Abstract/Summary

The popular media myth is that the protest song and the protest singer are in decline. It is unclear how anyone would know; there is no standard measure for the presence or absence of protest songs. Nonetheless, the myth raises an interesting question about how we might explain the rise and fall of protest music. Is it a matter of context, of exogenous changes in the state of the world? Or is it determined by internal processes, endogenous shifts in genres, or the music business more broadly? Taking our lead (and our title) from Richard Peterson’s article, “Why 1955?,” this chapter examines the case of punk in the UK from 1976 to 1978. It reveals that internal political and musical factors are just as important as the broader social and political trends (rising unemployment, industrial decline, new right policies) to understanding punk’s moment of protest.