The New Wave represents nothing less than a renaissance of rock ‘n’ roll, a cold war art form. The New Wave sprang from the ashes of the Punk movement. What started out around the middle of this decade in places like London, New York, and, strangely, Ohio, as a brash, simplistic protest against homogeneity in rock music soon spawned so much eclecticism within its own ranks that the term Punk became obsolete and had to be broadened. So the term “New Wave” includes everything from three-chord bands like the Ramones to idiomatic rock ‘n’ roll bands like Britain’s The Clash; from the bouncy creativity of Talking Heads and XTC to the experimentation of more serious “composers” such as the ubiquitous Brian Eno and Robert Fripp, and even their older-wave collaborator, David Bowie. There has been a return to the rebelliousness of youth that has always made the greatest rock ‘n’ roll moments—even when made by adults— and, for the best bands, sophistication has brought no loss of power.
Starting a couple of years ago when the Ramones put out their album, Rocket to Russia, I began to notice a greater geopolitical sophistication as well. The cartoon cover of this album showed a rocket leaving Cape Kennedy, heading toward an evil-looking Russky who was whipping a poor kulak carrying a bag of salt. At this exact time the Sex Pistols, the doomed focal point for the British Punk movement, came out with their first album, and it was filled with references to Britain’s malaise and the threat from the East. In the very first song of their only album, Johnny Rotten, the Pistols’ singer, goes to West Berlin. I wanna see some history, he says, ‘cause now I got a reasonable economy. Now I got a reason! To be
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