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Original poster

Where did it all go wrong

35 replies

Ryoko · 02/06/2012 16:33

Punk Britannia on BBC3 (4?) the other night about the history of punk was pointing out valid points about the history of the movement, kids being told they will never amount to anything, falling out of schools and being told to get jobs in the local factories or rot.

It's all so familiar, mammoth unemployment, people being told they will never get anywhere in life, the belittling of the poor and the sense of no hope, yet we have no outlet today, what went wrong?.

We have no "protest" music anymore it's all been taken over and softened by the music company big wigs, no shows on TV what happened to things like The Mark Thomas Comedy Product, Brass Eye, Bremner, Bird and Fortune etc, A little bit of politics is no longer part of mainsteam TV.

Where is the outlet for our disdain other then rioting and matching down the streets?, the more I think about it the more I see a dumbing down of expressive medias and hiding of things the only place to find real critics of life today and real life comedy/satire rather then OTT stereotypes to help enforce the statues qua of divided Britain is in the Internet, and by it's nature will never be anything more then a very small sideshow enjoyed by a few and quickly forgotten.

OP posts:
MayaAngelCool · 03/06/2012 00:20

We have hundreds of TV channels today. In the 70s there were only 3. The audience size has increased, but not enough to go round all the channels comfortably. So it's a ratings battle.

claig · 03/06/2012 00:19

A Sid himself sang

'People said we couldn't play
The called us foul-mothed yobs
But the only notes that really count
Are the ones that come in wads

They all drowned when the air turned blue
'Cos we didn't give a toss
Filthy lucre, ain't nothing new
But we all get cash from the chaos

The time is right to do it now
The greatest rock'n'roll swindle
The time is right to do it now

E.M.I. said you're out of hand
And they gave us the boot
But they couldn't sack us, just like that
Without giving us the loot

Thank you kindly A & M
They said we were out of bounds
But that ain't bad for two weeks work
And 75,000 pounds

The time is right to do it now
The greatest rock'n'roll swindle
The time is right to do it now'

claig · 03/06/2012 00:15

I watched Punk Britannia. But they are lying to us in pretending that punk was a protest. Punk was manufactured and was a fashion and fad which McClaren and svengalis made money out of. It was music and fashion, but it was the hippies, whom the punks despised, who were a real protest movement.

We saw the pictures of the left wing students protesting in the sixties against Vietnam etc. Punk was nothing like that. Punk was a narcissistic, nihilistic youth fashion movement which the record companies made money out of. It didn't last, it burned out like a candle blowing in the wind. Mini is right about Dylan. He lasted because his protest was real and not manufactured.

I like the Sex Pistols, but I don't fall for the lies that it was protest.

'I tell you it was all a frame
They only did it 'cos of fame
Who?

E.M.I. E.M.I. E.M.I.'

claig · 03/06/2012 00:00

Yes, you make some good points. Often it is students and young people who challenge the status quo, but they have been given huge fees to pay, so they are no longer in a position to think and challenge the status quo. In fact, they have been tricked into being green etc., which is exactly what the system wants.

breadandbutterfly · 02/06/2012 23:47

Sorry - I can spell and write coherent sentences in real life - clearly all those 'hapy' drugs have done it for me. Grin

breadandbutterfly · 02/06/2012 23:45

Bit simplistic. New Labour were just taking on Maggie's project. Which i suppose would be when the rot started...

I'd tend to blame, among other things, use of lots of hapy drugs - ie ecstacy etc is the opium of the people to paraphrase slightly (and scarily like Brave New World); plus rising house prices and impossibility of getting a council house meaning that for most ordinary people, having a secure roof over one's head and a reasonably secure job (back in the days of jobs for life) means most people are too busy panicking about getting by to have time to step off the treadmill for long enough to coherntly protest. I know i am. Factor in people trying to pay off or at least keep head above water re debts - credit cards, etc - that were thrown at them willy nilly till 2007, and you can ensure that the hard-pressed debt slaves will not be able to rise up or protest.

Chuck in some heavy-handed police surveillance under the excuse of 'counter terrorism' (my arse) and you can be sure only the very brave or unemployed (and therefore easily discounted) minority will protest.

claig · 02/06/2012 23:27

'Where did it all go wrong?'

A lot of people have asked that question, and the answer seems to be 'when New Labour was elected'.

MiniTheMinx · 02/06/2012 19:43

There has been a general dumbing down across the media and music in particular. I listen to Dylan, The Dead Kenedys as do my kids. I am desperate for them to take this forwards with them and actually appreciate music and art for the messages they convey. We don't have a television and we never listen to music in the charts, it's mostly inane crap. I despair of teenagers now being politically motivated and engaged, it would seem that they prefer a life of enforced arrested development and enforced infantalism, they grow up very quickly sucking up all that is wrong in the mainstream media and yet remain socially and politically stunted, unable to organise themselves, unable to fully mature into adults. Some seem totally unaware of life outside of their own heads and the Xfactor.

Original poster
Ryoko · 02/06/2012 18:52

You say that but I think it's harder back in the day someone had to think you where good to produce a record to send into a radio station now days only you have to think you are good.

And I still think kids are told they will get no where, the schools may tell them you can be what ever you want to be but society says no.

Either way there is no outlets now no solos to take in music or TV that speaks to you on your level.

OP posts:
JosephineCD · 02/06/2012 18:08

It's easier to produce and release music today than it was in the 1970s.

I don't think kids today are told they won't get anywhere in life. They are told they can do anything they want, and then they leave school and realise they can't because they have to work hard for it and don't know how.