Monday, December 20, 2021

The 1980 Listening Post - The Wall - Personal Troubles and Public Issues

 

The Wall - Personal Troubles and Public Issues


1980 Housekeeping

The Wall

Personal Troubles and Public Issues

Genre: Punk

3.25 out of 5


Highlights:

Delay 



When you listen to 700 “rock” records from one year you forget that certain genres exist. That’s how I felt when this thing fired up. That punk was still a thing. 

But that’s on me. I used to love punk. But I think I loved the idea of punk. And so do these guys. Because they are more melodic than aggressive. And the echo on the vocals suggest a late 60s garage aesthetic. Punk always had more in common with the past than with the immediate or the future. 

The Ramones, et al, were really nothing more than a return to a sound from 20 years before. Amped up for the speed of youth. And even they moved their sound to the late 60s psycho garage. 

Punk wasn’t about the future. It was designed to not stick around. Movements never do.

They move. 

But The Wall gives the impression that had they come around at a different time they might have discovered that secret sauce that Billie Joe Armstrong and Jaret Reddick did. 

But when they try to slow it down and examine life (“Unanswered Prayers”, “Cancer”) they fall down. 





https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGPQ1DmGXo4

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