Entertainment

Texas is a ridiculously large state. There’s a reason some (trashy) folks believe it should be its own nation. Apart from taxes and revenue from the sale of cheap beer – or maybe Austin to, but I can’t be sure – I don’t know that it would be a tremendous loss. Regardless of my relative ignorance regarding all things Texan, the hardcore affiliated groups that cropped up in the wild state during the early eighties were some of the most innovative on the scene.

Hüsker Dü surely ranks up there with other groups attempting to push the genre forward. But those Minnesotans really wound up taking the pop-music detour. In Texas – and the Minutemen by extension over there in Pedro – hardcore acts possessed a sort of rhythmic diversity that no one else engaged with punk communities were able to muster, no wave groups being exempt from this discussion even as that’s probably unfair in light of Really Red’s “No Art.”

Beyond groups’ ability to change up songs beyond the fast/breakdown dichotomy, there was a surprising persistence of sound at work. The Dicks, the Big Boys and RR all were able to approximate a sound while not necessarily being a part of one, cohesive scene – RR being based in Houston with those other ensembles living three hours east in Austin.