bands came to Glasgow, many playing picayune gigs and doing signing sessions in the shop where I worked, including The Clash who were considered to be the most overtly political band of the era.