Page "Punk rock" Paragraph 58

Scores of new punk groups formed around the United Kingdom, as far from London as Belfast's Stiff Little Fingers and Dunfermline, Scotland's The Skids.

Though most survived only briefly, perhaps recording a small-label single or two, others set off new trends.

Crass, from Essex, merged a vehement, straight-ahead punk rock style with a committed anarchist mission.

Sham 69, London's Menace, and the Angelic Upstarts from South Shields in the Northeast combined a similarly stripped-down sound with populist lyrics, a style that became known as streetpunk.

These expressly working-class bands contrasted with others in the second wave that presaged the post-punk phenomenon.

Liverpool's first punk group, Big in Japan, moved in a glam, theatrical direction.

The band didn't survive long, but it spun off several well-known post-punk acts.

The songs of London's Wire were characterized by sophisticated lyrics, minimalist arrangements, and extreme brevity.

By the end of 1977, according to music historian Clinton Heylin, they were " England's arch-exponents of New Musick, and the true heralds of what came next.