New wave music
New wave is a music genre that encompasses pop-oriented styles that emerged in the mid- to late 1970s as a lighter and more melodic "broadening of punk culture". The term new wave initially held distinct regional differences between the United States and United Kingdom. In the US, "new wave" had originally been used by music critics to label New York punk bands during the early-to mid 1970s. The term was later adopted by Sire Records founder Seymour Stein, who launched the "Don't Call It Punk" campaign in October 1977 to replace "punk" with "new wave". In the UK, new wave was less rooted in punk and had a more diverse definition. Over time, the genre became a catch-all for several musical styles that emerged after the initial popularity of punk rock, such as synth-pop, alternative dance and post-punk.
New wave commercially peaked during the late 1970s into the early 1980s with an abundance of one-hit wonders. In 1981, the MTV channel was launched, which heavily promoted and popularized new-wave acts in the United States. Regional new wave scenes developed across Europe, particularly the Netherlands' ultra, Germany's Neue Deutsche Welle, Spain's La Movida Madrileña, France, Poland and Belgium's coldwave, as well as the Yugoslav new wave. Additionally, the movement inspired subgenres such as minimal wave and darkwave.
By the mid- to late 1980s, new wave was overtaken in the UK by the new pop and New Romantic movement, alongside the Second British Invasion in the US, where the style later declined in popularity as other music genres gained commercial success. In the 1990s and 2000s, new wave experienced brief revivals, labelled the "new wave of new wave" and "new new wave" by the press. The genre influenced later internet microgenres such as bloghouse, new rave, chillwave, synthwave, vaporwave and devocore.
Etymology and characteristics
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, new wave music encompassed a wide variety of pop-oriented styles that shared a quirky, lighthearted, and humorous tone. The term was originally coined by Seymour Stein of Sire Records as a catch-all for the various styles of music that emerged after punk rock. The phrase also alluded to the French New Wave, a 1960s film movement known for its experimental approach and departure from traditional forms.Common characteristics of new wave music include a humorous or quirky pop approach, the use of electronic sounds, and a distinctive visual style in music videos and fashion. According to Simon Reynolds, new wave music had a twitchy, agitated feel. New wave musicians often played choppy rhythm guitars with angular riffs and fast tempos; keyboards, and stop-start song structures and melodies are common, with the use of jerky rhythms, and synthesizers. Reynolds noted new-wave vocalists sound high-pitched, geeky, and suburban.
In America, new wave became widely popularized by channels like MTV, which would play British new wave music videos because most American hit records did not have music videos to play. British videos, according to head of S-Curve Records and music producer Steve Greenberg, "were easy to come by since they'd been a staple of UK pop music TV programs like Top of the Pops since the mid-70s." This rise in technology made the visual style of new wave musicians important for their success. In the early 1980s, virtually every new pop and rock act – and particularly those that employed synthesizers – were tagged as "new wave" in the United States, while the term was also later used to label bands in the British post-punk scene. The term has been described as so loose and wide-ranging as to be "virtually meaningless", according to the New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock.
A nervous, nerdy persona was a common characteristic of new wave fans, and acts such as Talking Heads, Devo, and Elvis Costello. This took the forms of robotic dancing, jittery high-pitched vocals, and clothing fashions that hid the body such as suits and big glasses. This seemed radical to audiences accustomed to post-counterculture genres such as disco dancing and macho "cock rock" that emphasized a "hang loose" philosophy, open sexuality, and sexual bravado.
New wave may be seen as an attempt to reconcile "the energy and rebellious attitude of punk" with traditional forms of pop songwriting, as seen in the rockabilly riffs and classic craftsmanship of Elvis Costello and the 1960s mod influences of the Jam. Paul Weller, who called new wave "the pop music of the Seventies", explained to Chas de Whalley in 1977:
Although new wave shares punk's do-it-yourself artistic philosophy, the musicians were more influenced by the light strains of 1960s pop while opposed to mainstream "corporate" rock, which they considered creatively stagnant, as well as the generally abrasive and political bents of punk rock. In the early 1980s, particularly in the United States, notable new wave acts embraced a crossover of pop and rock music with African and African-American styles. Adam and the Ants and Bow Wow Wow, both acts with ties to former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren, used Burundi-style drumming. Talking Heads' album Remain in Light was marketed and positively reviewed as a breakthrough melding of new wave and African styles, although drummer Chris Frantz said he found out about this supposed African influence after the fact. As the decade continued, new wave elements would be adopted by African-American musicians such as Grace Jones, Janet Jackson, and Prince, who in particular used new wave influences to lay the groundwork for the Minneapolis sound.
History
Forerunners
have been heralded for their influence on new wave. The glam and art rock inspired style of Roxy Music and Sparks were also influential to the genre alongside the works of David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Brian Eno. The work of experimental rock artists such as Captain Beefheart, Frank Zappa, and the Residents, underground psychedelic bands Lothar and the Hand People as well as Germany's krautrock and electronic-based kosmische musik scene, particularly the work of Kraftwerk, have been described as influencing or presaging the movement.The influence of avant-garde and abstract art movements such as Dada, Cubism and the Bauhaus school would also influence the visual aesthetic and sound of new wave artists, which became contemporaneous with the development of the Memphis Design aesthetic adopted by MTV and many new wave artists during the 1980s. Additionally, Peter Ivers' early output was later recognized as a precursor to new wave with Ivers contributing to the Eraserhead soundtrack and later hosting the influential show New Wave Theatre which helped popularize many early Californian new wave acts.
1970s
Origins
As early as 1973, critics including Nick Kent and Dave Marsh were using the term "new wave" to classify New York–based groups such as the Velvet Underground and New York Dolls. In the US, many of the first new wave groups were found in the early New York punk scene, with acts such as Milk 'N' Cookies, the Shirts, Mumps, Talking Heads, Mink DeVille, and Blondie who drew influences from glam, art rock, and power pop and were primarily associated with the CBGB scene. Alongside Devo and Pere Ubu who emerged out of the early Ohio punk scene, followed by Ultravox in London. Some influential bands, such as New York's Suicide and Boston's the Modern Lovers debuted even earlier, with drummer David Robinson later joining early new wave band the Cars. CBGB owner Hilly Kristal, referring to the first show by Television at his club in March 1974, said; "I think of that as the beginning of new wave".Between 1976 and 1977, the terms "new wave" and "punk" were used somewhat interchangeably.
Music historian Vernon Joynson said new wave emerged in the UK in late 1976, when many bands began disassociating themselves from punk. That year, the term gained currency when it appeared in UK punk fanzines such as Sniffin' Glue, and music weeklies such as Melody Maker and New Musical Express. In November 1976, Caroline Coon used the term "new wave" to designate music by bands that were not exactly punk but were related to the punk-music scene. The mid-1970s British pub rock scene became another source of many of the most-commercially-successful new wave acts, such as Ian Dury and Nick Lowe, as well as Ireland's Boomtown Rats.
In the US, Sire Records chairman Seymour Stein, believing the term "punk" would mean poor sales for Sire's acts who had frequently played the New York club CBGB, launched a "Don't Call It Punk" campaign in October 1977 in order to replace the term with "new wave". At the time, due to the emergence of the Sex Pistols, the American media portrayed punk rock as dangerous and violent, leading to a stigma that made music "virtually unmarketable," emerging groups who stemmed from the American punk scene, began to adopt "new wave" as a form of marketing that distanced themselves from the "punk" label. A 1977 Phonogram Records compilation album of the same name includes American punk rock bands such as the Dead Boys and Ramones alongside Talking Heads and the Runaways.
The New York Rocker, which was suspicious of the term "punk", had been using the term "new wave" since December 1976 and was the first American journal to enthusiastically use the term, at first for British acts and later for acts associated with the CBGB scene. At first, most American writers used the term "new wave" exclusively in reference to British punk acts. The music's stripped-back style and upbeat tempos, which Stein and others viewed as a much-needed return to the energetic rush of rock and roll and 1960s rock that had dwindled in the 1970s with progressive rock and stadium spectacles, attracted them to new wave.
In England, the terms "post-punk" and "new musick" were popularized and coined by Sounds magazine, with music journalists Jane Suck and Jon Savage publishing editorials in the November 26, 1977 issue of Sounds entitled "New Musick" to describe a strain of bands that were moving passed the garage rock conventions of punk rock and incorporating wider influences. The terms "post-punk" and "new wave" were used interchangeably to describe these groups before the genres perceptibly narrowed, some artists adopted synthesizers. In London, artists such as Ultravox, Elvis Costello and Gary Numan's Tubeway Army later released influential new wave albums during this period. While punk rock wielded a major influence on the popular music scene in the UK, in the US it remained a fixture of the underground.
By the end of 1977, "new wave" had replaced "punk" as the term for new underground music in the UK. In early 1978, XTC released the single "This Is Pop" as a direct response to tags such as "new wave". Songwriter Andy Partridge later stated of bands such as themselves who were given those labels; "Let's be honest about this. This is pop, what we're playing ... don't try to give it any fancy new names, or any words that you've made up, because it's blatantly just pop music. We were a new pop group. That's all."
In October 1978, the Cars released the single "My Best Friend's Girl" which was one of the first new wave singles to enter the Top 40 peaking at number 35 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart, and reaching number three in the UK. In January 1979, Blondie released "Heart of Glass" which became the first new wave single to reach number 1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and the UK Singles Chart. This success was followed by other new wave hits including M's "Pop Muzik", Tubeway Army's "Are 'Friends' Electric?", the Police's "Roxanne" and "Message in a Bottle", Gary Numan's "Cars", the Knack's "Good Girls Don't" and the Buggles' "Video Killed the Radio Star", which not only became a hit but later made history in 1981 as the first music video played on MTV.