Confessions of a Punk-Rock Traditionalist
There are two types of people who may find this article interesting. If you’re involved in a 12-step program of any kind and maintain your sobriety, but secretly delight in the confessions of relapse or of wild times before Antabuse, you might enjoy what follows as your daily does of Schadenfreude. If you’re a traditionalist chagrined over the infiltration of the conservative movement by those insufficiently orthodox and of poor pedigree, it will be useful knowing that the number of misfit ex-nihilist, speed metal, and punk rock guys in your camp are legion.
Our presence makes a kind of sense. When as a member of the Goth-club underground, my identity was so vitally connected with being on the outside of damned near everything, it was only a matter of time before I gravitated towards traditionalism—a type of conservatism just about as incomprehensible to the mainstream of society as is Swedish black metal to a fan of U2.
I grew up a middle-class white kid from a stable military family. But from the age of 16 to 28, I was the frontman in a string of wildly socially unacceptable bands. We performed what can best be described as “confrontational performance art,” and we did it with a fanaticism that struck the parents as being, well, downright unhealthy.
I’ll recount an episode from the end of an era. My final live performance was with the last remaining person not too frightened or embarrassed to play with me at that point. The show just before scandalized the remaining band members, and they fled. It seems the audience was picking up on the insults hurled its way, and some kind of reprisal began to seem likely.
I had come to detest performing—I was sick of it, and all the yelling would make me hungry, and I’d fixate on burritos. Far worse, I loathed the people we played for.I hated the burn-out posers, metal heads, punks, ska kids, Goths, all of ‘em.
So, knowing this, my bass player heard about a warehouse that was converted by the city of Roanoke, Virginia, into a “new art” gallery. He contacted them, claiming to be an accomplished painter from D.C. who would create a piece of art just for their opening, donate it to the gallery, and than perform with his band for free. They accepted of course. He laughed. I was not amused.
Hating “art fags” even more than spoiled suburban kids thinking they’re Rastafarians, we agreed to make this unbearably uncomfortable for everyone there—indeed, to punish the city of Roanoke for encouraging such nonsense.
As mentioned, we were a two-man band at this point, like Milli Vanilli from Hell. I pre-recorded sequenced drums and other backing parts, over which we played our instruments and sang. Highlights of this five-song set were speed-metal versions of “Sweet Home Alabama” and The Cure’s over the top gay anthem “Fascination Street.” I was pretty sure we’d be kicked out well before reaching the end of the set.
So, we showed up at the warehouse/art gallery and were greeted by a mix of black-tie clad city people, mongrel art kids and punk rockers, probably a few tourists who’d come just to see this heavily promoted event, and the local finger painters proudly standing before their work.
My bandmate was a big, beer-heavy rugby player who liked to be called “Hawg.” We thought it would be funny, and disgusting, if he squeezed himself into a pair of tight black-leather Jim Morrison style pants and wear no shirt. I found a shiny silver shirt that made me look like I was wrapped in tin foil. The event people were visibly nervous when we walked in.
The milling around and hors d’oeuvres ended as the organizers called attention to the center of the main room. My bass player introduced himself as “a TRUE son of the Confederacy!” and then unveiled his gift to the gallery, which was a wooden box, opening up to the audience, about 18 inches wide and 5 inches deep. The inside was painted like a bright blue sky with puffy white clouds, and in front were prison bars—except these prison bars were completely wrapped in pornography. It was horrible beyond belief—not run-of-the-mill Playboy stuff but “you’re going to jail for that” nastiness. I immediately started the sequenced backing tracks, and we launch into the very loud, very aggressive micro set. I introduced each song by yelling short things like,
“You’re all losers! God hates you!”
“Why are you standing there? Go home!”
“You’re living in the South. Don’t bite the hand that feeds, support your tobacco industry!” while tossing out Virginia-grown Chesterfield unfiltered cigarettes.
And my favorite from the evening, “What the FUCK are you LOOKING AT!!”
Imagine Motorhead performing at a Bar Mitzvah. It was vile. But what made it worse was that throughout all this unforgivable behavior, too many of the people there actually liked it—confirming that my instinct to ridicule them was not entirely off base. They should have run us out of town with pitchforks, but instead, at what was a very dark time for me, their acceptance of abuse and contempt affirmed my assessment of my fellow men as despicable, foul, self-loathing creatures.
The scene form Sid and Nancy in which Sid Vicious sings a parody of Sinatra’s “My Way” and then ends the farce by shooting the fawning people in the audience perfectly captures how we felt.
And just where does one go from there?
I moved away from Roanoke a month after this. Eighteen months later, I returned to the Church. Ten years later, I’m reading Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddhin, Robert Nisbet, Romano Guardini and homeschooling four kids in a home without a television. After watching Sarah Palin’s interviews with Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric (on YouTube, of course), I’ve become a but worried. But I can’t get over the fact that I find her so nice. If it comes out that she, too, was in a confrontational performance art band, or owns a copy of Rekapitulacija, there are lots of us out here who would bob our heads, understanding why and how she turned out as she did. We’d be obliged to give her our support.
Comments
Whoa, an interesting read. I can’t wait for the commentaries to follow…
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Taki sure can find some interesting, erudite fellows. Welcome, sir. Do you still listen to Husker Du?
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My question is: does the author still make music, and what kind?
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LOL, Rekapitulacija.
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I love this guy, someone for Zmirick to pal around with. Add Voegelin,Oakshott, Balthasar, and Stein to your reading list.
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Laibach sure brings people to the Church, but I’m not so sure about evangelicals like Palin.
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I still think it is possible to be a punk rocker and maintain some self respect. I don’t see a problem walking around with my Brooks Brothers ties listening to the Misfits or Leftover Crack. I can still act like a sensible human being while maintaining my taste in music.
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If there was ever anything that was over rated it is “NICE”! So what was the name of your necessarily horrible band? I’m so sure a real art gallery would accept a showing sight unseen over the telephone too! Being obnoxious is/was the lowest common denominator in punk rock, it’s just too easy. If the Angry Samoans were just obnoxious, no one would remember them. They were obnoxious, but they were also funny, clever, and had some catchy tunes to boot. I dig some Rancid Vat and Antiseen myself, as well as the Pope and Catholicism, but we don’t need a “nice” vice president that is in lockstep with the march of rampant militarism. I’ll look toward the antiwar traditions of my church, Antiwar.com, LewRockwell.com, The American Conservative and Flipper too! (Lyrics from “Sacrifice"---- Can you hear the war cry? It’s time to enlist. The people speak as one, it’s the cattle call. Those too afraid to live, demand a sacrifice. They demand a sacrifice. ---Can’t you smell their stinking breath? Listen to them. Wheezing and gasping and, chanting their slogans. It’s the gravediggers song. Demanding a sacrifice. They demand a sacrifice. ----Can’t you smell the fresh blood, steaming into the soil? As our patriots, fathers and mothers and lovers, admire the military style, praising God and State. Crying tears of pride, for the sons and lovers, for all the fools slaughtered, for the maimed the dying, and the dead. So the nation will live. So the people will remain as cattle. They demand a sacrifice. They demand a sacrifice. They want your life!) Not all traditions are good or equal. Same with punk rock. Pax, PhilthyRex
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Let me get this straight. You play gay anthems and shout obscenities, yet you think you’re a conservative. Say what?
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That was during his rebellious period.
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For my money you can’t beat the Clash for some good anit-war anti-establishment lyrics. The way I see it the establishment has become twisted and anti-social that to be a traditionalist one has to be anti-establishment.
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To briefly address the feedback. The underground music scene in the late 80’s early 90’s was anti-establishment to the core equally distrusting both the left and the right. It was more reflective however than outsiders might imagine. There were of course leftists and people like Jello Biafra, but the number of people in bands in the DC punk/metal scene who use to attend CPAC or who were college Republicans might surprise you. During Bush I, we all left. Beyond all this was the fringe of the fringe, and THAT’S where we were, the Johnny Lydon school of sneer (Lydon a.k.a. Johnny Rotten has something interesting things to say about real patriotism and liberty). Everything was beneath contempt. Everything lacked integrity. To be affiliated with politics, pop culture, Progress, the suburbs, etc…was the mark of the crass and stupid. For the record, aside from an occasional costume befitting the occasion, it was chinos and penny loafers.
As unbelievable as it may seem to you, I assure you this performance happened. This was tame. The rodeo scene in Borat was filmed in Salem, VA, the neighboring town next to Roanoke. With in a few miles of leaving the city, you enter Franklin County, moonshine capital of the world. When I lived there it was common to see these good people smoking their Chesterfields in the grocery store, cabbage in one hand, smoke in the other. An effete art gallery in the heart of this needed to be challenged. In its own twisted way it was a very conservative reaction. And so were the Sex Pistols. Parodying one of the most popular songs by the Cure was blasphemy.
Like Derek Smalls from Spinal Tap, today I write music for my kids and what I call neo-luddite acoustic protest music for myself. On odd days of the week I have sympathy for Palin. Even days of the week I see her as a Trojan horse that has the potential of destroying the last shreds of anything I still have the energy to care about.
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Nucci,
Walker Percy says something similar. The truly radical man in “in these dread latter days of the old violent beloved U.S.A. and of the Christ-forgetting Christ-haunted death-dealing Western world”, is the one with a wife and kids, holding a steady job and wearing a polo shirt.
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I bet you understand the corruption better than most, as well as the solution, especially since you write:
I plan on doing the same (already have no TV but should save up a bit more before kids).
It might be fun, and effective, to produce a few YouTube music videos if you’ve the time/inclination.
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You’re the prodigal son…
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I am with Santos on having days where I feel Palin is getting a disproportionate amount of mockery and vitriol in the media. Then again, there are good reasons not to support her, none of them having to do with lipstick, hockey or her retarted son/grandson or her knocked up daughter. She represents what the slimy filth who run the brainwashing machine absolutely can’t stand. A white woman with FIVE kids!? And she hunts and fishes?? AAHHHHH!!!! Then she opens her mouth and ruins it for me. She’s W in a dress. No more or less qualified than “that one” so I personally don’t have anyone to vote for except maybe Chuck Baldwin. AND BY THE WAY, the entire House is up for relection. Let’s play “Flip This House” and vote out anyone who voted Yes for the bailout.
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“She represents what the slimy filth who run the brainwashing machine absolutely can’t stand. A white woman with FIVE kids!? And she hunts and fishes?? AAHHHHH!!!! Then she opens her mouth and ruins it for me. She’s W in a dress. “
Perfectly stated, Rich. The only difference in the way you and I see Palin is that I wasn’t surprised when she turned out to be W in a dress. After all, she’s a republican.
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Eighteen months later, I returned to the Church
I wonder if you ever think that had you not left you’d never have come back.
Legion are those who never left the Church but who are not in her.
Welcome home, brother.
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Huzzah! Finally someone speaks up for us Goth-Trads!
This Tridentine-Mass-going, distributist, goth-listening, EBM-dancing, 30-something Catholic is giddy with elation!
EVERYONE needs to listen to VNV Nation! Their music is martial and their lyrics read like a TFP hand bill!
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I wouldn’t be surprised if Henry Adams had grown up in the 80s, he would have been a metalhead or punk, ditto for his brothers. I had some ultra-Fundamentalist Scout Master growing up who said that practically everything you do will condemn you to hell, so after listening to your first Iron Maiden or Judas Priest album and not finding Lucifer under your bed, one let’s his adolescent impulses have free reign.
Let me quote something from the Autobiography of Charles Francis Adams, Jr., a paragon of American civic virtue:
“My father had the old New England sense of duty in religious observances. The Sabbath and church-going were institutions. All through my childhood how I disliked Sundays! I was glad when Monday came; for me it wasn’t ‘Black Monday,’ for it was six days before another Sunday… committing some verses from the Bible or a religious poem to memory. I especially remember the Sermon on the Mount and Pope’s Messiah; and these were the hardest lessons of the whole week, those we all disliked most; and so distasteful were they that they have left me to this day (1912) a sort of aversion to the Bible and to Pope.”
I never had any hostility to tradition or Christianity, but young people (or some anyway), go through this phase before they can put on the suit and tie and be “productive citizens”. BTW, many punk and metal bands assault hypocrisy and injustice, and lots of them have become Christians, Alice Cooper and Dave Mustaine come to mind.
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Yes, I used to belong to the punk rock scene myself, but am more embarrassed by my antics in those days than anything. One does many silly things when one is an arrogant, angst-ridden youth…
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Henry Adams at a Venom show! So why is it so many here were attracted to or still are into heavier music? Santos seemed to be saying that it was to sneer at everybody else. Are we all insecure and use harsh music to let out aggression? Is it just that everything else in the mainstream, including politics and the Novus Ordo, is just so boring? If the Latin Mass or punk ever became truly mainstream would we retreat even further to the edges?
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“This Tridentine-Mass-going, distributist, goth-listening, EBM-dancing, 30-something Catholic is giddy with elation!”
Isn’t the whole goth music thing opposed to being “giddy with elation?” I mean, do you wear black lipstick and fingernail polish to your Tridentine-Mass? Do you wear Doc Martens as you milk cows on your distributist farm plot?
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Fascination Street is a gay anthem?
You know Robert Smith is married to his childhood sweetheart and goes to church, right?
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The post didn’t say Smith was gay, but that the song was a favorite of that community. I’d have to agree, but interesting about him being a married man.
Ramus, the image of a Goth farmer is the funniest thing I’ve heard in a long time. REALLY American Gothic…
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I’m 25. I think that during my time there was no real “scene” even worth being a part of. I don’t know anything about the punk scene, but the hardcore scene was in it’s final throes while I was stil in high school. Now it’s become fashioncore and much of what you see in the “hipster scene” are the last movements of it’s bowels. In regards to the metal scene, I guess that internet porn took up too much of my time, and I wasn’t able to keep abreast of the encyclopedic canon of elite bands.
But in regards to the TLM, I’d advise people to not to thumb their nose at the Novus Ordo. Yes, much of the music is tacky, but with a few changes (let’s wait to see what the new revision of the English missals gives us) it should be sufficiently reverent but accessible to the volk.
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“This Tridentine-Mass-going, distributist, goth-listening, EBM-dancing, 30-something Catholic is giddy with elation!”
hmmm, this article, while interesting to me, does not strike me as news. I’m an unapologetic Cramps and Gun Club fan, and while not as confrontational as the latter incarnations of punk-metal/death rock, certainly as subversive.
but I really really could not listen to The Swans, so that is when Gregorian Chant became my top playlist.
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