No Wave: When Art Screams

During an intense and short period, rock's musical orthodoxy was purged from punk. A growing disdain for New Wave's commercial success was palpable in the artistic underground of the late seventies NYC.

Enveloped by punk rock's inevitable influence, No Wave emerged as an alternative, bursting with art school sensibilities. Thus, they had to be different. There is virtually no clear way of identifying it as a genre, especially when no two acts were alike.

Most of their shows were passionately concise (some of the performances lasted no more than 15 minutes). Some acts had a genuine desire to be perceived as monsters, and many others wanted some kind of purge through artistic expressions that were comparable to absolutely nothing. Music and art that reminds you of nothing else.

The artists were aware that music was a desperately needed medium, convenient enough for a rich output of ideas. It was fringing, independent and anti-music; a paradoxically creative art form. No Wave thrived, surrounded by artistic paradigms that needed to be, creatively, smashed.

Theirs was an "American success story". Undoubtedly, it all happened in New York.



Referencia: Kill Your Idols (Scott Crary, 2004)