Michael Younker – Bad News
People who don’t run fast enough from a terrible town that they grew up in, from terrible friends and family, or from an awful job are condemned to be stuck in it for life. It’s only the ones that would prefer to starve, to have nobody to help them and nobody to call upon, that are worth getting a better shot at life. Waste the energy and dissatisfaction you have in your youth at your own peril.
The same principle applies to punk and punk-adjacent music. Middle-aged people don’t form punk bands unless they’ve been playing in one for years. If they’ve got to that point in their lives, it’s likely that they’ve reached a certain level of comfort and just want to play pop and classic rock songs while having a beer with the boys. All the anger they might’ve had has been wasted away.
Michael Younker is angry and being screwed over by life. But he’s not a psychopath. He won’t just yell at you all of his troubles without throwing a few jokes in, letting you know that he’s going to be alright, and delivering some nice melodies to go along with it. “Bad News” is a song about a terrible relationship, and you believe Younker when he sings it. But you also believe that all the nervous energy that powers the vocals and the fuzz guitar will be used for Michael to find something better. Even anger can be fun, and it can certainly be fuel.
Running Man – One Wrong Move
I lie told long enough begins to resemble the truth in the eyes of many. But it is still a lie. One of the popular ones thrown around in respectable music documentaries and fancy gear boards is that the classic punk bands never knew how to play their instruments.
That, of course, wouldn’t exactly explain why so many of those records earn new fans every year or why they sound so good. It wouldn’t explain why some of these bands took their limited ability to the stadium stages or why many of those punk songs get played on the radio.
Nah, punk rock may not include many time changes or blistering guitar solos. But that’s usually because the bands are busy doing things that are more important.
Punk-rock that wants to stand out must first sound good. This is what Running Man’s “One Wrong Move” gets to do on a recording that brings to mind the precise moment where punk and the NWOBHM bands share a common band. Singer Skip Greer, moonlighting from The Dead Kennedys, does a good job of spitting barbed rhymes about the decline of our way of life. And if you can’t hum along, you may well be tone-deaf.
