What are the best modern punk albums? Let’s say that anything from 1990 onward is fair game, and stuff from the late 80s might be OK. I’m adding this restriction in because a call for the best overall punk albums will invariably come back with the same old classic punk and hardcore albums, and while those most frequently nominated are genuine classics, the newer stuff tends to get ignored.
My picks (and I am by no means a connoisseur):[ul]
[li]Operation Ivy, Operation Ivy[/li][li]Green Day, Dookie[/li][li]Rancid, And out Come the Wolves[/li][li]Refused, The Shape of Punk to Come[/li][li]Discount, Half-Fiction[/li][li]Gallows, Orchestra of Wolves (maybe, we’ll have to see how this one holds up.)[/li][/ul]
Well, to be fair it’s not that the late 80s do not demark an era in punk – just not the era we’re currently in. I saw the late 80s - mid 90s as the rise of more serious and lighter hardcore, along with a concurrent steady popularization of more and more bands, which lead to the Pop Punk era of late 90s - early 2000s. This in turn lead to the mainstreaming of emo and emo-influenced music (along with the continued popularity of pop-punk which was also labelled emo much of the time,) which we are currently starting to get over, IMO, if only because labelling something as “emo” nowadays is about as informative as saying something is “psychedelic-influenced” around 1970, i.e. you can’t get away from it.
But ISTM that it’s different from the rise in harsh-sounding hardcore and skapunk of the early-late 80s as well as the first-(big)-wave punk of the 70s, so the question does have some merit.
I can only give you my favorites from these eras, as I do not have the extensive catalogue of others:
Promise Ring, 30° Everywhere.
Fugazi, Steady Diet of Nothing.
Park, Building a Better _____
Dropkick Murphys, Do or Die.
NOFX are good but they don’t have enough great tracks on any one album to make the list. I really like Process of Belief by Bad Religion but it isn’t really a good punk qua punk album, although it is punk, it gets on my “good album” list through the harmonic singing and general songwriting, so I’m not sure if it should be on my entries here.
“modern” might not be the best word, but I couldn’t think of another one. The issue at bottom is that if I were to ask for a list of the best punk albums with no qualifiers, I’d guess that about 75-80% of the submissions would be albums released in the 70s, and most of the rest albums released in the early 80s. As I mentioned in the OP, a lot of those are genuine classics, but it gets kinda boring rehashing the same list over and over again when there’s so much new stuff out there.
Their discography has its highs and lows, but there are certainly great albums by the band. White Trash…, Punk in Drublic and So Long and Thanks for all the Shoes (come on! a Douglas Adams reference, even!) are all excellent albums where most of the songs on each disc are great. I’d highly recommend these albums, just stay away from Heavy Petting Zoo which is terrible.
I agree that the album is great because of the songwriting (plus the addition of a newer drummer makes things better). I think that is what most “punk” bands are moving toward and how I would define “modern” punk. The musicians are better now and it shows in the songs. You can’t play 4 chords anymore and be a great punk band.
I used to listen to plenty of punk but I’m sort of drawing a blank on classic albums from the 90s - for me it’s a genre where a lot of good stuff does sound the same and doesn’t really lend itself to classic status. Ultrafilter’s suggestion of ‘the shape of punk to come’ is probably one of the few punk albums I hear spoken of in classic terms - influential and whatnot - I didn’t really get on with it.
Kid Dynamite’s self titled is an awesome cd - according to wiki it’s an example of ‘melodic hardcore’. Put me down for more of that, love the sound.
**In on the killtaker **is my favourite fugazi album, maybe a classic. Very clean atonal sound that’s unmistakable.
Second **Do or Die **by the Dropkick Murphys. They’ve got great lyrics considering the competition. Most modern punk f-the man songs sound like bad Sham 69, which is fairly appalling when you think about it. The dropkicks had some quality to their lyrics, a bit of authenticity that made for a great couple of albums.
Your torn up knuckles and faded blue jeans
Are the colors you wear and the life that you’ve seen
You tell the truth look people in the eye
Don’t live your life in no baggy disguise.
You hear that wearers of baggy trousers?
THought the bronx’s self titled was v. good at the poppier end of punk.