In the late 1970s, New York City was in bad shape, crime was rampant, the city went through bankruptcy in 1975 and was forced to adopt austerity politics in order to receive funding from the federal government. In the midst of this crisis, an artistic movement known as “No Wave” appeared; film, visual art, performance art, and music were all part of this movement, but music was it’s most widespread aspect. The music was abrasive, dissonant and merged art-school experimentalism with punk music; it was unlike anything that preceded it.
In 1978, New York’s “Artist Space” hosted a No Wave festival, Brian Eno attended this festival and wanted to document this movement, so he recorded the “No New York” compilation. This compilation features 4 bands, “The Contortions”, a band that mixed the avant-garde rock of Captain Beefheart with James Brown style funk, “Teenage Jesus and The Jerks”, who made pioneering noise rock, “Mars” whose music lacked any semblance of melody, harmony, or rhythm, and “DNA” which utilized a noisy keyboard, and completely untrained idiosyncratic guitar playing. This is the most well known no wave release. Another No-Wave musician who’s a bit well known is Glenn Branca, who combined noise rock with classical music, and was a massive influence on Sonic Youth. There were other bands and artists in this scene who are a lot less known, and in this article I would like to highlight some of these bands and artists.
“Boris Policeband”
Boris Policeband was a performance artist who would play a noisy detuned electric viola, and recite police communications he overheard with his walkie talkie. He was never seen without his sunglasses and would frequent no wave clubs by himself and swap insults with attendees. There are 3 known recordings of him, in 1979 he released a 5 minute ep titled “Stereo/Mono”, there is a recording of his live show in the 1978 “X Magazine Benefit”, and there was a recently unearthed video of him performing at “The Kitchen” in 1981. Nobody has heard from him since 1986.
“Red Transistor”
Red Transistor was a short lived No-Wave trio formed in 1977, and was the most abrasive of them. Formed by Von LMO, and Rduolph Grey, and featuring various different drummers their music was noisy, aggressive and utterly lacking in any sense of structure. Their stage antics included chainsawing an organ in half on stage. Their 1977 recordings “Not Bite” and “We’re Not Crazy” were released as a single in 1990, and “We’re Not Crazy”, “Flying Saucer 88”, and “Coney Island” appear as bonus tracks on Von LMO’s 2001 solo album “Tranceformer”
“Jack Ruby”
Jack Ruby was formed in 1973 and actually predated the No-Wave scene. Their musical style incorporated influences from the Velvet Underground and the avant-garde dissonant compositions of Iannis Xenakis. Their members included Boris Policeband and George Scott III, who would later be the bassist of The Contortions. They never released any recordings in their lifetimes, but an archival release titled “Jack Ruby” consisting of studio recordings, live recordings, and rehearsals was released in 2011.
“Rhys Chatham”
Rhys Chatham is a composer who combined punk with classical minimalism. He studied under La Monte Young and played with his Theatre of Eternal Music. His first composition in this style was “Guitar Trio” in 1977, a hypnotic noisy guitar piece for 3 guitars that only uses 1 chord. All of his albums are great and worth listening to, however his first 2 albums “Factor X” (1983) and “Die Donnergötter” (1986) were created while the No-Wave scene was truly active and contain noisy and dissonant compositions for both electric guitars and brass instruments
“impLOG”
impLOG was the solo project of Don Christensen, a painter and the drummer for The Contortions. He released two singles under this alias, “Breakfast/She Creatures” and “Holland Tunnel Dive/On B’Way”. Holland Tunnel Drive is an industrial electronic song, that uses repetitive chugging while the narrator speaks of his empty existence
“Y Pants”
Y Pants were an all-women No-Wave band that consisted of Barbara Ess, Virge Piersol, and Gail Vachon. They didn’t use traditional rock instrumentation, instead choosing to utilize children’s instruments such as a Toy Piano and a Mickey-Mouse Drum Kit. Their music incorporated vocal harmonization, and included feminist lyrical themes. They lacked the noisy element of most No-Wave but retained the experimental aspect. They released a self-titled EP in 1980 and an album titled “Beat It Down” in 1982.
