Punk is … the transgressive politics of boredom In Memoriam: Ari Hirvonen a.k.a. Sally Flesh (1960 – 2021) This article was initially published in three parts for a series on Punk, Law, Resistance in CLT in 2011. Pawn in their game And that’s the way they...
I came late to riot grrrl. It was 2004 and there was a rush on tickets in Brisbane to see a band called Le Tigre. It seemed like every lesbian in the city was going. “What kind of music is it?” I asked my then girlfriend. “They’re girls”, she answered, “they shout a...
Boring life What a boring life /How could anyone surviveBoring life.(The Slits, “A Boring Life”) Punk spoke not of ideals and dreams but of boredom. For punks, the 1960s hippie dream was dead and the socialist utopias were as boring as the ideologies of...
My new rose, lets go Hey ho, let’s go Hey ho, let’s go […] They’re piling in the back seat They’re generating steam heat Pulsating to the back beat The Blitzkrieg Bop. (Ramones, “Blitzkrieg Bop”) Even if the lyrics of punk did not always...
Pawn in their game And that’s the way they try and run this land How they hold you down and keep you in hand You’re just a pawn in their game. (Stiff Little Fingers, “Law and Order”) Being nothing other than a pawn in their game – who...
