The Truth About Punk: CBGB and the New York Scene

A big part of the late 70's punk mythos is the music venue CBGB, itself an ironic twist considering what the name means. It was founded by club owner Hilly Kristal in 1973 as a performance space and record shop for Country, Bluegrass and Blues, later adding the cryptic OMFUG (Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers) when a bunch of decidedly different styles of music started drawing larger crowds. The idea that CBGB was the quintessential punk club is a classic example of retroactive continuity. CBGB only became a punk club in the 80's after it acquired that reputation in the pop culture consciousness of people who had never actually been there.

The bands that really made CBGB a major center for music were largely not punk. Aside from The Ramones, Misfits, The Dead Boys and The Cramps, the lineup at the venue featured a wide variety of pioneering non-punk acts. Even those bands with a little punk in them, like The Voidoids, dabbled in a lot of different styles. Listening to Blank Generation, it's obvious that Richard Hell and company get bored with punk. Half the album is straight-up blues rock, the other half is rockabilly if it's anything.

Really, what made those early years of CBGB so interesting was its extensive collection of very talented reformers. Talking Heads, for instance, made white funk that didn't sound as clean and well-researched as David Bowie's and they mixed it with all the theatricality one would expect from a bunch of art students. In doing so they developed a lion's share of the sound that would become New Wave.

The band Television used punk as a sort of spice to make Progressive Rock decidedly less pretentious. Marquee Moon is far too competent and melodic to really stand next to the screaming, thrashing Sex Pistols or the actively offensive Dead Boys. At the same time, it makes Pink Floyd sound like Dad's idea of rock, abandoning any dedication to conventional singing or machine-assisted production.

And while we're on the topic of non-conventional vocals, let's talk about Patti Smith. She ended up being the last person to ever perform at CBGB, a nod to her role as one of the last greats from the 70's bills. She was no more a punk than any of the performers she would clearly influence, i.e. Ani DiFranco, Fiona Apple, and others. Patti Smith gets lumped in with the punks because she played in close proximity to them and because she would occasionally try to prove that she could rock hard in addition to her spoken word poetry. Still, arguably her most punk song was a cover of "My Generation" by The Who.

For all its punk glory, the real contribution of CBGB to the music world was its willingness to harbor an impressive collection of artists who would influence bands who had, at best, only a passing interest in punk. By the time the 1980's rolled around, punk rock transformed from a pioneering art into a niche market. In other words, some bands grew up and some didn't.