Punk.
They called our music “Punk.” There are certain stylistic traits that are associated with that appellation: loud, crude, raw, angry. With all the movement’s rejection of the values of the giant media purveyors that thrive by cynically exploiting people’s vanity and sentimentality, maybe the thing that separates Punk from previous anti-establishment youth movements is that Punks were a little cynical themselves from the very beginning, or at least wary of understanding even their own self-serving impulses. What they valued most was honesty, but they recognized the complexity of that. The Punk scream was one of frustration as much as it was anger. This is why the real, pure thing tends to burn out and shut down: It doesn’t survive in captivity, which is also why you won’t find it in these five hundred words. You’ve got to do it yourself, you stupid monkey.
—-Conclusion of Richard Hell’s contribution to The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene 1974-1984
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