1. Patterico is collecting donations for an LAPD officer who was shot and paralyzed in the line of duty. If you have a few bucks to spare, or a blog on which to link the post, please do so.
2. Michele Catalano at Faster Than the World has compiled a list of the 100 greatest punk songs of all time and invites you to vote for your favorites. Oh, and you’re allowed to bitch about how awful the list is, if that’s the kind of thing that floats your biscuit.
Me, I see no Violent Femmes on the list—perhaps the crew over there considers them post-punk or geek-punk, but I’m not sure I’d agree—so I’m staying out of this to protest what is clearly an enormous oversight.
Definitely post punk. Second wave post punk. Post proto punk third wave twice removed.
Eh, I like them.
No X? How can that be?
“Punk”? Are you sure that’s not “funk”? Or is this some silly post-’70s music trend like that Zamfir frootloop?
No Ramones? At ALL—?!?
In the immortal words of Eric Cartman: ”Liberace gay.”
Beat on the Brat is there, Kent.
I fucking hate the Violent Femmes. You and I agree on so much, Jeff, but we’re miles apart on this one.
Eh, the Femmes had a few decent songs. I saw them once and they absolutely sucked live, though.
Hey, I don’t go for anything later than Johnny Cash.
Robin Roberts  he wasn’t punk. I think in his day they called them road agents.
No Meatmen either, that’s a crime of the highest order.
I think the Femmes got “Alternatived” and lost their Punk creds – which doesn’t matter much to their fans.
Anyone else remember another band that started Punk and went mainstream(ish) – The Go-Gos?
I loved their early punk stuff, though they were always borderline as far as Punk is concerned.
Femmes were never punk (but neither are half the songs on that list [a brutally unkind dismissal of which I just deleted from right here]), the greatest punk song of all time is “Mass Sterilization Caused By Venereal Disease” by No Trend, the next 98 are by Hüsker Dü (though they didn’t make that many), and the exclusion of the Meatmen from anything is a crime.
The Distillers. At least 2 or 3 songs on Coral Fang.
Saw them in Vancouver. Superb show. I was 30 years older than most of the audience …
Ah! So it is. Thank you, Michelle; I stand (happily) corrected!
Ah, but the Dead Milkmen are on the list. So life is good for fans of geek-punk.
Only one song from the Godfather of Punk, Iggy Pop. Sitting out as well.
Punk? Real punk died (actually was killed then coopted by a proto-MacSchrimpyBushHitler) a couple of years before it was even recognized to have existed.
Within several months span (79 I think) I saw Devo play in Baltimore and the Clash play in College Park. Silly me, I thought Devo was Punk.
Of course Ritchie Coliseum being a concrete bunker with horrible accoustics didnt help… Well neither was an obviously angry Joe Strummer. Come to think of it they all were angry. As they were several years later when I saw them in SoCal. Hummm…
I hadnt started college yet, so I had no clue that I was also supposed to be angry.
Anyway, its a fun list, regardless of glaring ommissions such as X.
I vote for Fear “Gimmie Some Action” as the quintessential Punk – short, crass and fast.
Michele, the Femmes was a grave oversight!
Hey, these lists are always pretty arbitrary. Don’t forget a good portion of these were chosen by our readers as well, so we can’t take all the blame.
As for the Meatmen, I agree we should have included at least Tooling for Anus. If it’s any consolation, we’re doing a Most Offensive Punk song list next week and you can bet that at the very least “Crippled Children Suck” will be there.
Guys, I like the V. Femmes, but they ain’t punk. They play acoustic ferchrissakes!
Pablo, dude, back in ‘84 there were a bunch of us punks that would fully disagree with you. I dig that the Femmes were pretty mello but somehow they made it to everyone’s mix tapes… right there with the Misfits, Ramones, Stooges etc. you get the point. Music doesn’t make one Punk.
bains —
You remember Crack the Sky? About that same time, same area (I’m originally from Baltimore). I have that first CTS album on CD. They were way ahead of their time.
Nominees: Guadalcanal Diary’s “Cattle Prod,” and “I Saw Your Mommy (and Your Mommy’s Dead),” by Suicidal Tendencies.
For the Meatmen, “Crippled” was tame. Hello, “Tooling For Anus,” anyone?
Regarding the Top 100, any list without Stiff Little Fingers’ “Suspect Device” (or any SLF at all!), no Wire, and no Television is a monumental joke. Too heavy on USA and too light on 1970s Golden Age Punk.
On the bright side, no Green Day!
On the bright side, no Green Day!
Dig that.
mac buckets i’m in love
But… but… where’s Malcolm McLaren’s opera album?
LOL- Balzac- that’s the one with Madame Butterfly, right?
I must be gettin’ too old for this shit.
“Love Comes in Spurts” is better than “Blank Generation” IMHO.
But “Blank Generation” is in heavy rotaion since I cleaned out the volvo and only left one cd in there. And “Dance Motherfucker, Dance” is a good Femmes tune. But you gotta skip it when the kids are in the car.
Oh yeah, nothin’ more punk than a volvo wagon with two car seats and the dog cage in the back.
oh honey, crack the sky? shhhh… there, there, it’s gonna be okay.
Carin  Yep, and that smokin’ hip-hop Carmen.
“Cattle Prod” is not punk. Guadalcanal Diary is a frickin’ Christian Rock band. Kind of like U2 and The Alarm.
If we’re doing just risque music: Butthole Surfers, anyone? How about Tool’s Prison Sex, or Stinkfist? For more mildly amusing/less revolting appeal, there’s always this CD by the Sugar Cubes. Only thing Bjork ever did that’s in the same neighborhood as “good”.
As far as punk goes, I’ve got pretty close to absolutely nothing. I mean, I’ve got a few Clash albums, but outside of that the closest it gets is Johnny Rotten’s post-Sex Pistols work.
i dunno…i learned about punk from my older brothers.
they say the femmes were punk.
what about mojo nixon?
i think (from punk 101 as taught by my brothers) the clash, the dead kennedys, the smiths, the femmes, and butthole surfers were all punkers.
no go-go’s, plz.
Here’s another “100 Punk Songs” list that I think would be more along the lines of consensus opinion, varying mileage and all that.
Also, I didn’t mean to harsh the “Faster” list that badly—I apologize to Michele for being an a-hole. Funny how music brings that out in some people.
For the Meatmen, “Crippled†was tame. Hello, “Tooling For Anus,†anyone?
Yea, I’m kind of pissed at myself for not including that on the list to begin with.
Mojo Nixon is his own genre. Ditto Dread Zeppelin.
Yes! And the Beat Farmers! And the Violent Femmes.
Wicked cool, but not punk.
He was just swimming in Skid Roper’s wake.
If I know Mojo, he was drinking it.
Saw Mojo once, and he kicked ass.
He was out wandering around in the bar before the show, wearing a t-shirt that said “I wanna put my finger in your ass” and telling everyone it was his birthday to try to get them to buy him drinks. Later, while he was playing, he explained that his t-shirt was a message to Chelsea Clinton.
I wasn’t quite sure what to make of that.
In 1987, I had Mojo and Skid in the (now-deceased) on-campus bar in San Jose, capacity 120, and they ripped the roof off of the place. “Stuffin Martha’s Muffin” was a crowd favorite. Mojo got to walking on top of the booths and ducking ceiling fans while banging on his 5-gallon jug during “Where The Hell’s My Money!”
Dude earned his money that night.
Uh-huh.
Here are the lyrics for their song extolling the manifold virtues of that ages-old “Christian Rock” musical staple: cow fucking.
Old hat, ever since Amy Grant first explored that specific lyrical territory, I know… but: whatcha gonna do, huh…?
I guess Walking In The Shadow Of The Big Man and their rendition of Kumbaya just threw me right off; sorry.
Still, punk they ain’t. A) Murray Attaway can actually sing, B) they can pretty much all play their instruments, and C) their recording quality doesn’t suck on purpose.