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    Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991
    Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991
    Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991
    Ebook69 pages1 hour

    Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991

    By Ben Nadler

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    Much has been written about the glamorous and short-lived New York City punk rock scene of the late 1970s. Less has been written about the second-wave punk scene that followed in the 1980s. Unlike the earlier scene, the ‘80s punk scene took place largely outside of the established downtown clubs, in the streets and squats of the Lower East Side. Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side, 1981-1991, the first installment in the Scene History Series offers a glimpse into this important cultural moment, which has had such a lasting impact on American subcultures, from Hardcore, to Skinhead, to, most crucially, Anarcho-Punk.Drawing on both archival documents and original interviews, this zine explores the music of the era’s bands, including Bad Brains, Cro-Mags, Agnostic Front, False Prophets, Urgent Fury, No Thanks, and Reagan Youth. At the same time, the scene is situated within the broader social context, from the election of Ronald Reagan to the Tompkins Square Riots. Woven throughout is the tragic story of New York City’s most legendary anarcho-punk, Reagan Youth’s Dave Insurgent. Insurgent came from a Jewish family of holocaust survivors whose history is rarely discussed. 
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMicrocosm Publishing
    Release dateMay 14, 2014
    ISBN9781621069089
    Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991
    Author

    Ben Nadler

    Ben Nadler is a writer based in Brooklyn, New York. He is the author of the novel, Harvitz, As To War (Iron Diesel Press, 2011), and the poetry chapbook, The Men Who Work Under The Ground (KTBAFC Press, 2012). He teaches writing courses at colleges throughout New York City. More can be found at his website, http://bennadler.com/.

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      Book preview

      Punk in NYC’s Lower East Side 1981-1991 - Ben Nadler

      http://microcosmpublishing.com/blogifesto/2012/12/introducing-the-scene-empowerment-history-series

      ONE.

      Degenerated, by the band Reagan Youth, is a perfect punk song. It clocks in at just two minutes and twenty-two seconds on the album version. It has a killer riff, relentless drums, and a catchy, snotty vocal hook. The lyrics—sung by Dave Insurgent—tell the story of a teenager named Johnny, who can’t read or write, and is only concerned with the momentary thrills of sex, drugs, and television.

      Dave Insurgent (David Rubinstein) and Paul Cripple (Paul Bakija) hashed out the first, rudimentary version of the song in 1979, the summer before they started high school. In that first version, the song featured more juvenile lyrics, and no doubt less than professional instrumentation, but over a solid half-decade of rehearsing the song, and performing it live around New York City, it solidified into its complete form. The song was initially recorded in 1984 for the Rat Cage Records release, Youth Anthems for the New Order, then re-mastered by New Red Archives in 1988 for the revamped version of Youth Anthems, known as Volume 1.

      In this final form, Degenerated became a classic punk anthem, a brutal and ironic attack on brain dead American youth. Like all anthems, though, especially ironic ones, it can easily be reduced to meaninglessness. Many people recognize the song today as it was covered in the Hollywood comedy Airheads, as a straightforward metal song. Even when performed by Reagan Youth, it is easy to take out of context as on embracement of mindless teen aggression.

      My favorite version is a very contextualized live recording. It was recorded at CBGB one afternoon in1983, and can be found on the Live & Rare compilation (New Red Archives). Despite being hailed as the birthplace of punk, CBGB as a business was never completely comfortable with the punks themselves. With the second wave of punk in the early 80s, the punks became younger, more vicious, more hardcore. CBGB’s solution was to hold weekend matinees, where underage kids (sixteen and over) could come, pay admission, and do their thing, while still being cleared away before a drink-buying crowd showed up at night.

      The recording captures the feel of the matinee show. Though the mix is taken right from the soundboard, you can still hear all the kids singing along with the chorus, in the background through Dave’s microphone. They are young and they are excited. Paul Cripple’s guitar is fuzzier, not as blazing as on the studio version, but the riff is heavy and it sounds great. When the drums (Al Pike) and bass (Steve Weissman) kick in, you can feel the whole room dancing. It’s a hell of a lot of energy packed into two minutes and twenty-seven seconds.

      What is most important to me about this particular recording, though, is Dave’s stage banter. Banter isn’t quite the right word. It’s proclamation, testimony, public confession. He speaks before the song, during the bridge, and at the end of the song, offering his personal counter-narrative. This autobiographical story—spoken honestly, in his Queens accent—is not as forceful as the sung verses of Johnny’s pathetic life. But Dave is telling his own story with earnestness, struggling to have it be the truer story.

      Alright, he starts. This is going out to whoever wants to hear it. Paul Cripple starts playing the riff. Sitting out in Queens, I was in a schoolyard doing a lot of drugs. Like mescaline, and stuff. And ludes. Dave takes a breath, transitioning from speaking to a shout: I was a teenage zombie! As of now, Dave’s story still mirrors Johnny’s. The drums and bass come in behind the riff, giving it solidity and speeding it up. Dave begins to sing the first lyrics of the song: What’s Johnny doing on Tuesday night?

      At the minute and a half mark, Paul Cripple starts galloping, going as far into a melodic metal solo as one can in the twenty-second bridge of a punk song, when you have no rhythm guitar to back you up. It’s an earned solo. Over it, Dave’s owns story takes a turn:

      So I was sitting in this fucking schoolyard, getting dope. And then punk came along and made me a human. He says human slow, in two parts (hu-MAN) like it is a word he is just learning. There is an answer!

      Paul snaps back into the main riff, and Dave launches into the last verse of the song, where Johnny becomes a spent, TV-watching dad, who has spawned an even more degenerated son. The end of the verse builds and builds, then abruptly

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