Rave Culture, The Music Issue
The Decline of Western Civilization is a haphazardly thrown together documentary on the Punk Scene in LA in the 80s. The whole scene is one giant ball of angst, fury, and being really fucked up. A friend who grew up then and there said, “I went to a show, and I came out going, “I am really not that angry, man..” so he ended up being a deadhead instead.
Same thing really, it’s still a subculture and refusing to be part of the mainstream. It’s all about escaping from what we’ve been told we should do.
The scene partly grew out of the disillusioning fact of living with Regan as the governor for so long, and it grew to what it was because he then became president two years later, spreading the pain far and wide. Then he joined forces with Maggie, which made them such a force for the next eight years, which maybe why all the kids growing up then, made such pissed off music a decade later too.
I just thought it was very apt my friends and I watched that video the day Orange Alert was put into place, the first time since September 11th. I think it’s very apt I have been talking about different music scenes and then a bit about how I didn’t started tuneing out as well as people I know who didn’t want to participate in a bunk system. And even before all Saddam got arrested, bringing this whole thing back to the forefront, I was already saying, that Glutter was about not buying in, and how a lot of us are embarrassed of the human race. No wonder, I woke up one morning and decided to go the Burning Man.
I don’t even know why some people feel surprised that I feel that way coz the very second post I ever made was anti-government.
My government, who trying to take away our free speech in Hong Kong, like five posts down, I started saying we deserved democracy.. Which at that time was the first time the issue was raised as publicly and vocally since the Student Movement in 1989. Then I went onto blast all those fools in the media, and in the letters to the editors who didn’t support our cause.
And now, as China clamps down on Cyber Dissidents within the mainland, it just makes me realize more and more how precarious my freedom is and maybe my ranting about not wanting to be put in jail for saying what I had been saying wasn’t so far from the truth if Article 23 passes. The border is constantly merging, and I am a Chinese Citizen after all.
Music was my first release out of what I perceived to be the conservative atmosphere I was being forced to go to school in and why I couldn’t wait to get out. Seems apt I escaped into the nether burgeoning world of the rave scene, all the while still loving what Seattle was putting out. Well since things aren’t going so well. I can look forward to some good music in about another six, seven years time, at least some good can come out of this.
Anyway, I suppose this also serves at a bit of a Glutter Retrospective for the end of the year also.
Yan Sham-Shackleton Online 