New Wave Discussion

[rkm]

When did it start, in your opinion?
When was it all over, in your opinion?
How do you personally define New Wave?
Best New Wave Albums?
Worst New Wave Albums?
Best New Wave Band?
Worst New Wave Band?

[bobbyb5]

New wave is one of those things where the more you try to find the definition of it, the less clear it becomes. If you go back and read things that were written at the time, seems to be it was a million different things to different people. The best I can figure out the first things that were actually called New Wave was in the late 70s, and people seemed to Define it as a kind of offshoot of punk, and sometimes Punk and New Wave were used interchangeably. But by time the 80s came it seemed to mean something else completely. What we call synth-pop today a lot of people called New Wave at the time. Even the Post Punk bands people called New Wave.

I most often hear people call The Cars or Blondie the first real New Wave bands, although Blondie actually preceded it by a few years. But I would still call them the first big-name New Wave bands, or at least the first popular ones. Along with Elvis Costello, The Police, Talking Heads, B-52s and people like that.
And I would say it ended about 1984 or so, just because people stopped using the term.

Anyway, when I hear somebody say New Wave, I think of these.
These are some of my favorite ones.


Candy-O by The Cars


Wild Planet by The B-52's


Replicas by Tubeway Army


Blondie by Blondie


Talking Heads: 77 by Talking Heads


Argybargy by Squeeze


Stateless by Lene Lovich


Drums And Wires by XTC


Wreckless Eric by Wreckless Eric


The Psychedelic Furs by The Psychedelic Furs


Labour Of Lust by Nick Lowe


The Hurting by Tears For Fears


Reach The Beach by The Fixx


Pretenders by The Pretenders


A Flock Of Seagulls by A Flock Of Seagulls


Rio by Duran Duran


The Photos by The Photos

[Yann]

We love New Wave in France !

As early New Wave, I'd say Magazine (Shot by Both Sides single for example, January 1978)

Typical New Wave :
Enola Gay OMD (1980)
Dancing with Tears in my Eyes_Ultravox (1984)

In France: Tombé pour la France Etienne Daho (1985)

[bobbyb5]

[Boltzmann]

I credit David Bowie and Iggy Pop for laying the basics of new wave with their album The Idiot and especially ‘China Girl’. It was also the album that inspired Joy Division who constructed the sound that basically dominated the chart throughout most part of the ‘80s. But of course, you could hear it already in Blondie, The Ramones, Patti Smith, Iggy’s older stuff, and even The Velvet Underground if you try hard enough.

I recognize new wave by its iconic beat often performed by a drum machine and it just sounds a bit as a poppy-er punk, which was probably what die-hard punkers hated about it. Basically, I would define it as rock/punk music with drum machines, and if more types of synths are used it becomes synthpop, just to keep definitions as simple as possible. But when I hear that people call Sonic Youth new wave, I’m not sure anymore where the boundary lies with post-punk.

What’s also funny, the song ‘Do It Again’ by The Beach Boys from ‘69 has a beat that sounds an awful lot like the iconic new wave beat of the ‘80s. It also sounds like they used a drum machine, but they recorded a drum and let it “echo” like 4/5 times with a fraction of a second between them. Crazy mf’s they were.

[Fischman]

I thought of New Wave much like I thought of Disco a half decade earlier--a sort of de-evolution subgenre of a larger genre of music, made not only technically simpler but also artistically more sterile. It was something to be mocked as an inferior flash in the pan.

As the years have passed, I first softened my stance and learned to enjoy some disco, and subsequently new wave, on a nostalgic level. As more years passed, I came so appreciate some for the music itself.

While I'll never be a big fan, I do listen to a lot of Joe Jackson, as well as plenty of rock that was able to absorb some new wave influence without losing its soul.

[dihansse]

[Graeme2]

[Graeme2]

Is new wave not more of a US term? Like when I used to read the music press I'd never see Duran, OMD or Magazine described as New Wave.

[bobbyb5]