No Wave: The Definitive History

No Wave was a short-lived but influential art music, film, performance art, video and contemporary art scene that had its beginnings during the mid-1970s in New York City and continued through the 1980s and into the early 1990s alongside punk subculture.[1] The term No Wave is in part satiric wordplay rejecting the commercial elements of the then-popular New Wave genre - a term imported into the New York contemporary artworld by Diego Cortez (born, James Allan Curtis, Geneva, Illinois) in a show he curated called "New York/New Wave" held at the Institute for Art and Urban Resources (1981). The No Wave term also highlights the music's experimental nature; as No Wave music belonged to no fixed style or genre.

Contents
1 Styles and characteristics
2 No Wave Cinema
3 No Wave musicians
4 1990 on
5 Compilations
6 See also
7 References
8 ReferencesTexts
9 External links


Styles and characteristics

In many ways, No Wave is not a clearly definable musical genre with consistent features. Various groups drew on such disparate styles as funk, jazz, blues, punk rock, avant garde, and experimental. There are, however, some elements common to most No Wave music, such as abrasive atonal sounds, repetitive driving rhythms, and a tendency to emphasize musical texture over melody - typical of the early downtown music of La Monte Young. No Wave lyrics often focused on nihilism and confrontation.
No Wave is often better defined in terms of the artistic environment in which it thrived (the downtown scene of minimal art) and the character of performances typical to its context. No Wave performances drew heavily on performance art and as a result were often examples of a highly theatrical minimalism in their renditions.
In 1978 a series of punk rock influenced loud noise music was held at New York’s Artists’ Space that led to the Brian Eno-produced recording No New York. This recording was the first attempt to define the no wave sound, documenting The Contortions, Teenage Jesus & the Jerks, Mars and DNA. [3]
The Noise Fest was an influential festival of art noise music curated by Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth at the New York City art space White Columns in June 1981. Sonic Youth made their first live appearances at this show. [4] Each night three to five acts performed, including Glenn Branca, Rhys Chatham, Jeffrey Lohn, Dog Eat Dog, Built on Guilt, Rudolph Grey, the Avant Squares, Mofungo, Red Decade, Robin Crutchfield's Dark Day, Ad Hoc Rock, Smoking Section, Chinese Puzzle, Avoidance Behaviour, and Sonic Youth. [5]
No Wave had a notable influence on noise and industrial bands who formed after, like Big Black, Lev Six, Helmet, and Live Skull. The Theoretical Girls heavily influenced early Sonic Youth, who then emerged from this scene by creating music that eventually reached mass audiences and critical acclaim. Also for new bands like Liars, Ex Models, Neptune, Erase Errata the influence of the No Wave scene was important.
Simon Reynolds, author of Rip It Up and Start Again: Postpunk 1978-1984, wrote:
And although "affection" is possibly an odd word to use in reference to a bunch of nihilists, I do feel fond of the No Wave people. James Chance's music actually stands up really well, I think; there are great moments throughout Lydia Lunch's long discography, and Suicide's records are just beautiful.
—Listen to James Chance & the Contortions, "Contort Yourself," 1979; and Suicide, "Touch Me," 1980, [6]
No Wave music inspired the Speed Trials noise rock series organized by Live Skull members in May 1983 at White Columns with the music of The Fall, Beastie Boys, Live Skull, Sonic Youth, Lydia Lunch, Elliot Sharp, Swans and Arto Lindsay. This was followed by the after-hours Speed Club that was fleetingly established at ABC No Rio. [7]

No Wave Cinema
No Wave Cinema was an underground film movement coming out of Tribeca and the East Village, Manhattan at the time. No Wave filmmakers included: Amos Poe, Eric Mitchell, James Nares, Vivienne Dick, Scott B and Beth B, and Seth Tillett (among others) and led to the Cinema of Transgression and work by Nick Zedd and Richard Kern.

No Wave musicians
Glenn Branca
Rhys Chatham
Bush Tetras
James Chance/James White and the Blacks
The Contortions
Dark Day
The Del-Byzanteens
Lizzy Mercier Descloux
DNA
8-Eyed Spy
Friction
J. G. Thirlwell
Lydia Lunch
Jody Harris
Mars
Massacre
Judy Nylon
Rosa Yemen
Sonic Youth
The Static
Swans
Teenage Jesus & the Jerks
Theoretical Girls
Ut

1990 on
The No Wave movement continues to have a far-reaching impact on the American anti-culture music scene. In a foreword to the book No Wave, Weasel Walter wrote of the movement's ongoing influence,
I began to express myself musically in a way that felt true to myself, constantly pushing the limits of idiom or genre and always screaming "Fuck You!" loudly in the process. It's how I felt then and I still feel it now. The ideals behind the (anti-) movement known as No Wave were found in many other archetypes before and just as many afterwards, but for a few years around the late 1970s, the concentration of those ideals reached a cohesive, white-hot focus.
—[8]
In 2004 Scott Crary made a documentary, Kill Your Idols about the No wave scene. [9] In 2008, three books on the No Wave scene were published: Soul Jazz's New York Noise[10], Marc Masters' No Wave[11], and Thurston Moore and Byron Coley's No Wave: Post-Punk. Underground. New York. 1976-1980"[12].

Compilations
All Guitars (1985) Tellus Audio Cassette Magazine #10, Harvestworks.org
Just Another Asshole #5 (1981) compilation LP (CD reissue 1995 on Atavistic # ALP39CD), producers: Barbara Ess & Glenn Branca
N.Y. No Wave (2003) ZE France B00009OKOP
New York Noise (2003) Soul Jazz B00009OYSE
New York Noise, Vol. 2 (2006) Soul Jazz B000CHYHOG
New York Noise, Vol. 3 (2006) Soul Jazz B000HEZ5CC
Noise Fest Tape (1982) TSoWC, White Columns
No New York (1978) Antilles, (2006) Lilith, B000B63ISE
Speed Trials (1984) Homestead Records HMS-011

See also
ZE Records
Noise music
ABC No Rio
Colab
Tellus Audio Cassette Magazine (selective issues)
Mudd Club
Tier 3

References
^ a b c [1983] (1995) in Romanowski, P.: The New Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll, H. George-Warren & J. Pareles, Revised edition, New York: Fireside, p. 717. ISBN 0-684-81044-1.
^ Romanowski, p.717: "It seemed to have had its short lifespan built in from its inception."
^ [http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/article/feature/31364/Interview_Interview_James_Chance James Chance Pitchfork
^ Simon Reynolds, Rip It Up and Start Again: Post-punk 1978-1984 (2006) Penguin
^ Marc Masters, (2007) No Wave London, Black Dog Publishing, pp. 170-171
^ Rip It Up and Start Again. - By Stephen Metcalf and Simon Reynolds - Slate Magazine
^ Carlo McCormick, "The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene, 1974–1984", Princeton University Press, 2006
^ Masters, Marc. (2007) No Wave London, UK: Black Dog Publishing
^ Kill Your Idols (2004)
^ Soul Jazz Records — New York Noise Book — Art and Music from the New York Underground 1978-88
^ No Wave: - All Books - Black Dog Publishing
^ Harry N. Abrams, Inc. :: No Wave :: Abrams Image :: Thurston Moore, Byron Coley

ReferencesTexts
Carlo McCormick, The Downtown Book: The New York Art Scene, 1974–1984, Princeton University Press, 2006
Marc Masters, No Wave, Black Dog Publishing, London, 2007
Alan Moore and Marc Miller, eds., ABC No Rio Dinero: The Story of a Lower East Side Art Gallery, Collaborative Projects, NY, 1985

External links
No Wave at AllMusicGuide
New York No Wave Photo Archive
Official MySpace page for Kill Your Idols, a documentary about the Cinema of Transgression & the No Wave scene