rebuilding the rights of statues – tv show (hang the police)

i started reading wilson neate’s “pink flag” from the 33 1/3 band biography series. this one is, as you may guess, about wire. wire, like gang of four or devo, were always considered as the strange art students version of punk appendix to the early punk movement by me. punk in a very unpunk way. this book taught me that they were unpunk in a very punk way. it also got me to listening to wire again. and not just “12XU”.
wire were surely the first post punk band because even though coming from a punk background they tried to leave that behind right from the beginning.
and without this conscious decision to also expand behind the limits of punk by wire post punk would have been a failure. the music scene needed, and still needs, the punk attitude. but punk also needed the wire attitude to question the new rules.
bands like bauhaus or joy division would never have happened without punk but they could also not have happened within punk.

the next impact, almost as if not more important than punk was the internet. punk made creating music possible for everyone, no matter what his or hers musical skills were. the internet made distributing this music possible for everyone. and that on a level that is way beyond tape distribution. with platforms like myspace or last.fm you not only don’t need a record contract, you don’t even need any contact in places on the other side of the planet to get your music there. or from there.

i don’t remember what the initial tag was that led me to rebuilding the rights of on last.fm but i fell in love with their music immediately. tv show combines the bass lines of early bauhaus with the dissonant vocals of early siouxie and the banshees. both are delivered by liu min. whereas hua dong contributes with, and that unlike bauhau’s peter murphy, very detached, very sterile vocals and a dissonant guitar. what impresses my most is the complete absence of the merest hint of the bands origin. this song is definitely not what i’d expect from a band from peking. but it seems i have too recalibrate my perception of chinas music and art scene. a friend of mine who just returned from hongkong told me that peking is the place to be in china when you’re into underground music. so i’ll try to see what else might make it’s way into my headphones.

rebuilding the rights of statues just released their first full length and i’m curious whether the kept their style or went further post punk.




rebuilding the rights of myspace