1980

Sep 24, 2024

Killer episode this week on the pod. Check it out here, here, or here and check the playlist here or here.

Here are our picks for the best songs of the year:

Let’s shoot it to Bedge for a 1980s primer:

It’s Zero Boys vs. Big Boys vs. Soft Boys. It’s DICKIES vs. DICKS vs. buzzCOCKS. It’s X vs. Gen X vs. X (Australia). It’s BLACK flag vs. RED cross vs. agent ORANGE. It’s Crass vs. The Clash.
Zack Oxnard is born and the world is never the same.
First gen style punk like The Damned, Ramones, Stiff Little Fingers, The Weirdos, The Gears, and The Professionals is still holding on for dear life while a second generation that we know as hardcore is replacing it (Discharge from England, Terveet Kadet from Finland, Rondos from the Netherlands, Circle Jerks from the South Bay, to name a handful), but evolution is never straight forward and there is a transitional half-generation between 1 and 2 that is having its heyday. If only there existed a number between 1 and 2 to represent these bands. I’m talking about Angry Samoans, The Cheifs, Dead Kennedys with the og drummer, Stimulators, Canadian Subhumans, Teen Idles, Toxic Reasons, and Adolescents.
Black Flag loses vocalist #2 Ron Reyes and gets vocalist #3 Dez Cadena. Oi! music is crystalizing into its own free-standing sub-genre across the pond with releases by Cockney Rejects and Sham 69. The Exploited puts out their first two singles.
Labels formed: Frontier, Dischord, Clay, New Alliance, and Mystic begins putting out punk records

Significant comps: Rodney On the ROQ, Oi! The Album

Bands who form: Minor Threat, Bad Religion, Circle One, Minutemen

Bands who break up: Germs, Sham 69, Zeros (Chula Vista)

Deaths: Darby Crash of the Germs, Malcolm Owen of the Ruts
- Ben Merlis AKA Ben Edge AKA Bedge

Sick ass year, eh? Shoutout to my mom for birthing me in January 1980.

I’m pretty burnt on writing so this week is going to be more of a clip show, plus it’s probably more interesting showing the year through the eyes of people who were there. Perusing a bunch of pre-MRR zines online actually ended up being more labor intensive than just elaborating on Ben’s nice chunk of knowledge, but fuck it…let’s go!

Dan chose “Bad Man” off the first Cockney Rejects LP and the 7” reviewed below. You know it, you love it…it’s an all timer, as is the idea of calling your debut record Greatest Hits. Imitation is…ya know.

He also took an excellent Stiff Little Fingers song.

3 our of 4 of us had a Discharge song on our list. This would be a good time to throw shade Ben’s way, but I listened to his section of the playlist and the Modernettes and The Professionals tracks on his list were stellar and I hadn’t heard them before. But still, it’s Discharge man. What a flawless catalog up through 1982, and to be honest I like all their output through 1984. Ignorance sucks in general and as a 1985 Discharge 7”.

Speaking of Ben’s final pick…

I took “Warhead” by the UK Subs, one of the greatest songs in the history of recorded music. Mr. B from Beantown didn’t like the record though.

No idea if Suburban News liked three of our picks or not, but Damage definitely did NOT like one of Dan’s picks…

But this dude did!

Critics had mixed feelings on his The Fall pick.

Ben took two songs off the 1st Rodney comp and could’ve taken a third but he opted for a different Black Flag song. 1980 continued that band’s streak of zero bad songs on record which would end in 1981 (Looking at you “Damaged I”).

Black Flag’s original singer Keith Morris came back hard with the debut Circle Jerks LP Group Sex. 3/4 of us took Circle Jerks songs. “Red Tape” is the blueprint for ‘80s Hardcore.

Circle Jerks show review from a show at Blackie’s. Slash Vol 3 Issue 3

Clevo took Dead Kennedys and X.

Dan and I both took Wipers songs (shoutout to the typo on the album name)…

Heading north into Canada. I took a song by The Subhumans. I originally discovered the song on Killed by Death #4 which is still one of my favorite comps ever.