Far Out 40: The best post-punk songs in the world
Elle Palmer
Charting the many iterations of post-punk, its changing meaning over time, and picking out the best of the best bands and tracks to grace the genre.
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Far Out Magazine
As the third iteration of the genre seems to be nearing its timely end, the term post-punk seems more convoluted than ever. It was first coined to describe an era rather than a genre, born out of a need to characterise the wave of music that followed the death of punk. Now, the term has been adopted to describe contemporary bands with shouty vocalists and angular guitars who borrow from the sounds of their post-punk predecessors.

The first iteration of post-punk remains perhaps the most beloved. Pioneered by the likes of Talking Heads and Gang of Four, the movement sought to take a more avant-garde direction than punk. Art school kids were experimenting with genres such as funk and dub, infusing their creations with their cultural influences and creating communities around venues such as The Fenton.

For the four decades since then, those communities have continually been made and remade. The first revival of the genre came with the dawn of the century, as the alternative scene took a revived interest in garage, punk and post-punk. The result was a new wave of guitar-driven music that would be coined the post-punk revival, led by the likes of The Strokes and Bloc Party.

Less than a decade later, another wave of artists took up the term and breathed new life into it. A burgeoning scene emerged around Dan Carey’s cult label Speedy Wunderground and venues such as the Brixton Windmill. Characterised by their harsh guitars and angry lyrics. Politicised by current events such as Brexit, the genre looked to revive community and solidarity through music.

The new wave of artists often take inspiration from their 1980s predecessors, borrowing from the personas of David Byrne and Mark E. Smith, but the second iteration of post-punk seems yet to receive the same retroactive admiration and appreciation. Rather, those artists who first revived the genre have been remembered as landfill indie, not yet awarded the nostalgia of their predecessors or the current cool status of their successors.

This so-called cool, most recent iteration of the genre is still ongoing, though it seems to become increasingly monotonous by the day. The term post-punk has almost become a unique selling point – it sounds slightly cooler, slightly more nostalgic, slightly more intelligent than just dubbing yourself an “indie” band – but its meaning seems to have become convoluted, a catch-all phrase for upcoming guitar bands.

Nonetheless, some real stars have come out of the Speedy Wunderground scene, reinvigorating the term with experimentation and individuality, creating communities of artists and creatives as it was first designed to. Its revival has reinvented the indie scene for a modern audience, and encouraged countless budding musicians to pick up a guitar.

Spanning around half a century and three iterations, post-punk now encompasses several cultural moments and countless bands – it’s almost impossible to pick the best of the best, but we’ve given it a good go nonetheless. Find our top 40 post-punk picks below.

The best 40 post-punk songs: