Best Punk Album in The World...Ever

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Partly political, conceptual, supple, ambitious – the record features not one, but two nine-minute songs – catchy and complete, American Idiot is the sound of a group testing both themselves and the boundaries of the genre they so capably represent. This is what Telegraph readers said: Each night before taking to the stage The Interrupters prepare for their show by watching the British film Dance Craze. Featuring music from The Specials, The Selecter and Madness, among others, the documentary from 1981 gives a clue as to the young LA band’s motivation when it comes to finding a groove. While Johnny Rotten sang about anarchy with all the comprehension of a child playing with a hand-grenade – although not even a child would have considered rhyming the word ‘anarchist’ with ‘antichrist’ – for Crass such matters were far more serious. During a career of infamy and provocation, the Epping collective produced a homemade tape that purported to contain a private conversation between Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan – the Prime Minister was made aware of its existence – and had their music criticised in the House of Commons. With The Feeding Of The 5000, they laid down a marker for hardcore militancy for generations to come. 26. Social Distortion, Somewhere Between Heaven And Hell (1992)

The Best Punk Album in the WorldEver, Part 2 - AllMusic The Best Punk Album in the WorldEver, Part 2 - AllMusic

Propelled by the melodic and mischievous songwriting of Glen Danzig, the Misfits played songs about Martians and zombies with the kind of revelry that Ed Wood Jr. might have brought to The Beach Boys. Silly, yes; a classic, certainly. 13. The Damned, Damned Damned Damned (1977)

It ended in a mess, obviously, with guitarist Steve Jones and bassist Sid Vicious addicted to heroin, the latter up on a charge of murder for a crime in Manhattan that he probably didn’t commit. But by then Johnny Rotten had formed Public Image Ltd. and found a wildly different way to continue his one-man war with everything, including himself. 1. Green Day, American Idiot (2004)

The Best British Punk Albums | GQ The Best British Punk Albums | GQ

They were the unlikeliest of saviors. Suffer was the band’s first album for five years – its predecessor had sold in the hundreds – and their singer, Greg Graffin, was a full-time student at UCLA (today he is a lecturer in evolution at Cornell University). His co-songwriter, Brett Gurewitz, had spent years learning to produce music; when the time came to record his own band, the results were powerful and rich.Prior to the release of American Idiot, Rob Cavallo called a meeting at the headquarters of Warner Bros. Records in Burbank, California, for the company’s press officers and sales team. As well producing Green Day’s seventh album, Cavallo was also the president of the label. Beloved of everyone that has heard it, …And Out Come The Wolves is the finest American punk record of the nineties. It also happens to be only the third native release of its kind to have attained platinum status in its country of origin.

The Best Punk Album In The WorldEver! 2 by Various Artists The Best Punk Album In The WorldEver! 2 by Various Artists

On an LP that can barely contain its own fury, singer Dave Dictor sings about animal rights, transvestite rights, police oppression – “what you gonna do? The mafia in blue, hunting for queers, n_____s, and you” – the craven morality of slumlords, and, even, the idea that John Wayne was a Nazi. The past tense is important, cos he’s “not any more”, not since “life evened the score”, anyway. Described as ‘a case study in calculated cruelty’, Converge have carved a celebrated career making the kind of music that ought to carry a government health warning. You Fail Me, the New Englanders’ fifth album, is a work of astounding brutality from a band with the musical chops required to drive their needles purposefully into the red. As aggravating as earache, this is much more than noise for its own sake. 36. Stiff Little Fingers, Inflammable Material (1979) With the release of Frankenchrist, the third album from the Dead Kennedys, the US authorities decided they’d had just about enough of the country’s most provocative punk band. Aggrieved at the decision to include a poster of H.R. Giger’s painting Penis Landscape in the inner sleeve, the group were charged with violating the Californian penal code.

Originally released in a – yes – metal box, the band considered separating with sandpaper the three 12” discs onto which their hypnotic and dependably challenging songs were pressed. All fun and games, but the legacy of PiL endured; the dreamscape guitar work of Keith Levene in particular can be heard throughout the 1980s as replicated by REM, The Cult, and even The Smiths. 15. Dead Kennedys, Frankenchrist (1985) Sometimes I’m a bit jealous of the certainty that we had in the nineties, the way we said ‘this is the way things are,’” Lyxzen said, five years after the Swedish group had re-formed. “Now I’m more like, ‘I think this is the way things are.’” 5. The Clash, London's Calling (1979) The Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. Please review our