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After a skateboard rolls past me, I hear a crash and I look up to see a body on the concrete. Stopping the skateboard with my foot, I pick it up and see the heap peal himself from the ground. Holding out the board, I notice what could only be described as a mullet-hawk, with blond strands of hair laying flat against his sweat-soaked neck. His thin, worn t-shirt clung to his chest and appeared gray, but in all probability was faded black.

 

“Thanks,” he says.

 

I quickly fire back, “Are you a punk?”

 

Justin Campbell, a New Hampshire native attending the University of Utah, smiles wide and exposes the gap in his pearly smile, “I listen to punk music,” he says as he weaves his body and rolls away with knowledge I can only hope to discover: the truth about a reoccurring phenomenon.

 

Although social trends ebb and flow quicker than I can pay them off on my credit card, one such trend never seems to fade entirely out of rotation: The punk scene. It has been a staple of and often linked-directly to the urban jungles of the United States, somehow encompassing the conservative citizens of Salt Lake City.

 

The collective punk, amalgamated by plaid and patches, brightly dyed hair and Mohawks is kept running with a heart full of rebellion and a mind sprinkled with anarchy and chaos. This narrow line must be stepped, not by the wisest philosophers, but by young virtuosos in a youth subculture stereotypically defined by fast music and violence. What is this thing called punk and where did my insatiable desire to uncover it come from?

 

When I moved to Salt Lake City from a small town in Northern Missouri, the only knowledge I had of Salt Lake and Utah was construed from a single artifact: “SLC Punk.” The film documents the wrath of patriot loathing, anarchy hungry Utah punks in the 80’s  and opened my eyes wide enough to cramp my forehead. It informed me that I would soon be in for a big change. Oddly, the only change that I encountered once I arrived was the realization that I’m a left-lefty-leftist-liberal, not a democrat from the river bluffs of the muddy Missouri. The writing on the wall never screamed anarchy, but rather politely informed me that there was no skateboarding allowed. With my stint in the Beehive State drawing to a close, I needed some answers. Does punk simply end at blue-spiked hair and fish net gloves, or is this only where it begins? I won’t be fooled by Utah’s squeaky-clean surface; I will dig deep and unearth this healthy subculture.

 

To realize the present I needed to understand the past. With blue Mohawks on the brain, eye make-up to rival Tammy Faye and steel-toed boots to guide me, I knew I was one-step closer to my prey.

 

The Past of Punk

 

The origins of punk are rooted in England and are most often associated to the late 1960s as a reaction to the hippy subculture and the bland, corporate rock of the period. Much before this time, though, the term punk was used with a slightly different connotation.

 

In George Chauncey’s non-fictional, “Gay New York,” a West Virginia prison inmate in 1892 described the term punk as being birthed from the mind of Shakespeare, saying “Know the place, ‘He’s neither man nor woman; he’s punk.’ Well, Billy knew. A punk’s a boy that’ll…give himself to a man.”

 

Whether Shakespeare thought the term punk had a sexual implication is solely hearsay, but somehow the term penetrated the high prison fences and seeped into the mind of the free world. When the term reached the other side, it was lacking the sexual undertone it once had in the prison system. The criminality associated with the term remained and transformed punk to exemplify a young, violent hoodlum.

 

By the 1970s punk asserted itself in what it wasn’t, a hippie. The punk of this time took the violent criminal element and turned to music characterized by short, angry vocals and bitter political and social commentary emphasized by hostile volume.

 

Rob Nish, the author and publisher of Resolution, a straightedge lifestyle zine who is currently touring with the Californian band, Scare Tactic, deviates from this view. “I’m not too sure that the Clash, and the other bands from England were too worried about the hippies when they started all this. It was more about rebellion,” says Nish. “But it’s not like punk could be around for 30 years and be the same as when it started.”

 

Touch. The punks of today, ostensible neo-punks, are attributed as a backlash to the grunge music typical of the early 1990s. These newfangled punks moved from rebelling against social movements to musical ones. Adam Speer, a self-proclaimed punker of the early 90s says, “A punk rocker is a person who does not accept social norms; he’s a free-thinker with a critical eye to the world around him. “Could it be that my former college philosophy professor was a punk? I began to tunnel deeper.

 

 “I remember gutter punks,” says former punker Bianka Juchelka, swiping a strand of white-bleached hair out of her face. “They were classic assholes,” she continued, “with their Doc Martins, plaid pants, jackets with patches attached by safety pins and, of course, a Mohawk.”

 

This new evidence would disband notions of a former punk philosophy professor, or would it? According to Jack Stephenson it wouldn’t.

 

A is for Anarchy: Is it a social movement?

Staring at me through hip silver-rimmed spectacles Stephenson asserts, “I’m a punk, and my punk friends from California say that I am the biggest punk because if you looked at me you couldn’t say, ‘Hey, there’s a punk.’”

 

Ogling the blue and red Tommy Hilfiger t-shirt and khaki pants, he was right: not in fitting with my presumptions of a punk. This notion was also contradictory to my cinematic research, including such punk classics as SLC Punk and Sid and Nancy. A punk, at least in 2004, doesn’t have to believe in anarchy.  Speer reinforces this idea. “You can definitely be a punk without believing in anarchy.  Punk is more of an attitude: anarchy gets you nowhere,” says Speer.

 

This holding true, punk is about rebellion and not necessarily anarchy. Rebellion in Salt Lake City, then, should carry the vices often shunned by the overwhelming conservative views carried by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

 

“In a country of lost souls rebellion comes hard. But in a religiously oppressive city, where half it's population isn't even of that religion, it comes like fire,” quoting a line from Stevo in SLC Punk.

 

The ideals of the straightedge lifestyle, on the contrary, are highly associated with the punk scene in Utah and complement traditional standards.

 

Straightedge refers to a philosophy that’s most essential doctrines encourage a drug-free lifestyle. It developed as a derivative of the rock/hardcore punk scene of the 80’s. “It definitely makes you think that LDS has something to do with it,” says Nish. “but it doesn’t. When a kid goes to a show they might think, ‘I don’t want to have crutches and vices. I want to do my own thing and not be wasting my time being drunk.’”

Punks relate themselves to organized religion? Say it ain’t so.

“There is definitely a connection with religious repression and being a punk in Utah. It is a reaction to the conservative culture; straight edge came out of punk rock,” says Speer.

 

After a little chasing Campbell tells me that he is not into anarchy and not necessarily rebellion either. “It’s hard to rebel against your parents when they are from that generation, too,” he says. “I just like punk music.”

It does seem possible that the ideas of punk rebellion have come full-circle. That in the punk scene, not drinking or doing drugs and being tattoo-free would be a rebellion to what the typical punk is about today.

 

“How much did you pay for your first tattoo?” Nish turns to ask a band-mate with no audible answer. “The first one that you paid to get done,” he clarifies. “I mean, tattoos are more socially accepted now. You know how it goes; you can get them done in the mall. If I am on stage and am ink-free then I am going to stand out, but 20 years ago it would have been the other way around.”

 

Nish is not sure whether he will get a tattoo in the future, but he is the only one in his band that doesn’t have “ink.”

If the punks of Utah are rebelling against rebellion, could punk of today be but a trend and these neo-punks only trendy?

 

 

Posers and Sell-outs: Is it about the clothes?

According to an explicitly described revelation in SLC Punk by the blue-haired donning main character Stevo, if you ask a person if they are a punk and they say, “Yes,” they are a poser, but if you ask someone if they are a poser and they say, “Yes,” then they are a punk. One more time through for clarity – got it. Citing this theory: If you are a self-proclaimed punk, you are really a poser. “Posers do it for the fashion, without understanding the concepts,” says Speers.

 

Inquiring about the rational for his Mohawk, Campbell asserts, “I had a Mohawk when I was five.” Then pointing behind us he adds, “Look, there’s another kid with a Mohawk.” Although the “other kid’s” Mohawk was more of a take-my-spiky-hair-and-squish-it-together-in-the-middle-today look, and not a true Mohawk, Campbell was accurate in his detection of punk becoming more mainstream.

 

In the 1970s dress was optional, but intended to shock. Such dress included plastic garbage bags and old school uniforms. The hair of a punk was dyed bright colors, in Mohawks or bright plumes referred to as “liberty spikes.” Seemingly ironic during the time when punks did believe in and attempted to achieve anarchy in their respective cities. A paradoxical occurrence like this one could end with a punk getting the modern-day of being called out at high noon: being labeled a poser.

 

The last thing in the world a punk could want is to be called a poser or a sell-out. Examples of this could be going corporate instead of staying underground, or if you’re a band; making money off your fans.  Nish defends himself by saying, “I’m not a sell-out if I make a hundred t-shirts at 3 bucks a pop and sell them at a show for 10 dollars, because if I didn’t how would I pay for my instruments or travel expenses. A band is a brand.”

There was hope for me to blend in yet, I had a band t-shirt. But I was sure New Kids on the Block didn’t believe in rebellion. I would have to make a trip to the local mall, where surely I could find a suitable punk ensemble.

“Some kids who want to make money and are smart know there is a market out there,” says Nish. “Someone could make a t-shirt and go and sell it at Hot Topic or something, but it is only worth half the meaning at the store.

 

My ego definitely shrank at the sound of this, and I began to rub at the black that encircled my eyes and wish I hadn’t bought this full-length mesh bodysuit and had “Sex Pistol” tattooed on my arm. I picked up the yellow pages and turned to “L,” for laser removal. 

 

The Chicken or the Egg: Is it the music?

 

Punk music has been played hard and fast since the 70s. Groups like the Ramones, the Clash, Sex Pistols and Buzzcocks pioneered the way for what is now known as punk music. My mind wondered though, was it the first punk who made punk music, or simply that punk music bred punks?

“The punk came first,” says Speer. “He turned to music as an outlet.”

 

Nish, a guitarist, disagrees. “When you learn how to play an instrument, some of the easiest songs to play are punk songs, like Green Day.”

 

Using music as an outlet and then finding out that the most simplistic songs to play are punk songs could turn you on to that genre, but after your skills improve the reasons for continuing to play punk music seem unclear. “Once a kid starts playing punk music some guy at school will ask if he is into this music or this band, or he sees a t-shirt and goes to a show, and then he sees how it really is,” says Nish. “It’s not handed over to you: you find punk music.”

People have always been drawn to other people of similar interests and punk music is no different.

 

“It’s a niche for people to be a part of,” says Speer. “It starts small and grows.”

 

This mantra is fitting to the way the punk music industry is run. Nish receives hundreds of CDs from grass root record labels for each issue of Resolution zine. In the last issue alone, he reviewed over 150 bands.

 

“If a band wants to push it to the next level they can, and get corporate record labels, but a lot of Salt Lake City bands that I interview are about the music and having fun,” says Nish.

 

Punks have a lot to say about their social and political environment and the way they can express that successfully is through music. That’s why essentially punk music breeds punks, but I needed to substantiate this for myself and my quarry in its natural environment.

 

 

The Punk Show: It’s all about the mosh pit.

 

It was time to put all that I had learned about punk to good use. I would now watch the masters at play and dissect the movement and rituals of a live punk show.

 

The stage seemed to be held in place from 500 or more bodies leaning to hold it erect. Red, yellow and green lights flashed capriciously through the hoard of sweat soaked gatherers. The band took the stage as the rumble of the audience turned to a roar. The guitars started in with a hard-synthesized melody and the drums quickly followed. With the onset of this driving beat, the tired faces of the audience snapped into wide-mouthed grins and suddenly taken by what mimicked a wave pool: energy began to flow.

The vocalist grabbed the microphone stand in a fit of fury with a hand already grasping a necktie. He began to shake, not in Elvis Presley fashion, but as if he were having convulsions. He lifted his right leg and stomped heavily on the stage making sound that was immediately absorbed by the heavy guitars and screaming audience.  He dressed in black from head to toe with bright red piping on the sleeves of his half-unbuttoned shirt. The clothes clung to his body, suctioning to his skin with heavy perspiration that also dripped from the tips of his short wavy hair.

 

The mid-section of the audience began to revolve, almost magnetized in that they rammed shoulders and punched when there was enough room to raise an elbow. A few listeners against the stage were smoking, but the audience was high on the intense vocals that I couldn’t make out and the drums that could make a heart beat with every strike of the snare.

 

Each member of the band waited two bars before screaming into their respective microphones, their mouths open wide enough to fit two inside. The drummer’s face was manic and intense and he never looked away from his kick drum.

 

As quick as it had started it was over. I hadn’t noticed any tattoos or anarchy signs, no track marks or fists adorned with large black “X”s. A rush settled over me and I knew I had to see it again, but something that Campbell said seemed to ring in my mind: “All that matters is the mosh pit. When you’re in there everything else doesn’t matter.”

 

As far as I was concerned, the ultimate act of punk was to watch The Clash and maybe there is no better way to rebel against the system than watching a punk band on tape.