Rip it Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978-1984 [Paperback]

1. The idea that the best period for Pop was the Sixties. Simon Reynolds' elegantly and urgently written survey of post-punk puts that complacent baby boomer myth to rest once and for all. All of Reynolds' books have been essential reading for anyone serious about Pop, and this is no exception. If you are at all interested in how Pop could be challenging, weird and yet compulsive, you really will not be able to put this book down. 'Rip it Up' eloquently and exhaustively makes the case that the 1978-84 period was a pop cultural treasure trove. Reynolds lets us see the usual suspects (PiL, Joy Division, The Fall, The Raincoats, The Slits, Throbbing Gristle, Gang of 4, Cabaret Voltaire) from unusual angles (the anecdote about Martin Hannett making Steve Morris record each drum separately is a wonderful insight into the way in which Joy Division's sound was produced, for instance), as well as re-focusing attention on the forgotten or barely remembered (This Heat, Tuxedomoon).

2. The idea that Pop is essentially to do with music. Reynolds demonstrates that this was a period in which politics, theory and sonic innovation fed into each other in a now scarcely imaginable cocktail of mutual intensification.

3. The idea that Pop has to be entertainment. Reynolds' analysis of postpunk is an implicit broadside against contemporary pop's compulsory trivialization. Pop then was a way of living, not simply a style of consuming.

...and start again:

The book inevitably poses the question - could we ever have it so good again? Can Pop ever return to a Now this urgent, or will it always be yesterday once more? Well, part of what made post-punk so powerful was its unashamed intellectualism. Such intellectualism came from the critical culture that surrounded the groups as much as from the artists themselves. Reynolds, inspired to write by the confluence 'Rip it Up' describes, has kept the faith with that mode of theoretically-engaged criticism. Is it too much to hope that the book will contribute to a climate in which expectations about what Pop can be are raised?

It's a vast area Reynolds writes about, choosing to get a handle on it by presenting the book in (i) two halves: Post-Punk and New Pop/New Rock & (ii) writing a chapter on related acts - so we move back and forth, and round and about (there's a great timeline, though sadly a discography in the style of 'Energy Flash' is not in the book- it's on the publisher's website!)Reynolds writes, as his features in 'Uncut' & in prior publications, interestingly and intelligently, taking in such names as PIL, Throbbing Gristle, Wire, Devo, The Slits, The Raincoats, Pere Ubu, Joy Division, The Fall, Cabaret Voltaire, Scritti Politti, Gang of Four, Magazine, Subway Sect, The Pop Group, No-Wave (and in what came after post-punk, such names as Dexys, The Specials, Associates, Malcolm McClaren, Soft Cell, Depeche Mode, Foetus, Mission of Burma, Husker Du, Meat Puppets and so on...) The only problem with this is that you read about one band, go and put one of their records on, turn a few pages and you're with another band, whose record you go and get and put on (and so on!!!) The answer to this would be a Nuggets-style box-set compiled by Mr Reynolds! Some of the chapters are tasters and for a wider read on certain subjects here, there is a handy bibliography - so while we have a few nice chapters on the U.S. underground SST-wise in the 80s, there are better/more extensive books on that scene (which I felt didn't fit as well as the other parts).

Reynolds has timed his enthuasism for this scene well, with various acts from this time reforming/reissueing (Gang of Four, The Cure, Scritti Politti, Throbbing Gristle, The Fall) & contemporary acts like Interpol, Bloc Party, Franz Ferdinand, LCD Soundsystem, Radio 4, Liars etc nodding this way (some rather plagiaristically!). Plus this book fits into a similar continuum to the recent film 'Kill Your Idols', which pitched acts from No-Wave/the U.S. underground (Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch, Swans) against such pseuds as Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

Some chapters are stronger than others - the Throbbing Gristle chapter is particularly foul (especially when detailing the joys of Coum Transmissions!) & takes issue with their flirtations with fascism - I enjoyed that chapter so much, I bought the book! The stuff on PIL is excellent, as too the writing on acts who aren't written about as much as they ought to (Associates, Jim Thirwell, Psychic TV, The Blue Orchids, James Chance & the Contortions). Reynolds reassesses the poppier-Stevo-associated Cabaret Voltaire (underrated I feel) and is correct in pointing out that Depeche Mode did the 'conform to deform' thing well. I think he's a bit hard on Julian Cope and The Cure, but clearly they're not his bag of hammers & the goth-chapter is great fun, going from the great (The Birthday Party, The Banshees) to rubbish (Southern Death Cult, Sisters of Mercy). Obviously George Orwell has rewritten my tastes from the 1980s, so I can slate stuff like The Cult happilly! & as fun as a few FGTH singles were, the attempt to shock is a bit unshocking after the Throbbing Gristle chapter!

'Rip It Up & Start Again' is an excellent book that champions and details the most significant music scene ever seen. I think the ideas and methods of the bands covered here were as forward-thinking as music has ever got. This book is therefore a wonderful exercise in modern cultural history (though the bit on Ballard's 'The Atrocity Exhibition' bizarrely lists Ballard short-stories and then cites 'The Atrocity Exhibition'- in which those named short-stories are chapters!) and with Paul Morley's 'Words & Music' is one of the great recent books from the realm of music journalism. Great stuff and a book I devoured with joy in a day or so....OWN!!!

But what the heck - I loved it anyway (and that's in part because I'm the same age group, and I still get a frisson listening to my old Cabaret Voltaire and Fall records). Down with rockism! Up with looped samples of American televangelists!