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One young punker, advocating the violent overthrow of parlia–
ment and the monarchy, believes that England "needs another
Hitler" to bomb the country and re-create the anarchical ambience
of the last world war.
Punk-rock groups have been banned from appearing many
places in Britain, their records going unplayed on top-forty sta–
tions. Nonetheless, the punk group Sex Pistofs' first album,
God
Save
the Queen
("She ain't no human being "), sold 1,800
copies the first day it was released.
Punk has already spread to the colonies. Los Angeles and
New York have a dozen or so groups each, and the
phenomenon is gaining momentum now due to a minor
barrage of media hype.
Retailers across the U.S. are gearing up for a con–
sumer run on punk items
like ripped and pínned
T-shírts , and one New
York store features $1 00
gold safety pins.
Perhaps musícally and
politically conservativa
folks thought thíngs were
getting better when hard
metal rock mellowed into
disco music. But appar–
ently a vacuum existed –
and punk, wíth its under–
fying philosophy of anar–
chy and nihil ism, filled
that empty space in the
hearts of youth looking for
a new way to rebel.
Perhaps American
punkers are only following another commercialized
British fad. But if this " new wave" of music does
indicate a significan! social undercurrent, it could be
echoing the mindset of a generation who feel they
have no frontiers, goals or challenges to stir them to
productive action.
o
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