Task 2
Questions 13-18
Read the article about a protest punk band. For questions 13-18, choose the correct answer
(A, B, C or D). Mark your answer on the answer sheet.
Protest Punk
It was the late 1970s and there was a lot of tension because of the political situation. Naturally, this was reflected in the music of the time. We got the idea for the band after seeing the Pistols play. The audience was full of kids who wanted to hear what punk had to say and to dance to the energetic music. They were all wearing ripped jeans and had messy hair. Initially, we weren’t interested in the sound or fashion. We just thought that it would be a laugh to try ourselves. It was only later that we realised that punk rock was the perfect vehicle to express our political views.
Some critics say that our controversial lyrics were the most important thing about us. I’m not convinced. We wanted to send a message through our music that it didn’t matter who you were, because you could start a band too. We also wanted to prove that music doesn’t belong to the big companies and radio stations. As a result, our style was very straightforward. Although we all listened to different sorts of music, you would struggle to find such influences in what we actually played. Eight years later when we finally broke up, we had barely improved technically.
It didn’t take long for people to get interested in us and we signed a deal with a small label. We made an album called “The Fightback Starts Now”, but the company wouldn’t release it. They said the politics were too risky. We weren’t going to stand for censorship, so we set up our own company. We did all our own artwork and managed to sell the album for much less than the usual price. The result was unexpected but spectacular. Within weeks, we had sold thousands of copies. One of the results was that we were able to offer unknown bands the same opportunity on our label.
By now, we were getting lots of attention. The press even started writing about our pasts. However, we refused to give interviews to journalists. It’s not that we wanted to keep out of the spotlight. On the contrary, we wanted to express our political views. The media actually offered us huge amounts of cash, but we weren’t interested. We knew they would twist and distort everything we said. Quite by chance, one day we did give an interview but to a small amateur magazine known as a fanzine. We felt we could trust them. As a result, a whole new independent publishing scene was born.
However, we knew it couldn’t last. We decided to stop in 1984. By then, we all had our own obligations. You can’t raise kids when you’re constantly touring and in the recording studio. Besides, there were new groups ready to continue the struggle. A couple of us set up our own publishing house a couple of years later. We print books by anarchist groups and other alternative movements.
People ask me if it was worth it. The same political parties are in power and the music business, although it might look different, is like it’s always been. What we learnt is that you can’t change the system as a whole. You have to work at a more local level. Today most young people have never even heard of us or the part we played in the protest movements of the 1980s. But before then, hardly anyone was a vegetarian and no one protested against injustice. Nowadays, there are many more people like that. We played a role in that and I’m proud of it.
The author and his friends decided to start a band because
What does the author say about the band's music?
Why did the band start their own record company?
The band didn't do interviews with the media because
Why did the group stop playing?
What does the author think the band achieved?