I've never been super into Green Day. I liked a few songs of theirs in the 90's, but I haven't heard anything I liked since then. I find them highly over-rated.

Metallica's new album was a real hit I though. The first CD was like a fusion of Kill'em All, Black Album, and Justice. The second CD was.... eh... a little crappy. Lot's of slow songs trying to be emotional.

Are they really considered punk? I don't think they really vibe the same as Sex Pistols, NOFX, or Misfits.

I'm glad you said it and I didn't have to... I kinda held my 'tongue' on this one!

Pop-Punk. Tossing aside the "screw the Establishment" ethos of traditional punk and hard-core movements and prodigies, grabbing a solid and well marketed grip of consumerism, while shooting a quick wink and being "as punk as mainstream pop allows".

In much the same way the Ed Sheeran and Katy Perry are huge sellers to the teen and pre teen markets, with songs ranging from drug and alcohol abuse to acts of lewd and lavacious sexual misconduct.

Call it what they will, it is a package deal.... packaged to sell sell sell!

None of this is new... The Vapors Turning Japanese is perhaps the most recognised song in the world about masturbation, released in 1980.

Here is No Use for a Name giving us a punk version for those who needed a relevant top up...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9DGtaM5jUg

I never realized it was about masturbation, but to be fair, I never listened to it for very long.

When I think of songs mentioning self gratification, I think of Weezer's Say It Ain't So.

I would dare to say that bands like Blink 182, Sum 41, Product of 4>N(4x-p), and Green Day are not even pop punk. I would consider them pop rock. Their drums beats, which are the most important attribute to a song being punk or not IMO, don't have the main punk beats.

Their drums beats, which are the most important attribute to a song being punk or not IMO, don't have the main punk beats.

ummm, I'm not sure about that....

Punk, by tradition was fast, hard and dirty. Stripped back songs delivered with belief and aggression, with lyrics that meant something... a whole lot of something... to its writers, and the people who listened to it. Common themes were tearing down the governmental bodies and being a voice to those who wanted to be heard.

Punk came across as simplistic, but the players were not simple and the techniques they employed showed speed, prowess, and a degree of finesse (that many who were not versed in the style) completely overlooked.. because ignorance was easier than acceptance.

Punk was DIY. Printed flyers, home recorded tapes, hand drawn t-shirts. Hired halls and small clubs with multiple bands on the shared bill. It was what THEY made of it.

Punk was music's next evolution, the gritty underbelly that was passionate and honest, that grabbed the youth seeking an edge or a rebellion and got in their face to show them they were not alone.

The punk movement continued to evolve and shift, becoming the grunge and stoner rock movement on one hand, goth and shoe gaze on another, and thrash metal and speed metal on another. Taking aspects of it's origins and spitting them into the wind.

Blink and Pennywise and cohorts were the anthem of skate punk, losing their political voice, discarding any real beliefs and selling direct to the kids.

Record companies saw the kids wanting these bands.... how POPular they were, and signed them giving kids wider access to the popular punks.... Pop punk in it's purest form.... If this disillusion of belief can be truly considered to have a pure form.

Points to Green Day. They recall the scene, and saw the influence it had. They are copying the style and trying to capture the energy and passion that The Sex Pistols, The Exploited and The Damned threw at us. They are supplying the formula. But the supermarket version of grandmas recipe is not the same as grabbing one of her cookies off the windowsill while they were cooling...

Punk, by tradition was fast, hard and dirty. Stripped back songs delivered with belief and aggression

Fast, Hard, and Dirty are all adjectives that can not be used to describe Green Day, especially what they've made in the last 15 years. Half of their albums now have ballads and soft love songs on them.

Punk came across as simplistic, but the players were not simple and the techniques they employed showed speed, prowess, and a degree of finesse.

Punk players weren't virtuoso's. Many of their bassists and guitarists would simply play chords in 1/16 notes and their hand would literally just strum up and down in the same rhythm. The reason why it was catching on so rapidly was that it WAS easy to replicate, and anyone who wanted to play it could without having to master an instrument, study theory, or even spend years developing the style. I believe this is why young teenagers picked up the banner and ran with it. When you have a bunch of 14 year olds in a garage playing, Punk songs are a good starter genre for them to develop as a team. As a bass player, it agitates me so much to hear people throw Mike Durnt into a list of the best bass players of all time, and with certain crowds, he always is. My cure for all the "best" musicians is to stick them into competition where they have limited time to learn and play another musician's work. Whoever comes out the other end with the fewest mistakes across 20 or so genres and difficulty ranges can claim the title, so if say Durnt were able to play Frantic Disembowelment with his fingers and Alex Webster were for some reason not able to play When I Come Around with a pick, Durnt could be considered the better bassist.

Punk was DIY. Printed flyers, home recorded tapes, hand drawn t-shirts. Hired halls and small clubs with multiple bands on the shared bill. It was what THEY made of it.

That would be nearly all bands that are not signed yet :/

Blink and Pennywise and cohorts were the anthem of skate punk, losing their political voice, discarding any real beliefs and selling direct to the kids. Record companies saw the kids wanting these bands.... how POPular they were, and signed them giving kids wider access to the popular punks.... Pop punk in it's purest form.... If this disillusion of belief can be truly considered to have a pure form.

I would not consider content of lyrics to be the what makes or breaks a genre. Black Metal for instance can be done instrumentally and it still retains it's genre. Punk should be considered likewise. If you were to play all punk music without any lyrics, does it stay punk? Of course it does. Whether or not the band is singing about how horrible they have it as white males living in North America or if they think their friends' moms are hot should not dictate whether or not they are punk. The POP comes from the actual music. Whether it retains it's punk roots in how the instruments are played or if it the play-style was altered to be more acceptable to a young, modern audience.

You can blame two points for kids in the late 90's-early 2000's liking these genre as much as they did.

1. Due to the skill required to play this genre, an explosion of bands came out during this time, all generally sounding the same, and all with the same look. I think record companies probably put them together as they did with boy bands. If throwing a ball up in the air and catching it was being done while the thrower became famous, they assume it's the ball throwing that is accredited.

2. The "Edginess" attracted rebellious kids. Wearing a tie with a T-Shirt, parties with no adults around, motor bikes, seemingly random acts of excitement and out of ordinary behavior, men wearing mascara, and uncleanliness. These things seem cool to a child but they have the natural urge to resist what their parents expect of them, which is to be clean, well behaved, and intelligent. Seeing a group of people professing the opposite is what hooks him.

Okay, imo there's different kinds of pop-punk.

There's:

-Good Charlotte Pop Punk

more pop than punk, most mainstream

-Green Day Pop Punk

reminiscent of the Buzzcocks, anything they've made in the 21st century is NOT this, lyrically similar to NOFX in that they're humorous, but different in that they're less political

-Blink-182 Pop Punk

closest instrumentally to punk, I'd best classify it as skate-punk

-Every Mislabeled Post-Hardcore Band That Tried to Sell Out to Teens Ever

super emo, fast drums that remind me very specifically of NOFX

-Indie Punk Influenced By The Buzzcocks That Is Really Catchy But Will Never Be Popular Because It Sounds Too Much Like Real Punk

the best variation imo fast, uncompromising, aggressive, gang vocals, introspective lyrics (so not lyrically punk)

And there you go. I think really that the Indie Punk variation is probably the closest variation of pop-punk to real punk, and I think that the undeniably worst version is the post-hardcore "punk" music.

Of course, real punk bands do still exist. NOFX, the Misfits, etc.

Okay, imo there's different kinds of pop-punk.

There's:

*facepalm*

thanks, man... that was great 1st thing in the morning, just totally cravking me up with your very earnest descriptions of sub genres of a sub-genre of a type of rock n roll that was anti-music-biz and categorization.... its a snow day! I hope I get to dick off work, make music and then run around in the snow until dark with my kid.... and I even bought beer yesterday, yippee! but first I'm going to read that shit again. actually your personal genre names are really funny, 'specially the last one! I take it you like the buzzcocks?

NameDrop

yeah I do. I take quite a bit of inspiration from them in terms of riff writing.