Post-Punk, Mark Fisher & Popular Modernism

[@jonasceikaCCK]

I made a playlist of classic British post-punk for those new to the genre: kzbin.info/aero/PL7y0zyKXzhwxVzp_BcWJJp6NFas79RYLl&si=5wN_Q8VJrGALriIU I kept to one song per artist, but the albums each song is from are great as a whole, and highly recommended. It's not an exhaustive list but it'll be a good introduction. If you're interested in the Polish scene in particular (and you should be), I highly recommend these albums: Siekiera - Nowa Aleksandria Aya RL - Aya RL Republika - Nowe sytuacje Obywatel G.C. - Tak! Tak! Tilt - Tilt And if you'd like to get into minimal wave/minimal synth, you can't go wrong with these albums: Oppenheimer Analysis - New Mexico Solid Space - Space Museum Ensemble Pittoresque - For This Is Past The Human League - Reproduction Fad Gadget - Fireside Favourites Young Marble Giants - Colossal Youth Enjoy, and let me know if there are any other particular recommendations you're looking for. Thanks!

[@ember_flux]

hi, really sorry to bother but i really like the song that came on in the end credits, and i cant find the name. i really am in love with it, do you know what it's called? Really liked the video, btw, and appreciated an insight into post punk that I wasn't fully aware of, even as a post punk fan.

[@jonasceikaCCK]

Thank you! That is actually a song I made myself for this video. Several people have asked me about it now so I guess I'll have to upload it, I'll drop a link when I do!

[@contentinternational]

Can't wait to be obnoxiously critical of your choices lol.

[@waterguyroks]

​@@contentinternationalDon't be that person 🙄

[@contentinternational]

@@waterguyroks i know but like i wanna so bad. my dad raised my on this stuff so i shift all blame to him, stop oppressing me

[@cesarrdyoniziak8402]

Post-Punk & Philosophy? this is epic

[@MarcioSilva-ssiillvvaa]

Meant for each other.

[@zakkcrlss6307]

looking fwd to the Industrial music sequel

[@Ocinneade345]

I KNOOOWWWW. This is absolutely an all-time video for me

[@jiggersotoole7823]

All the "post punk" groups I knew were just trying to have hits, just like everyone else. So. What's it all mean?

[@sexobscura]

They're both Conspiracies

[@thegeekclub8810]

“leading people to feel nostalgic for a future that never arrived” I get that feeling a lot. I find myself indulging in the nostalgia for stuff like Y2K and pixel art and old 3D graphics and the early internet despite these things either existing before I was born or when I was too young to experience them. They represent a vision of the future that was utopian, especially Y2K and the early internet. There was a sense that the new millennium would usher in a new idealistic future. The early internet was an exciting place of experimentation of creative freedom in many ways, and people dreamed of the ways this new medium would democratize the art world. But none of that happened. Instead we got minimalism and photorealistic graphics and social media. Yet I can’t help but yearn for a world where all those dreams came to pass, or at least a time when we believed they would.

[@planettrax9754]

Also in regards to the early Internet there was a form of radical politics inscribed in the pirate scene and free-sharing of stuff. The act of actually multiplying a digital file through millions of copies was paradoxical to the anathema representative of the Cultural industry itself - is it possible to ascribe a monetary value to knowledge and art? Then things like Spotify, Netflix and content creation (and its subsequent monetization) basically killed it. For me, this was when the Internet lost its last utopian event horizon.

[@burnemail2467]

Having experienced that era I feel as if it is one of the more significant differences between me and the younger generation that didn't, which isn't that much younger than me really.

[@MapacheOculto]

@@planettrax9754 That scene still exists :p but yeah not many take part on it after monetization and the death of some of those services and avenues of sharing.

[@diosamurcielaga9418]

I was a late teen and young adult during these times, living far away but close enough from the imperial core to use the tools, enjoy them, experiment with them without the feeling of being part of the main "spirit of the era"... It was indeed wonder-full and stimulating, open in ways we did not even know. But living through that and surfing the wave all the way in youth, banged us hard into the void of neoliberalism deeming all those thoughts, ideas, sensations, constructions, hours of learning, meaningless at best aesthetics swallowed by the machine... and in honesty, I don´t think we have recovered, we either got absorbed and utilized, and or, developed recurrent mental and physical issues that left us "behind" in the work for survival chance, I remember when pretty much every person my age, back in our late 20's mid 30's was having panic attacks and discovering what they are. Not just the future dissolved, the present did too, as social media gobbled up any creative or experimental path we had taken and turned it into forms of hooking in people and the "monetization" of everything. I understand younger people yearning nostalgically for the early internet, but realize that those who lived through that are now very bitter about how that panned out

[@FrithonaHrududu02127]

Post Punk was the single greatest flowering of music in human history. When I was like 7 years old I got a radio/cassette player for Xmas, this was like 82. I took it apart (I was always taking shit apart and trying to build time machines) but when I put it back together I couldn't get the dial to go above 93 so all I could listen to was college radio now Boston college radio what's phenomenal in the early eighties and I would constantly tape songs from the radio I still have these taped from the radio mixes of joy division a certain ratio, Cocteau twins that I made when I was like 8 years old. Seeing as that was pretty much all I heard from my broken radio I kind of thought that was what everyone was listening to. I was in South Boston and as I got a little older I would sneak in town and I realized I could only find theusic I loved as vinyl exports from tiny record stores. I actually unwittingly bought my first Mission of Burma cassettes from Peter Prescott, the drummer, because he owned one of the record stores, He actually rang me up, and he had this little fat 11year old telling him all about this band Mission of Burma( li especially loved that they are a Boston band). He said "open up the cassette, I want to show you something" so there was his picture. I felt kinda stupid but he was cool as hell. To this day I have a bunch of mission of Burma cassettes signed by Peter Prescott but only Peter Prescott.

[@ArK047]

Time continues forward but the future was left behind.

[@nowhereman6019]

*FLAT CIRCLE*

[@VaQm11]

And so it was...

[@pugix]

@@VaQm11 Does time move?

[@Paulomachadolobo]

What you said remind me of a Portishead's song called Half Day Closing. She sings in the chorus "dreams and beliefs have gone, time, and life itself goes on".

[@mathafaker12345]

"Touching from a distance further all the time"

[@caniorderapizza]

Finally, another Mark Fisher video. May he not be forgotten!

[@deathuponusalll]

Yesss sir 👏🏽👏🏽🙌🏼

[@bookofthedeadinternet]

follow your leader

[@bce6936]

HE DIED????

[@deathuponusalll]

@@bce6936 yeah years ago sadly

[@johnradclyffehall]

@@bce6936he very sadly died by suicide in 2017

[@planettrax9754]

The appeal of post punk to me was always its working class roots, the infinite possibilities without needing to be exceptional. It was liberating for someone like me who could never play an instrument like the metalheads or the hippies (who also never had any consistent politics to be honest). The only other place where it happened was some parts of the electronic music scene (and postpunk always intersected with it). Post punk is the music of the future and still is!

[@sexobscura]

The appeal of post punk to me was always that it finally stopped

[@sexobscura]

That's exactly what rock n roll was and was supposed to continue as. Not to offend you, but you really should get educated on its history. It's a very simple medium to play when you leave out the 'virtuosity' that came along later

[@sametkrutzo]

as a darkwave musician in this year, 2024, this is the most accurate description of the essences of post-punk i have ever seen on the internet. i’m really glad you talked about every aspect of it, thank you jonas. hoping to see the development of industrial music video soon.

[@stuartsmith5146]

As an academic exercise, can you pull apart the “wave” part of darkwave? Is this a branch of “new wave” or does it reference wave form of synths or something else?

[@bardofhighrenown]

The section of the video talking about publicly funded arts education in Britain really hits hard. I was considering going to school for photography, the idea of being around creative people doing interesting things and experimenting and having a community of people that share your desire to just create stuff sounds like a dream to me. But it just doesn't make any sense, I would go into a life changing amount of debt and with no strong career paths to help offset the cost at the end so I simply just couldn't justify it. So I create instead in a vacuum. I just shout into the void of Instagram. No real feedback, no interaction, I don't even get to see people be dismissive of my photos. Nothing. No wonder the future is dead.

[@emese6346]

agree

[@MrWolf-xc9pr]

I am an art graduate in Britain. My guy, debt is unavoidable in any situation no matter what you do. What art school gives you is four years of a studio space, discounted/free materials and incredible networking opportunities. The lectures are fine; you'll remember what you like and forget most of it. In Britain you just ignore the debt until they cancel it in your 50s. The learning, the freedom, the access is priceless. I haven't been in a room where I couldn't make interesting conversation for 15 years. Some of the most important discoveries and exposures of my life happened in those spaces. And hey, if you apply you may not even get in. Take it from me, you have nothing to lose by applying.

[@rileybanks1191]

@@MrWolf-xc9pr seconding this as a recent (as in, this year) music graduate

[@waterguyroks]

No offense, but I'm not sure a graduate of a few months is really qualified to speak about the long-term prospects of a degree. I think it's incredibly reckless to recommend someone to take on potentially life-ruining debt to pursue an extremely perilous career path. If it's a free program or if you're wealthy enough to afford it then that's a different story but for the average person it really is a terrible idea

[@MrWolf-xc9pr]

@@waterguyroks I graduated 11 years ago. To clarify, I'm British and talking to British people. We get 5 years of funding and are protected from the most egregious practices common in America and elsewhere regarding debt. If you never earn more than a certain amount, you never have to pay it back. It is eventually cancelled. I have never regretted my decision because it improved my quality of life in ways totally unrelated to cashflow. Advice is not reckless, bud. This is my experience, nothing more. Listen or don't.

[@odvedokikrema]

24:35 "With so many factories closing down, there were entire towns that had been built around industry, which now found themselves losing the social purpose and meaning that they had developed around." Oh... now I have full understanding of these lines: "As railhead towns feel the steel mills rust Water froze In the generation" (Straight to Hell) Much thanks for this brilliant video and my renewed appreciation for The Clash.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

I strongly recommend Rip It Up and Start Again, by Simon Reynolds (the expanded UK edition)- for those who want to learn all the info on post-punk.

[@classicbambi]

yes! helped me a lot while writing my post-punk and politics paper.

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

@@classicbambi Nice!

[@mally9886]

The vid quotes it around 30 mins in

[@jonasceikaCCK]

Yep, I drew from it in researching this video. Also recommend the anthology Post-Punk Then & Now (Mark Fisher is one of the editors) released by Repeater Books, which I drew a lot from

[@user-wl2xl5hm7k]

@@jonasceikaCCK Very cool! Thanks for the recommendation

[@MichaeloStarzioni]

As a Pole, that Jarocin segment with the showcase of our post-punk music scene was a welcome addition. Well researched, absolutely a job well done ♥️

[@Reid-mv4ll]

This is the coolest mini-documentary on post-punk that I have seen, great work!

[@yawnandjokeoh]

I think this analysis is spot on. I lived in Providence Rhode Island during the period of 2001 to 2014. During which time largely affordable post industrial spaces were available to many artists at then relatively affordable rates of rent. There existed a community of people who lived and produced work in former mill buildings. There was a flourishing of artists and projects that came into being due to the resources available, particularly spaces that were multi-purpose: living, gallery and performance spaces, as well as political, social and economic venues aimed at creating an environment of liberation. This wasn’t always the explicit goal but the vibe was there. The difference with social democratic structures was Providence and it’s diy movement existed in a sort of liminal space owing to the class tension between the government of local protectionism the Rhode Island mafia created against the financial system of broader political and economic institutions within the US, that eventually was overturned by the FBI and political rivals to the Cianci regime there. The presence of Brown University and RISD helped introduce a class layer of students with leanings towards modernist and postmodernist ideas in a city whose infrastructural achievements under capitalism halted with the beginning of the Great Depression largely. When the FBI and local Democratic Party were able to oust the long sitting Mafia and Republican Mayor Cianci the city became less shaped by a local protectionist political system and that of the prevailing neoliberal direction. Mills became condos and real estate developers began to shift towards urban development schemes. Fort Thunder and anarchic flea market became a strip mall, corporations and banks built offices. This is to say the Cianci clique was ‘progressive’ as under his admin the Providence Place Mall (once considered as a large Casino was built, and a tourism based downtown improvement scheme started) but there was a distinct shift the national capitalist class forced onto that city via the FBI by ousting a long standing however corrupt mayor. The shift in 2007/2008 with the economic crisis also had its effect, Cianci’s government would have also most likely eventually caved to financial and real estate pressures. But there was a brief period of spaces that where utilized by many local and transplant artists and other creative people, even undocumented workers that led to a period of heightened imaginative art particularly in live music performances.

[@Birbface]

I admire punk and post-punk but cannot stand the music almost entirely, but I seem to recall Fisher saying similar things about techno, club, rave, trance and drum n' bass, which are all the genres I love the most. Techno and house and acid and trance and dn'b were all forms of protest music as well originally, though sometimes you had to squint to see it compared to other genres like punk and post-punk, and they were co-opted by capital and the culture industry just as quickly as with other forms of music, but I find it entertaining that one of the quiet stalwarts of 90s techno, Richard H Kirk, gradually moved into electro, techno, ambient dub and noise as a continuation of his themes of resistance, rebellion, and internationalism that he started in Cabaret Voltaire, bridging the genres in intention and time. Meat Beat Manifesto was inspired by the industrial movement (and made it himself to start) and noise collages and funk a la the Bomb Squad before pioneering big beat that influenced the Prodigy, and many many others.

[@Birbface]

I did like Gang of Four and still love Remain in Light though I guess most people say that's New Wave.

[@MrAdrien1999]

I’m pretty dure Mark loved all those genres you name, he himself was in a breakbeat hardcore group called D-Generation and linked to the CCRU and Hyperdub

[@Birbface]

Yes I think I heard him talk about it in a filmed talk

[@basementmadetapes]

I’m the same except it’s more hip hop that informs me, despite how consumeristic the most recognizable parts of it became. There are still those radical artists that shape the bulk of my soundscapes

[@wowrude]

​@@Birbface Gang of Four were kinda punk/funk, the first album is danceable in most places. Heavily political with a strong left wing bent. Talking Heads predate "new wave" and were part of the New York CBGBs punk scene in the mid-70s that included Ramones, Blondie, and Television.

[@coming_up_roses]

dude soviet band KINO is SO GODDAMN GOOD, you didnt talk about them but i appreciate the included footage :P

[@SamuraiAkechi]

The real hidden gem of soviet rock scene would be Pop-Mechanics: a super-band, led by jazz pianist Sergei Kuryokhin that included musicians from other bands, like Kino, Zvuki Mu and Aquarium, as well as some pop scene artists, playing experimental music and doing strange stage performances.

[@-so4im]

@@SamuraiAkechi100%, Kuryokhin’s solo work is incredible too

[@YegorLetov69]

ЕГОР ЛЕТОВ И GRAZHDANSKAYA OBORONA

[@DacLMK]

You may want to also check out Yugoslav rock, since we also had great rock bands. From Macedonia Leb i Sol and Leva Patika.

[@Biteflight]

Your videos have honestly fucking changed my life. I love the way you philosphicize, and the way you think about music, it has allowed me to hone my understanding of the medium, of the art form, and ultimately to become a better artist and for that I truly thank you from the bottom of my heart .

[@Voicecolors]

You somehow mix my favorite things and organize them into a system. Love you, man !

[@Analysis_Paralysis]

Same! Music, politics, philosophy, language and culture. :) I think there was also a video referencing food, if I remember correctly... 😊

[@nowhereman6019]

I love how the go-to picture of Mark Fisher is him holding his chest like his heart is breaking upon seeing the dystopia that we live in.

[@jonasceikaCCK]

It's the best Mark Fisher photo ever taken by far, has such an existentialist quality

[@seanh9059]

22:24 "But at the end of the day this is a KZbin video essay, so one thing is inevitable..." KZbin ad immediately plays!!!...Intentional or Unintentional but perfect timing....

[@Phosphoreus]

Parts II, III, and IV please. Subscribed.

[@panwamave]

I loved this one. I was very into post-punk as a teen and although I still listen to it occasionally I didn't think listening or trying to do an analysis on it would bring to the surface many thoughts that I had at the time and still hold about art and politics in general but now in a more conscious way. Thanks, this was very inspiring to me in various ways.

[@dylanclarke2787]

"Ghosts of My Life" is a really thought-provoking collection of essays. I wish the world had more people like Mark Fisher, RIP.

[@Anonymous95202]

another day another CCK banger

[@leon3589]

This is one of your best videos. I loved it, thank you. I didn't know much of this.

[@christopher5846]

Joy Division in the thumbnail? You know this is going to be a banger.

[@cameron3452]

Absolutely. Greatest of All Time.

[@NeedForMadnessSVK]

Loved the essay. I might not know much about philosophy, but I know a lot about post-punk. Also, Molchat Doma and Panorama hotel mentioned.

[@thepeacefulenemy4026]

I just recently discovered post-punk/goth thanks to an embarrassingly reactionary family member. So this was *super* interesting and timely for me. Thanks for putting this together.

[@jameswallace6378]

This is so great. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any better, a video about post-punk. This is my favorite channel on KZbin. Thanks for all the work you put into these videos.

[@vasilijevujcic6464]

another band worth mentioning that took their name from modernist literature is josef k great video as always

[@websiteuser7926]

happy to see the BBC Radiophonic Workshop mentions, even the little jingles to come out if them were so expressive

[@carlop3019]

Groundshaking, heartbreaking, amazing.. The demonstration that pop counterculture (or whatever you want to call it) is high culture at all. Thank you Jonas CCK for what you do, I consider you a valuable intellectual of the new social digital era. Amen :)

[@SvalbardSleeperDistrict]

Explaining all this and hauntology to people who have never been exposed to this analysis of the past four decades is so difficult - I hope these videos are going to make it easier to explain.

[@titaniumteddybear]

Excellent video. A balanced contrast of Punk and Modernism is something I didn't know I needed.

[@lila202]

I am from Bulgaria and I can confirm that sadly it was the artists that were against their own funding as they were conflating freedom with the West and therefore with capitalism. It's a conversation that continues still claiming that communism was horrible for art and yet the hip bands of today are from the eighties. At least we still have some brutalist buildings around which can make you stop and wonder. Great video!

[@aprofondir]

Same with ex Yugoslavia - the Serbian music scene has produced nothing of cultural significance since the 90s

[@LauraMendes-we2np]

For years now I've been fascinated with post-punk and I've never quite could put to words what made it so interesting and admirable to me. Until you made this video. Awesome awesome stuff, you're one of the best creators in KZbin

[@Ocinneade345]

An absolutely excellent video. I almost fell to the floor at the title.

[@toohak2782]

Kurt Cobains punk music was eye changing for me. He mixed punk with Beatles sound which created something magical for me

[@romanticplacebo3693]

Jonas, you hit it out of the park here. Fisher's memories of popular culture that took time to consume and yet was relevant to our lives is what makes the lost futures seem close enough to touch. We have to leave behind what music means to us and embrace what it can do, but without the time and focus there's also no way to be affected. Therefore we should make consuming music a political act not just it's content. Two additions: Fisher emphasizes two elements in post--punk that are concerned with the listener and not just the music, one is "Proletarian Discipline" which he describes as an ethics based on rejecting the 1960s indulgence in order to find enjoyment in music that is difficult and conceptual, as well as seeing through the positivity that constantly seeks to respect the past rather than surpass it. The other is how he pinpointed the way post-punk musicians used their bodies to convey ideas and create contexts beyond the lyrics, that their was no truth of the Self and so the body should be glammed up rather than humanized or deconstructed. His piece on Grace Jones is particularly good because it points away from identity as unified or fluid but as artificial, with interiority being "exposed as an ideological bluff" that could challenge listeners understanding of their thoughts and desires as feedback circuits rather than "authentic subjectivity"

[@DonChups]

Thanks for taking the work to make this wonderful documentary. So interesting, I'm sending a link to a few friends.

[@TRUETOILETTENPAPIER]

this is the best youtube channel. period

[@madukamagica]

Art history and philosophy go extremely well together! I'd love more videos like these

[@ConvincingPeople]

16:06 Vibrant Thigh! and The Manchester Mekon making an extremely brief cameo! This is clearly the best video essay on KZbin. :P But in all seriousness, Rip It Up and Start Again was a crucial work of my teens and I have probably casually absorbed more obscure early post-punk and industrial music than most people have absorbed, uhhhh, music. This topic is absolute catnip for me. I have complicated feelings about the "conform to deform" strategy-the eternal paradox of Scritti Politti attempting to create Situationist pop music will never cease to fascinate and haunt me-but what a period for art it was, and what object-lessons it provided us! P.S. I would be _extremely_ down for an industrial video. I will say vis à vis Reynolds as a source that I think his presentation of early power electronics (much as with his coverage of Gothic rock) comes off as affording less leeway on the subject of transgression to groups whose music and aesthetics he dislikes than to groups whose work he actually enjoys, missing the fairly obvious black humour and anti-authoritarian, anti-neoliberal subtext of acts like Whitehouse entirely; that said, there is definitely an important and interesting conversation to be had about the way that transgressive art can serve radically different political valences, more often than not being a blunt instrument rather than a scalpel, with this somewhat laissez-faire attitude towards provocation leading to some really shady figures with far-right sympathies (most notably Boyd Rice) lingering in the scene for years before being frozen out for bad behaviour behind the scenes. There's also a whole other conversation to be had about the modern international noise scene as the successor to the ethos of first-wave industrial (and to some extent an outgrowth of punk DIY culture) and how it has tackled those same issues for better and for worse, but that's a pretty massive subject unto itself and really outside the scope.

[@POSTELVIS]

I wonder if Adorno would be able to appreciate punk or post-punk. it's crazy to think that only about 10 or so years after his death that modernism ended up synthesizing with popular art distinction. also fantastic essay!!!

[@arnonuehm1]

Considering the raging hate-boner Adorno had for Jazz I'm not so sure he'd enjoy any modern-ish popular music. Especially cause he thought it was simplistic and repetitive.

[@SuperTazuki]

No doubt, he would hate it.

[@strangebird5974]

I never wanted this video to end. Thank you, this made so much come together. "Looked beyond the day at hand - there's nothing there at all!" I'll have to share this around.

[@Iridescence93]

I suppose it's not unusual that I'm a huge fan of post-punk music as the soundtrack of my youth but I also unirionically like and admire brutalist architecture so this was interesting to me

[@QuestionsIAskMyself]

One of best videos truly, thanks for your work

[@FeststeckenXD]

Wow, thank you for this video. This brings together so much stuff I'm into. Great to see that many people appreciate the same as me.

[@ChapterTwoLaundromat]

A video on Industrial music would be fantastic. Thank you for your work.

[@kurtrambus2728]

I love this subject. Glad you covered it. Simon's Reynolds book is also the post punk bible!!

[@AMikhailovna]

From a brit with a life-long obsession with the sub and pop cultures of my home, this is a fantastic video essay, well done, immediately subscribed.

[@basedfantastic4341]

Some amazing music was highlighted in this video. I've really been getting into Polish stuff

[@yashchenko999]

this video is literally what goes on in my head 24/7

[@imanihekima1659]

Very comprehensive and well made.

[@Klausemann66]

Thanks, mate, for this wonderful essay. I learned so much.

[@LokiBeckonswow]

really really nice video here, thanks so much for the great info, these themes are so damn relevant

[@PC42190]

The Soviet rock and pop scene is heavily underrated

[@nihil1]

We have been taught to underrate it. They could never have done something cool.

[@PC42190]

@@nihil1 agree

[@johnvonachen1672]

I am a fan of your videos about the failed German communist revolution and I was already all about post-punk so it all fits and makes sense for you to make a video about post-punk. I am so inspired by this.

[@davidsteece4283]

THE PROBLEM OF A-LEISURE / WHAT TO DO, FOR A-PLEASURE

[@jonasceikaCCK]

IDEAL LOVE A NEW PURCHASE!!!!!!!

[@jiggersotoole7823]

Go to Glastonbury....sell out maintain the "interest"

[@bryankinney1]

Brilliant article, no corrections. Beautifully put together. Your comment on modern "IKEA" architecture is so bang on the money and it matters. I'd love to create a community space for fans of post punk - the music and the idealism.

[@lf4434]

Once socialism ended in Poland, there was that cultural emptiness - rebelling against the government was the default, how to rebel when your new democratic government received support from the people via votes? We had to learn again what to rebel against when there was no one, central "enemy".

[@quintessenceSL]

(Not specific to the politics of Poland). There's been much ink dedicated to the phases of movements (discovery, refinement, capture, etc. until you become sclerotic and someone rebels against you) and more importantly, how to manage those phases to maximize the best parts. Especially now, it's more approachable to give space within movements (that was the truly revolutionary aspect of post-punk) to where all that takes place within the movement. In relation to now, the cultural emptiness is there really isn't room to grow (you will be bought up and exploited before you have a chance for your idioms to become cliches).

[@TimoDcTheLikelyLad]

NOT socialist tho

[@Senumunu]

it really is impressive how brutally social democracy broke the spirits of young people. in the old regimes they had things to live for and fight against, things worth changing. all they are left with now is solipsism and empty farces of indulgence.

[@kdzr0017]

It’s interesting that the fall of the People’s Repuplic of Poland created this weird cultural vacuum especially among youth subcultures. During the early 1990’s groups such as the punks, skinheads, “depesze” aka goth kids, and anarchists became (for a brief period) extremely prevalent especially in poorer areas of industrial cities (for instance Szczecin and Łódź). During this time there were many very niche bands; such as the skinhead influenced Honor and Konkwista 88, or feminist punk rock bands from Biała Podlaska (can’t remember their exact name but I think they were called “piekło kobiet” [no relation to the modern movement]). Sadly, a lot of this great music (maybe not the nazi inspired kinds) are almost lost media nowadays.

[@chriss780]

@@quintessenceSL I'd be interested on where to start reading on that subject? writers that broke down movements into those phases you've mentioned?

[@colinzeal5816]

I'd love if you explored how new-wave and no-wave tie in with all this, if at all.

[@Brian-sh5ne]

Awesome video! I would definitely watch a follow-up on industrial music

[@stuartsmith5146]

Hey! Great distillation! Thanks

[@J5L5M6]

One of your finest, unique glimpses into culture. Thank you.

[@mihajlolukic506]

really glad i had chance to watch this video. Good f@cking job !

[@christiandolz6272]

Jesus Christ, just when I thought I couldn't love this channel more...

[@noheroespublishing1907]

As the KZbin Video on "Sovietwave" music put it, it's the funeral song of the future we failed to build.

[@denyspikus48]

Thank you! Now looking for similar video essay on political economy of German techno rave culture.

[@CatrinaDaimonLee]

i like fisher because he lectures and writes in the simplest possible language free of academic ivory tower jargon for the everyday person demonstrating that anarchism really is for everyone right? i mean.....right?

[@FlosBlog]

Yeah, I think I kinda agree with Fisher on that social democracy creates small spaces free of capitalist exploitation. Its no trivial thing. But its also not enough.

[@televisionblitz]

Great video! In retrospect it does seem an unusual time of creativity in popular music. I would have liked there to have been more on modernist and popular modernist depictions and descriptions of brutalist architecture as it isn't clear to me, and probably varies based on the artists, if the artists are celebrating brutalist architecture, or criticizing them as false heralds of a future that was never possible. Most of the art I've costumed has used brutalist architecture to evoke the bleak nature of existence in modern society, and the lack of hope for the future, but you present it rather positively here. The asides into soviet society were interesting, but I think a more thorough look into how the UK social democracy was viewed as failing/collapsing in the 70s, and how '77 punk explosion disrupted the popular music industry of the UK and opened up the space for Post-Punk to be commercially mighty have been more relevant here. That could have made the whole video too focused in the UK though. PS loved how you showed a picture of the Mekons but didn't name them like all the other bands, that's very fitting.

[@coming_up_roses]

very very very very good video, i found myself wanting to like it many times only to find that i had already liked it 5 minutes earlier

[@azaraniichan]

another banger video !!!

[@12kwh]

Holy shit, post punk is my favorite genre. Very hyped for this. I never thought i would see the day this channel covers it!

[@joaomarcelo742]

Mine too😊

[@breohtbrusmid489]

I so enjoyed this essay! I so miss these. Would be great to see one focussing on the parallel deindustrialisation in the US because I now realise in many states it happened there too.

[@Zombirichard]

Was their an Einsturzende Neubauten section somewhere that got edited out? I thought I saw some footage of them in there and maybe something cute could've been tied in with the tearing down the future/brutalist buildings end. It might have seemed too overwrought or not have worked in the timeline so I wouldn't blame you.

[@jonasceikaCCK]

I'm saving Einsturzende Neubauten for a video on industrial music I might make in the future

[@polkunus]

Huge, huge. My journey into understanding of things, question epistemology, and the world started with post punk and it still holds up. From joy division to molchat doma and everything in between

[@nessman69]

it bears saying - the uptake of post-punk to earlier modernist ideas has a LOT to do with the general popularization of universities and art schools in the period immediately proceeding. Prior to the 60s these had not been in reach of the average joe

[@silver1788]

Comrade George Lucas ???

[@Johnmrobinson-vb5vd]

Lucas was pro Vietnam so yeah

[@Johnmrobinson-vb5vd]

It's pretty ironic though because starwars is probably the most commercialized property in existence

[@celestialteapot309]

Middle class art school students are now the professional managerial class, the closest they come to brutalist architecture is driving past it on the way to the theatre; no one chooses to live in a f...... urinal.

[@haxio17]

l m f a o

[@lynnpehrson8826]

7I'd be curious if mark fisher ever had a take on hardcore punk. If it would also be popular modernism, although at the time probably couldn't be considered popular

[@JohnSmith-ij6ms]

minutemen

[@MartinMacabre]

Great Essay !

[@belladonnaofsadness981]

it would be nice to have a video about trip-hop from you, or in general about bristol art scene at that time - cultural variety, sense of community, activism, constant experimentation with the sound and genres, hell even Massive Attack playing Grazhdanskaya Oborona(Civil Defense) is epic - seems interesting

[@bagatellezzz2981]

this video changed my life

[@QuestionsIAskMyself]

Real

[@OracleNeedsAHandle]

It's genuinely mind-boggling that the world replaced this so-called "Popular Modernism" with just money-hungry cultural malaise. In place of grants for the arts and humanities helping people experience art everyone only gets to express themselves within their algorithmically designated hole in the ground in which cultural crossover is essentially impossible. I can't even fathom how this works out for the money-handlers in the long run. It just seems so needlessly cruel. Don't you want new things to monetize? Does forever nostalgia just pay better? And now so much new art is created and shared every day just to be fed to the machines (either to be entered into the dataset or just otherwise uselessly marked by seemingly innumerable bots). I guess every era is awful in some way, but god you'd think we'd find less existentially hollowing problems to solve.

[@kelechi_77]

But then there's the whole argument that barely anything was ever new, many of these bands were sidelined during their heyday, the whole notion of "popular modernism" if were to be applied, could be seen in the experimental culture of the 1960s, by the '70s it would just be a rehashing. Music critics like Lester Bangs were saying nothing is new and original anymore all the way back in 1980! There were songs by the Who, Rolling Stones and Kinks exploring socioeconomic issues in pop culture on aspects of consumerism and modern culture too. There were even artists pre-1978 (post-punk's heyday) who had already explore the genre musically before punk hadn't even been a thing. Pere Ubu, Red Krayola, Residents, Brian Eno (Third Uncle)... etc. In this kind of philosophy, where is the line drawn between influence and innovation? Think the only thing that is lost today is the modernist sense of aiming for the future or trying to do something new, regardless of if the goal is actually met. Simon Reynolds mentions that this seemed to be the driving force of 20th century art and culture, but is now largely forgotten. There's some merit in what Fisher talks about but it's hard to look at it as him speaking from an objective lens because he is a turbo fan of post-punk (so am I) and seems to also be blinded by nostalgia, which is the same thing with Simon Reynolds. Just think there should be more counterarguments on this stuff, because it's a very depressing worldview, and makes it look like there's no innovation happening in art nowadays when there really is.

[@spazthespasticcolonel1054]

Respectfully, if you think that existential problems are subject to being improved over time, we clearly understand the concepts differently. We're supposed to pretend that Sisiphus is happy, not that he's achieved an 8 hour workday through collective bargaining...

[@paddioche]

I dont think they planned it all out, with downloading music became free and art became a moneylaudering parody of itself....its sad that we watch good times thru a screen very 1984

[@spazthespasticcolonel1054]

@randomusername1735 But you sound like a revolutionary, role playing as an artist. Artists create. They persist. Some get censored. Some... experience far worse fates. But there is art, created under regimes that make neoliberalism seem quaint, that will endure, will inspire, or provoke, or simply delight, long after its political context is forgotten. And artists will keep creating, regardless.

[@hankwedelmusic9965]

A very well researched and informative production… However, it’s interesting that not once did I hear the name of David Bowie in this production… because if ANY British artist influenced post punk artists it was David Bowie… Bowie’s “Berlin period” so to speak, 1977-79 and the the trilogy of “Low”, “Heroes” and “Lodger”, in particular, set a standard in use of the electronica brutalism of the music of the bands you’ve described here… Bowie’s interest in always reinventing himself, somehow, was a major focus to SO many of these artists… I was also surprised that Brian Eno and his influence are not acknowledged here…

[@rhmendelson]

Phenomenal! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

[@newforestpixie5297]

the man is correct- i have only a certificate for gas service engineering not political sociology ,philosophy or art but it’s a fact that when the original independent local radio companies ( 10 year franchisees tendered by British government to local radio management companies beginning in 1973) were gradually replaced , the sound of those in Portsmouth & Reading which i could receive was homogeneous beyond compare. In 1985 Radio Victory in Portsmouth became Ocean Sound & immediately lost most of its authentic presenters & their personal music tastes or playlists determined by sales in 4 of the cities record shops disappeared to be replaced by national chart preferences. Following soon after ,the release of frequencies above 100mhz to 108mhz in about 1988 bought with it more stations & more homogeneity rather than real choice. The nail in even the more diverse or independent stations’ coffins came in the late 00s in the shape of Global, Bauer & Capital buying everything then simply networking the whole shebang bar local advertising !

[@g.boychev9355]

I'm not a big fan of UK post-punk, more of a "first album Christian Death" guy myself, but I've thought the same things about modernism in relation to underground extreme metal which brought to the rock format compositional experimentation (e. g. in long chorusless "songs" where barely any riff repeats such as those of Suffocation, or in minimalistic trance-inducing pieces such as those of Von), dissonance and (quasi-)atonality and outright conceptual insanity (where e. g. a band like Carcass would aesthetize pathology). What is interesting to me is first the rather high-brow approach of post-punk bands as described by you versus the self-consciously low-brow and unintellectual approach of extreme metal (even when the music itself was demanding from a technical perspective), and second, post-punk developing in urban communal spaces and by destitute left-wingers versus underground metal's more individualistic, libertarian (using the term broadly politically here to also include some of the outright neonazi elements of the scene) and in turn also its self-financed approach (metal musicians would mostly just work to support their commercially unviable music, I can't think of any who relied on an art school or any similar institution). Doesn't this comparison strike you as the same contradiction that is at the heart of modernism itself with the communist anarchism of Dada versus the protofascism of the Italian futurists, musical modernism and Stravinsky, the politics of Breton and those of Dali, modernist poetry and Ezra Pound...?

[@lepercolony8214]

Got some album recs for these groups?

[@jonasceikaCCK]

Only Theatre of Pain is one of my fav albums of all time! And I agree with the links you pointed out, it would be interesting to cover the metal scene too sometime

[@Wantedpresents]

This was great. Thanks!

[@jamesrobertson9149]

A lot of public money now goes into improving diversity and LGBT programs. These are seen as the cultural cutting edge. That is great, but I think that white working class is missing out on things like the arts schools etc. that gave them creative expression.

[@Swagkonge]

Oh shit Delia Derbyshire appearance at 17:10 !!!

[@skynet4496]

Great stuff, can you also post the writing of this piece? It's easier to share to my philosophical friends.

[@pugix]

The American band Negativeland emerged in this period, engaging in self-conscious cultural criticism. Not fitting into any genre of pop music, still they combined rock beats with image collages and sound fragments of popular culture. I wonder, Jonas, if you ever attended to their peculiar form of post-something creativity.

[@tlines7443]

yes please to a video on industrial music! great video x

[@F3XT]

I appreciate this video a lot, this topic fleshed out a lot of things about modernism for me, despite the good aspects you have shown I still think it's something we need to let go, it's a cultural phenomenon directly tied to industrialization even at the point where it was collapsing in itself, and to be honest I don't see Adorno's point since modernism created a lot of conditions for the culture industry, and this happened regardless of the political reality of each country. to me this crazy drive this movement had towards industrialization is its biggest flaw and even post modernism (at least in an architectural sense, can't say of other aspects) never tried getting away with this and feels more like only some small additions to it, I think it's just something that doesn't fit our century, it's very tied to the material conditions of the 20th century

[@F3XT]

this also helps to clarify the sentiments I had towards brutalist architecture tying back to the poll you made recently, I think brutalist architecture can be good and it is a big part of my country in Brazil, but much like the rest of the modernist traditions that are still strong in Brazil and the rest of the world, I think they don't fit the issues we currently face and are somewhat antiquated, I don't think a movement with so much concrete as its identity has any meaningful thing to say today

[@pjoterem141]

poland mentioned, also an absolute banger video

[@RoAgVa]

Jonas my brother in christ, great video, really informative and thought provoking, but you killed me in the Neoliberalism transition of this video adbasjdasda "But, at the end of the day, this is a KZbin video essay, which means that one thing is innevitable... Neoliberalism" I AM NOT BREATHING AND YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE

[@anneallison6402]

I have never told you but I love your voice

[@pfflam]

oops meant to post this here: I went to art-Graduate-school late in life, after living a drug-filled experimental life in San Francisco centered around art, literature philosophy, books and did I say drugs - I was in my mid-30s when I entered Grad school I took loans - I had an off-and-on successful career teaching at Colleges for 24-ish years The main thing is is that I'm an old-dude now, but I regret nothing and really I consider myself STILL JUST STARTING! All my learning and growing were accompanied by a soundtrack of radical outsider Jazz, Post Punk and experimental music. I agree deeply that what we need generally and specifically to Culture is Public Funding, Hell, even the very IDEA of a Public with values not defined solely by the Market is hard to find anymore - and the Public, with its Agora and a frame which is inclusive beyond $$ alone is utterly necessary for the nascence that needs to be INSIDE of a Culture for it to be a Living thing - Culture must rebirth itself creatively: Creativity is the essence of the transformation of the Sun and the Earth's energetic processes into Consciousness Consciousness though comes from the difference between Creativity and physical-chemical determined repetition - ie: Habit - and therefore means in order for it to achieve Consciousness it must come out of that DIFFERENCE, meaning free from the habit -meaning Creativity comes out of Freedom - Creativity is the interpretive, critical and productive mode of that Transformation. But not all transformation is conducive to Consciousness - ie: habit, coercion etc. Entire Social Environs become closed down to creativity by having lives conform to needs-demands alone (ei=$) So, yes, Public Funding is good for us, avoiding Capture by habit/$$/needs-demands is difficult when 'Primitive Accumulation' has made sure all options are taken, and, as we saw with Post Punk and it's still thriving off the dying Public Teet, it makes for Creativity. Anyway - just riffing, and saying that my goal -into old age is to emulate Titian/L.Bourgious -both of whom had Golden Ages in their 90s! - and to GET STARTED (all Creativity is a New-Beginning!) being Creative despite our total FAILED Public Society and IN-SPITE of it!!

[@haxio17]

What late in life There was a chick on my design course who was 80