Hardcore has spawned the straight edge movements, whose adherents refrain from using alcohol, tobacco, and other recreational drugs, and its associated submovements, hardline and youth crew. Hardcore was heavily involved with the rise of the independent record labels in the 1980s, and with the DIY ethics in underground music scenes. It has influenced a number of music genres which have experienced mainstream success, such as alternative rock, grunge, alternative metal, metalcore, thrash metal, post-hardcore, and hip-hop.
Hardcore sprouted underground scenes across the United States in the early 1980s particularly in Washington, D.C., California, New York, New Jersey, and Boston—as well as in Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom.
While traditional hardcore has never experienced mainstream commercial success, some of its early pioneers have garnered appreciation over time. Black Flag's album Damaged was included in Rolling Stone's list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003,[10] and the Dead Kennedys have seen one of their albums reach gold status over a period of 25 years.[11] Although the music started in English-speaking western countries, scenes have also existed in Brazil, Japan, Europe and The Middle East.[12]
Musical characteristics
In the vein of earlier punk rock, most hardcore punk bands have followed the traditional singer/guitar/bass/drum format. The songwriting has more emphasis on rhythm rather than melody. Critic Steven Blush writes "The Sex Pistols were still rock'n'roll...like the craziest version of Chuck Berry. Hardcore was a radical departure from that. It wasn't verse-chorus rock. It dispelled any notion of what songwriting is supposed to be. It's its own form."[13] According to Allmusic.com, the overall blueprint for hardcore was playing louder, harder and faster.[14] Hardcore vocalists often shout,[14]scream or chant along with the music. Hardcore vocal lines are often based on minor scales.[15] Hardcore songs may include shouted background vocals from the other band members.Guitar parts in hardcore can be complex, technically versatile and rhythmically challenging.[16] Guitar melody lines usually use the same minor scales used by vocalists (although some solos use pentatonic scales)[17] Some hardcore punk guitarists play solos, octave leads and grooves, as well as tapping into the various feedback and harmonic noises available to them. The guitar sound is almost always distorted and amplified, creating what has been called a "buzzsaw" sound.[18] Hardcore bassists use varied rhythms in their basslines, ranging from longer held notes (whole notes and half notes) to quarter notes, to rapid eighth note or sixteenth note runs. To play rapid bass lines that would be hard to play with the fingers, some bassists use a pick.[16] Some bassists such as Mike Watt from the Minuteman emphasize a very technical style of bass playing. Some hardcore punk drummers play fast D beat one moment and then drop tempo into elaborate musical breakdowns the next. Drummers typically play eighth notes on the cymbals, because at the tempos used in hardcore it would be difficult to play a smaller subdivision of the beat.[16]
Politics
Many early hardcore punk bands took far left wing political or anarchist stances and were vocal against Ronald Reagan, who was the Republican United States president from 1981 to 1989, and/or Margaret Thatcher, who was the Conservative British prime minister from 1979 to 1990. Reagan's policies, including Reaganomics and social conservatism, were common subjects for these bands.[19][20] Jimmy Gestapo of Murphy's Law, however, endorsed Reagan and called Jimmy Carter a "pussy" in a 1986 New York Magazine cover story.[21] Shortly after Reagan's death in 2004, the Maximumrocknroll radio show aired an episode composed of anti-Reagan songs from hardcore punk bands including Dead Kennedys, Government Issue, DRI, Youth Brigade, Crucifucks, Wasted Youth, Dayglo Abortions, Reagan Youth, T.S.O.L. and The Fartz.[22]During the 2001–2009 United States presidency of George W. Bush, a number of hardcore bands expressed anti-Bush stances. During the 2004 United States presidential election, artists and bands including Brian Baker, Jello Biafra, Mike Watt, Bad Religion, Rise Against,[23] Circle Jerks, Ensign, Sick of It All, The Unseen, Western Addiction and Youth Brigade were involved with the anti-Bush political activist group Punkvoter.[24] A minority of hardcore musicians were more right wing, such as the band Antiseen, whose guitarist Joe Young ran for office as a North Carolina Libertarian.[25] Former Misfits singer Michale Graves appeared on an episode of The Daily Show, voicing support for George W. Bush.[26]
Hardcore dancing
Further information: Moshing
The UK punk band Hacksaw came out against moshing after an incident at a 2006 gig caused several fans to suffer serious injuries. This resulted in a song on their 2007 album, Vote Hacksaw, titled "Amateurs in the Pit", wherein they condemn some moshers as "brain dead morons who wanna stamp on kiddies".[citation needed]
Clothing style
Many hardcore punk fans adopted a dressed-down style of T-shirts, jeans, combat boots or sneakers and crewcut-style haircuts. Women in the hardcore scene typically wore army pants, band t-shirts, and hooded sweatshirts.[30] The style of the 1980s hardcore scene contrasted with the more provocative fashion styles of late 1970s punk rockers (elaborate hairdos, torn clothes, patches, safety pins, studs, spikes, etc.). A scholarly source states that "hardcore kids do not look like punks", since hardcore scene members wore basic clothing and short haircuts, in contrast to the "embellished leather jackets and pants" worn in the punk scene.[31] Another scholarly source, however, claims that the standard hardcore punk clothing and styles included torn jeans, leather jackets, spiked armbands and dog collars and mohawk hairstyles and DIY ornamentation of clothes with studs, painted band names, political statements, and patches.[32] Another scholarly source describes the look that was common in the San Francisco hardcore scene as consisting of biker-style leather jackets, chains, studded wristbands, pierced noses and multiple piercings, painted or tattooed statements (e.g. an anarchy symbol) and hairstyles ranging from military-style haircuts dyed black or blonde, mohawks, and shaved heads.[33]
History
Late 1970s-early 1980s
United States
Los Angeles
Hardcore historian Steven Blush states that for West coasters, the first hardcore record was the 1978 single "Out of Vogue" by the Santa Ana band Middle Class.[36] They pioneered a shouted, fast version of punk rock which would shape the hardcore sound that would soon emerge. In terms of impact upon the hardcore scene, Black Flag has been deemed the most influential group. Michael Azerrad, author of Our Band Could Be Your Life, calls Black Flag the "godfathers" of hardcore punk.[37] Blush states that Black Flag defined American hardcore in the same way that the Sex Pistols defined punk.[6] Formed in Hermosa Beach, California by guitarist and lyricist Greg Ginn, they played their first show in December 1977. Originally called Panic, they changed their name to Black Flag in 1978.[38] Black Flag's sound mixed the raw simplicity of the Ramones with atonal guitar solos and frequent tempo shifts.
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Whilst popular traditional punk bands such as the Ramones, The Clash, and Sex Pistols were signed to major record labels, the hardcore punk bands were generally not. Black Flag, however, was briefly signed to MCA subsidiary Unicorn Records, but were dropped because an executive considered their music to be "anti-parent".[41] Instead of trying to be courted by the major labels, hardcore bands started their own independent record labels and distributed their records themselves. Ginn started SST Records, which released Black Flag's debut EP Nervous Breakdown in 1978. SST went on to release a number of albums by other hardcore artists, and was described by Azerrad as "easily the most influential and popular underground indie of the Eighties."[37] SST was followed by a number of other successful artist-run labels — including BYO Records (started by Shawn and Mark Stern of Youth Brigade), Epitaph Records (started by Brett Gurewitz of Bad Religion), New Alliance Records (started by the Minutemen's D. Boon) — as well as fan-run labels like Frontier Records and Slash Records.
Bands also funded and organized their own tours. Black Flag's tours in 1980 and 1981 brought them in contact with developing hardcore scenes in many parts of North America, and blazed trails that were followed by other touring bands.[42][43][44] Youth Brigade was one of the first hardcore punk bands to create a documentary of their tour, releasing Another State of Mind in 1984.[45] The Another State of Mind tour was funded by "Youth Movement '82", a concert organized by BYO at the Hollywood Palladium that — in addition to Youth Brigade — featured T.S.O.L., The Adolescents, Wasted Youth, Social Distortion and Blades. The concert was one of the largest punk shows ever held around that time, attended by more than 3,500 people.[46] Concerts in the early Los Angeles hardcore scene increasingly became sites of violent battles between police and concertgoers. Another source of violence in LA was tension created by what one writer calls the invasion of "antagonistic suburban poseurs" into hardcore venues.[47] Violence at hardcore concerts was portrayed in episodes of the popular television shows CHiPs and Quincy, M.E.[48]
San Francisco
Shortly after Black Flag debuted in Los Angeles, Dead Kennedys were formed in San Francisco. While the band's early releases were played in a style closer to traditional punk rock, In God We Trust, Inc. (1981) marked a shift into hardcore. Similar to Black Flag and Youth Brigade, Dead Kennedys released their albums on their own label Alternative Tentacles. While not as large as the scene in Los Angeles, the San Francisco Bay Area hardcore scene of the 1980s included a number of noteworthy bands, including Crucifix, Flipper, and Whipping Boy.Additionally, during this time, seminal Texas-based bands The Dicks, MDC, Verbal Abuse, and Dirty Rotten Imbeciles (D.R.I.) relocated to San Francisco. This scene was helped in particular by the San Francisco club Mabuhay Gardens, whose promoter, Dirk Dirksen, became known as "The Pope of Punk".[49] Another important local institution was Tim Yohannan's fanzine, Maximumrocknroll, as well as his show on Berkeley, California public radio station KPFA Maximum RocknRoll Radio Show, which played the younger Northern California bands. One of those bands was Tales of Terror from Sacramento. Many, including Mark Arm, cite Tales of Terror as a key inspiration for the then-burgeoning grunge scene.[50]
Washington, D.C.
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Boston
Seminal Boston hardcore bands included Jerry's Kids, Gang Green, The F.U.'s, SS Decontrol, Negative FX, The Freeze and Siege. A faction of the scene was influenced by D.C.'s straight edge scene. Members of bands such as DYS, Negative FX, and SS Decontrol formed the Boston Crew, a militant straight edge group that frequently assaulted punks who drank or used drugs. The controversy surrounding this crew and their antics sparked a debate about violence within the hardcore scene. In the late 1980s, Elgin James became involved in the militant faction of the Boston straight edge scene, and he later helped found the organization Friends Stand United, which would eventually be classified as a street gang.[55] In 1982, Modern Method Records released This Is Boston, Not L.A., a seminal compilation album of the Boston hardcore scene. The compilation included songs by The Proletariat, The Freeze, The F.U.'s, Jerry's Kids and Gang Green. Curtis Casella's Taang! Records was also pivotal in releasing material by bands from this era.New York
Main article: New York hardcore
Early radio support in New York's surrounding Tri state area came from Pat Duncan, who had hosted live punk and hardcore bands weekly on WFMU since 1979.[61] Bridgeport, Connecticut's WPKN had a radio show featuring hardcore called Capital Radio, hosted by Brad Morrison, beginning in February 1979 and continuing weekly until late 1983. In New York City, Tim Sommer hosted Noise The Show on WNYU.[62] In 1982, Bob Sallese produced The Big Apple Rotten To The Core compilation on S.I.N. Records, featuring The Mob, Ism and four other bands from the early A7 era. The album gained notoriety on the commercial radio station WLIR, and nationally on college radio. The LP was followed by The Big Apple Rotten To The Core, Vol. 2 in 1987 on Raw Power Records.
Other North American regions
United Kingdom
Another UK band, The Varukers, were one of the original D-beat bands,[69] and Sweden in particular produced a number of D-beat bands during this time period including Anti-Cimex, Disfear, and Totalitär. Scottish band The Exploited were also influential, with the term "UK 82" being taken from one of their songs. They contrasted with early American hardcore bands by placing an emphasis on appearance with frontman Walter "Wattie" Buchan's giant red mohawk, and the bands continuance of wearing swastikas à la Sid Vicious. Because of this they were labeled by others in the scene as "cartoon punks".[70] Other UK hardcore bands from this period included Broken Bones, Chaos UK, Charged GBH, Dogsflesh, Disorder, English Dogs, and grindcore innovators Napalm Death.
 Napalm Death live in Germany, 1987 on YouTube, authorized by Earache Records. |
Mid-1980s
Late 1980s
By the mid to late 1980s, many of the most prominent early hardcore punk bands had broken up. Bad Religion made a progressive rock album with Into the Unknown,[71] the Beastie Boys gained fame by playing hip hop, and Bad Brains incorporated more reggae into their music, such as in their 1989 album Quickness.[72] Social Distortion went on hiatus after its first album was released, due to Mike Ness's drug problems, and returned with a sound based more on country music, which was referred to as cowpunk.[73] In WA state, many hardcore punk/metal cross over bands had emerged like Stric-9, The Brain Dead, and Dumt.Youth crew
While hardcore punk was declining in some American cities, New York City was becoming an even bigger epicenter for hardcore. Influenced by original straight edge bands 7 Seconds, Minor Threat, Bl'ast, and Uniform Choice, bands such as Youth of Today spearheaded the youth crew movement. An extension to the original pioneers groundwork of lyrically expressing views against drugs, alcohol and promiscuous sex, this newer belief system also focused on topics such as vegetarianism or veganism.[74] In the late 1980s, other bands associated with youth crew included Bold, Gorilla Biscuits, Side by Side and beyond the New York area to Southern California bands such as Chain of Strength and Inside Out.1990s
At the beginning of the 1990s, bands such as Born Against, Rorschach, Burn and Drive Like Jehu took the 1980s styles of hardcore and pushed them into more contemporary sounds. Many of the bands from this era were strongly influenced by other genres, such as heavy metal, alternative, pop, and even rap. Hardcore subsequently became a broad umbrella term, as a variety of different subgenres arose, such as melodic hardcore (Avail, Lifetime, Kid Dynamite), emo (Ashes, Endpoint, Saves the Day), d-beat (Avskum, Aus Rotten, Skitsystem), powerviolence (Spazz, Dropdead, Charles Bronson), thrashcore (What Happens Next?, Voorhees, Vivisick), mathcore (The Dillinger Escape Plan, Botch, Converge), screamo (Heroin, Antioch Arrow, Portraits of Past, Swing Kids) and rapcore.
While the 1990s had many different sounds and styles emerging, the genre primarily branched into two directions; new school metallic hardcore (sometimes referred to as metalcore), which incorporated aspects of thrash metal and death metal for a heavier and more technical sound, and old school, reminiscent of classic styles of hardcore punk like youth crew. "New school" bands such as Strung Out, Earth Crisis, Snapcase, Strife, Hatebreed, 108, Integrity and Damnation A.D. dominated the scene in the early 1990s, but towards the end of the decade, a new-found interest in "old school" had developed, represented by bands like Battery, Ten Yard Fight, In My Eyes, Good Clean Fun, H2O and Ray Cappo's new band Better Than a Thousand.[75][76][77][78]
Many of the bands during this time wrote lyrics about straight edge, politics, civil rights, animal rights and spirituality. Ray Cappo's views led him to become a Hare Krishna and fellow members of the New York scene, John Joseph and Harley Flanagan of the Cro-Mags also converted, as would new bands embracing youth crew.[79] While most of the bands embraced the straight edge lifestyle, some prominent ones from this era did not, such as Biohazard, Madball and Sick of It All. As a result of the Internet, music festivals such as Hellfest, and the commercial success of Victory Records and Trustkill Records, various bands such as Refused went on to find success with a larger audience and eventually brought the term "hardcore" into the mainstream.[80][81]
2000s
United Kingdom band Gallows were signed to Warner Bros. Records for £1 million.[85] Their major label debut Grey Britain was described as being even more aggressive than their previous material, and the band was subsequently dropped from the label.[86]
Los Angeles band The Bronx briefly appeared on Island Def Jam Music Group for the release of their 2006 self-titled album, which was named one of the top 40 albums of the year by Spin magazine.[87] They appeared in the Darby Crash biopic What We Do Is Secret, playing members of Black Flag. In 2007, Toronto's Fucked Up appeared on MTV Live Canada, where they were introduced as "Effed Up".[88] During the performance of its song "Baiting the Public", the majority of the audience was moshing, which caused $2000 in damages to the set.[89]
