New Wave Outpost Forum

I'm sure this has been asked before, but I'll ask it again:

What is/was it about the new wave genre that appealed to you and caused you to be a fan?

I became a fan of it in the very early days - the late 70s (I started high school in the '78-'79 year) - when there were no radio stations that were dedicated to the new wave/alternative genre. Back then, you could hear all different genres on many stations.

The first songs I can really remember that would become a part of the new wave genre were "Pop Muzik" by M, "Cars" by Gary Numan, "Cleopatra" by Adam and the Ants and "Beat Goes On/Switchin' To Glide" by The Kings. I ran out and bought the vinyl albums of those artists.

There was just something about the sound of those songs that was so different from mainstream rock 'n roll that I was immediately taken in. As I said, there were no specific stations (in SLC) that were dedicated to that genre - until about 1981 when KCGL fist hit the airwaves.

That's how it started for me. How about you folks?

[i]New Wave or nothing![/i]

weirdness+fun++dancing

when the midnight album hour played the ENTIRE brand new Devo first album instead of the usual Journey/Boston/Styx

The Cars first record in 1978
my parents purchased it for me since I liked My Best Friend's Girl
I was about 11 at the time and hooked ever since

It's very creative, experimental, and the synth gives you a trip!

Watching the B-52's on Saturday night Live did it for me.

"You just pick a chord, go twang, and you've got music." ~ Sid Vicious

http://www.nwoutpost.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=14995

Check out my blog @ http://docmuzic.blogspot.com/

[:)]An apple a day keeps the doctor away!
DR. STIRRING RHOD

All of the above plus the fact that the punk and new wave girls were much hotter than the metal chicks.

it just seemed like a natural progression from disco for me. Loved the Donna Summer/Moroder electronic collaborations, and then Blondie slipped in Heart of Glass, which I was obsessed with, as well as "I Was Made for Lovin You", the disco rock fusion attempt by Kiss. My older cousin bought me Parallel Lines, and I was hooked on that album. Then I loved "Let's Go" by the Cars, "whip it" by Devo, "my sharona" by the Knack, and "Cars" by Gary Numan, and my older brother, who was into Led Zeppelin and 70s Heart and stuff like that, for some reason bought the B-52s Wild Planet album and I became obsessed with listening to Private Idaho in his room with him. By then, it was pretty much inevitable that I was feeling the new wave vibe, even though I didn't know it was 'new wave' at the time. It started to become clear to me that the 80s were going to be different than the 70s disco era when I got the K-tel record "Rock 80"...

I'm generally drawn to counter-cultural / alt-cultural / subcultural means of expression. I'm a person that usually needs to be challenged. I find mainstream culture too easy to like and group-think usually repulses me. Alot of designers I know feel the same way. It's a big part of our job to be constantly thinking outside the box, reinventing whatever client we're taking on. This philosophy typically spills over into our private lives.

Alot of New Wave has been the basis for subsequent musical movements and as such, many New Wave bands are "musician's bands" or "producer's bands". What could be cooler than following a trend-setter rather than a trend-follower? Plus there's the whole underdog story to these bands which has always inspired me.

<a href="http://s7.photobucket.com/albums/y271/marvymarv/?action=view¤t=tick.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y271/marvymarv/tick.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

[quote][i]Originally posted by i_like_lectric_motors[/i]
<br>All of the above plus the fact that the punk and new wave girls were much hotter than the metal chicks.
[/quote]

I totally agree.

Yes, that too. It's nonconventional and against the mainstream.

Asymmetrical hairdos

Hearing the Smiths' "How Soon Is Now" breaking through some radio static and overriding the bland country usually played on that frequency. Someone was finally singing exactly what I felt and it was love from then on.

Just Fun Music! No Angst and Screaming like a Devil lol..

<a href="http://media.photobucket.com/image/depeche%20mode/sober0406/depeche-mode.jpg?o=20" target="_blank"><img src="http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m1/sober0406/depeche-mode.jpg"></a>

the synths and the beat mainly.

I thought the synthesizer was about the most important advancement in music in the 1960's and wished it would be used more. I always loved Kraftwerk, Jean Michel Jarre, Tomita, Mike Oldfield, and other acts that featured the synthesizer prominently in the 70's. And I also loved the acts that were not afraid to experiment musically in the 70's such as David Bowie, 10CC, and Brian Eno.

The New Wavers took that sound and put a beat to it. I couldn't ask for a better utopia of music at the time.