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New Wave / Punk forebears...

#441
A criminally overlooked band from back in the day, they were obviously coming off of
the Joy Division/Gang Of 4/Wire axis, but were ahead of Sisters Of Mercy---



classic UK style bass grind

If you are a 4AD aficionado, you should know about these guys, if not, here's what I would call post-punk prog, absolutely brilliant, their recorded output is unfortunately small---


 
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#447
corndog said:
Ahhh....was about to mention [...most of the bands I was going to mention, have been mentioned]

Many of these musicians where influenced by disco, 60's/70's rock and punk which resulted in some pretty diverse music. Was a great era for new music.

Great thread!
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& a lot of bass in R&B at the time, as well as the bass in Hip Hop, thanks to the DJs. Found out about a lot of music during conversations at record stores (especially Tower Records), & lines for concerts, parties & clubs. Very creative period. I just started playing the bass, but I'm trying to catch up.

I subscribed at Mission of Burma.
 
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#448
Muddslide said:
I am right with you re: Lewis / Newman. And what a friggin' band, Wire. I have often said I cannot think of another band that evolved and expanded their sound SO quickly. The change from the more upbeat rigid punk of Pink Flag to the much more poppy Chairs Missing to the almost prog/goth of 154. Three albums in a row--and they could be passed off as entirely different bands!
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They faked me out. After I bought Pink Flag, I was convinced there was 2 bands called Wire on either side of the Atlantic - years later I figured it out thanks to the Internet. I encourage people to give their first 3 albums a listen because they changed their sound for each one. Not many singles hits, but the songs flow into each other so I would listen to the albums before you go to the best of album. No guarantees you'll love them, but quite a feat. They've put out a lot more music over the years which I haven't heard yet, but on my To Listen list.

EDIT: maybe even the first 4 albums, my memory is blurry - the albums up to 1987 are all different; the album with the horse's head on the cover (released in '88?) kinda settles down.
 
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#449
Spirit of Ox said:
The guy from Bow Wow Wow did some cool bass work. He played it like a rhythm guitar a lot of the time. Most notably on their one hit, I want Candy. They have much better songs than that and were pretty underrated.
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& two drummers helped with their sound. I think Malcolm McLaren took the Ants from Adam & the Ants, added a lead singer & came up with Bow Wow Wow.

I haven't seen The Modern Lovers ' Roadrunner mentioned yet - despite the release date I'd call it post-punk. Consider them ahead of their time.
 
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#452
DrummerwStrings said:
& two drummers helped with their sound. I think Malcolm McLaren took the Ants from Adam & the Ants, added a lead singer & came up with Bow Wow Wow.

I haven't seen The Modern Lovers ' Roadrunner mentioned yet - despite the release date I'd call it post-punk. Consider them ahead of their time.
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Modern Lovers are awesome.
Here is something that I'm sure has been mentioned by now. But anyhow it's good enough to post.
 
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#457
Halabja said:
I see your Einsturzende Neubauten, and present to you This Heat!



I actually discovered post-punk in a backwards fashion. It was through industrial music that I had listened to in my teen years that I finally in my adult years discovered where everything I was listening to came from. So I took the journey backwards Industrial --> Post-Punk --> Krautrock. *don't listen to much Industrial these days however*

I've also read many books on both Krautrock and Post-Punk.
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... and Krautrock & Industrial music were partly a cross-Atlantic conversation with early synthesizer users, Disco, Hip-Hop & club music (Kraftwerk's "Numbers" & The Art of Noise's "Beatbox" deserve special mention, and the Hip-Hop call out 'How low can you go? We don't care' from KMFDM's "Light"). You can directly trace the Chicago House music (eg, New Yorker transplant Frankie Knuckles) & early Industrial (eg, The Sisters of Mercy's "Dominion/Mother Russia") exchange. A big reason to resist sleep & go out in those Days was to hear new music & new beats.
 
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#459
mpm32 said:
Ok, I can't believe I missed this thread, like the OP, I started playing bass learning off of AC/DC, Iron Maiden, Rush, Yes, etc. Then I bought U2's War and went down the Punk/New Wave/Industrial rabbit hole - it was all over for metal.

This is such a great thread and I like/love almost all the bands mentioned. I went through all 14 pages and one band I don't think that has been mentioned is The Housemartins. Ted Key was their original bassist replaced by Norman Cook aka (Fatboy Slim).

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+1 : Both of their albums are worth a listen. I was trying to limit myself to bass in 80's post-punk - now I'll consider anything punkish.

I haven't seen the Violent Femmes mentioned yet - their self-titled album is a classic. For years I thought they used an upright bass.

PS - Big Up to the ppl buying the music, give these artists their royalties.

EDIT: I'm catching up with the posts, & I noticed many of my mentions were already mentioned. Hope you bear with me.

(Finally caught up, noticed even my mention pun was already used by Corndog. Thanks everyone for making my To Listen list MUCH longer).
 
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#460
Black Bart said:
I still have one of the first pressings of Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! that I received as a b-day present as a wee lad :D I think Mongoloid was one of the first songs that made me really "notice" the bass.
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I still remember the 1st time I heard this song, & the band: a deserved shoutout to a tween's babysitter, Saturday Night Live. Ditto The B-52s, which my Dad got a big kick out of the name - We both liked the set. Not many tv shows were (are) breaking artists nationally, maybe Soul Train.
 

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