Modern Punk
 

Why do all new punk bands sound whiny and like poorly executed indie music? Fidlar and Wavves are the ones dominating the scene (if it can even be called a scene). That just tells me punk is dead. Anyone know of some new but authentic punk bands?

I don't agree with your stance on Wavves and FIDLAR but garage punk revival is only the most saturated form of the moment, there's tons of authentic bands coming out; be that skate, ska, hardcore, and whatever else.

Try your hand at:

Stabbed in Back
The Big Ups
Young Widows
Spraynard
Abraskadabra
DC Fallout
Jump Street
Banner Pilot
Bomb the Music Industry!
Hate for State
Cave State
Crime Desire
Title Fight
Pissed Jeans
Ceremony
METZ
World's Scariest Police Chases
Pears
Self-Defense Family
Lumber Lung
Daniel Striped Tiger
The Hotelier
Streetlight Manifesto
Flesh Wounds
Skemata
Atlas Losing Grip
Loma Prieta
Basement
Tiger's Jaw
The Front Bottoms
Weekend Nachos
Code Orange Kids
Foxmoulder
Pup
Cerebral Ballzy
The Pine
KEN mode

Thanks; will explore your list. What I find is that often the seemingly "authentic" sounding punk bands emulate 90's punk bands and were just late to the game. Other than the garage punk that you mention, there doesn't seem to be much of a punk scene among young people. Maybe, they've transferred their rebellious, anti-establishment energy toward rap and (god forbid) pop.

This would be interesting indeed. If anything I'd like to hear artist's philosophy on how they maintain being an anti-establishment band while still making music with the mind of being popular.

There's always going to be genuine punk at the high school level at least, imo. It'll carry over with the diehard enthusiasts, but I feel like teenagers are a market that punk will always find a fanbase in. There's some solid punk coming out on the noisier side of things these days, and that seems to really generate scenes because that's more closely related to live experiences (which noisy punk qualifies as one of the funnest live genres).

Punk scenes still going strong. Still loads of it coming out, not sure if your looking for it right. I frequent punknews.org, because they know their stuff about it and have spectacularly written reviews and editorials.

I think the main problem your facing is that you can't find the scene it's at, which is understandable. While there are tons of groups, there's no current trend other than garage revival, and Epi-Fat has been pretty low-key since the mid-2000's. I assure you that there are many great bands on these labels still, but they really aren't making an impact like in the late 90's.

One scene that does come to mind is "The Wave", a tight-knit group of post-hardcore bands. They don't really sound all that similar but they all play variants of the progressive hardcore sound. Included in this movement are La Dispute, Touche Amore, Make Do and Mend, and Pianos Become the Teeth. Title Fight, Tiger's Jaw, and Balance & Composure ate also seen as members of this group. It's not straightforward punk, but it's good nonetheless.

Skate Punk also has a huge following still, I included some of those in the above post, but also see The Fest line-up from recent years. The way I see it, punk is more or less an extension of college radio at this point, so you mainly see these bands popping up around college scenes (like they usually have in the past)

Before I forget, check out Edward in Venice as well.

I forgot to add a lot of noise punk bands to my list. I've failed everyone.

The Pine are more Post-Hardcore/Emo than "Punk."

Yeah a few of these are. I'm trying to familiarize him with the current scene.

They're not too modern, their last album was ten years ago. The OP was looking for "modern Punk." Which I don't know of any. Most indie bands are mostly in Garage, Psychedelia, lo-fi & somewhat super Twee, and Post-Punk revival phases. If you wait long enough it'll come around again.

Really? I thought that came out in 2013. Guess I wasn't too well-informed on that.

Yeah, I'm aware of current punk bands too. The rest in the list fit that label, and I could name more if I wanted. At least where I am I hear a lot of these bands on college radio, I don't think it necessarily out of style right now.

Oh well idk, discog has their last album released in 2011 of unreleased material. If they have new stuff then that would be cool.

You raise a notable point: most genres (especially punk) have become more segmented over the past decade or so, and it is important to target your search for bands at a particular scene. Also, as Frownland brings up, punk music often revolves around anti-authoritarian energy and as a result is particularly tied to local scenes and live performances, which are easy to overlook if you are not informed in that community (punknews.org certainly helps). What I find interesting is that punk can blend in with college radio music, which is often low-energy and tame sounding from my experience. On the other hand, college radio is supposed to be an outlet for new music and bands to emerge and become known to an audience who is particularly receptive to non-mainstream forms of music. In any case, I have not found that punk has much of a presence on college radios, other than FIDLAR and Wavves. By the way, I'd be curious to know what your opinions are about those two bands. And thanks for that list of recommendations--I'm definitely getting a feel for that scene.

Another band you might want to check out is Rise Against.

Rise Against isn't very new, but they're great in my opinion.

Rise Against was ok up until Sufferer and the Witness, which was decent in itself. Appeal to Reason was terrible however, Endgame was decent again, and the new album is really lacking as well. RPM10/Siren Song era was their peak.

I find some indie to be more on the punk side, because indie really isn't a one thing genre, it's a scene of eclectic bands trying new things out. I've heard some recently that had sludge metal sensibilities. Neato.

As for Wavves and FIDLAR, I don't expect most people to get them. I see them as continuing off from slacker skate punk culture and adding a fair amount of no-fi noise and a fun, pop punk attitude. King of the Beach is one of my favorite albums for that reason, and I don't really see many dull moments in their discog. Sure, their first two albums are really monotonous, but at the very least it's fun slacker background noise. FIDLAR is kinda the same way, I really like both's embrace of surf influences, cause you can never have too much of that.

At the same time I realize why someone wouldn't like their stuff. But most music I listen to isn't to be taken too seriously anyways.

Yeah I forgot to put Pissed Jeans and Iceage in my list but these are seriously all great recs.

I would say, however, that Destruction Unit is more stoner metal than punk, but that genre does take some of it's influence from punk anyways.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwhLklZcvZg

Great song by Cable35.

Modern punk is easy to find on Bandcamp. Night Birds is a particularly good band. I highly recommend them. I'm no modern punk expert, but I look up a lot of grunge on BC, and with grunge usually comes punk. Also, Refused came out w/ a new album.

I've heard of Night Birds before. Refused new album has sone moments on it, but for the most part isn't my thing. Granted, there was no perceivable way they could top TSoPTC anyways, so I like how they didn't even try and went in a totally different direction that their usual stuff.

I'm just glad they're back.

I probably should've gone to see them and Faith No More on their tour when the came around, I heard they cancelled some dates though.

Fairly underground, but...
Mean Jeans (actually kinda borderline not underground anymore)
Midnite Snaxx
Andy Place and the Coolheads
The Spits
Dino's Boys
The Chernobyl Babies

That's all I got off the top of my head.