The allusive amoprhous term known as "post punk"

This is from my friend Irish's blog which can be found here:
As some of you may know Mike and I have a little running argument about which band is better Joy Division or New Order. While entirely futile and imbecilic, it is fun so I thought I would share some of my arguments on the topic with the readers at large. Joy division typifies the movement of post punk (almost as bad a name as emo) more than another band. You could say the New Order has the better sales, that PiL had the Name (Johnny Rotten), That Devo and Pere Ubu were around before but the core of what the movement was about had its most creditable start in Manchester. It was a city in decline. A former industrial juggernaut that at that point 1979-1982 was in such a wretched state, it could not help but breed the dissonant and alienating sound that Joy Division mastered. When you hear a song like Atrocity Exhibition you can feel the alienation the space and aimlessness that was abundant in the youth of the day. The music itself not just the lyrics give off that presence.


This was my reply:
Actually I think Devo is far more important to post punk (and definitely underground music today) than Joy Division is.
All you really need to do is pick up any "underground" album that can be loosey associated with "punk" and you hear something of Devo. I may have to let you borrow some more Devo...
At the time, sure Joy Division was far more relevant. Time has definitely changed that.


Okay I'm going to speak further on this.
Joy Division is a hugely important band. I can't stress the word important enough. However if Ian Curtis had not have died when he did (I've been told by fellow music jerks that this is an impossibility) I'm not sure if the band could have stayed fresh. I don't think they could or would have turned to a New Order type sound if Curtis still had a say in the band. All that said Joy Division was obviously more important than both Devo and New Order within that current time period of late-late 70s and early 80s. But this is the problem with music, it's ever changing. Speaking in modern times from a post punk/punk rock/western US musical background, Devo is to me the more important, influential band. I can see their fingerprint on everything from Spock rock (The Locust, The VSS) to noise rock (Fast Forward, Melt-Banana). But it's not just the underground you can see it in popular music. Some of the more robotic sounding keyboard driven beats in rap to keys/keyboard breakdowns becoming a more regular thing (again) in popular rock music (Panic! At The Disco). How much would great/modernly relevant labels like 31G or Gold Standard Labs be changed if there were no Devo? Not to mention the whole no-wave movement...
Curtis is more influential right now than Joy Division itself. Not for his vocals/vocal delivery but rather lyrically. I think his shadow is cast over that whole My Chemical Romance/A.F.I. scene.
As for New Order they to me continue to prove keys matter in pop music. They also brought a more poppy sound to what Devo maybe (?) wanted to do and left a lasting effect on every music genre from goth to techno.

This is not meant at all to discount Ian Curtis' or Joy Division's contributions to music as a whole. They still remain one of the more interesting bands in history.

Ian Curtis movie? Here.

By the by good call on Pere Ubu, Irish. Oh and in terms of worst genre name, you have to go with spock rock over both emo and post punk. Stoner rock deserves an honorable mention. "But stoner rock isn't a real genre Jerk!" Bongzilla. Sleep. Weedeater. Yes it is!