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Punk’s not dead, but… The Exploited’s Wattie suffers onstage heart attack
02.17.2014
09:52 am
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Per a report in the Scottish Daily Record, the notorious, mohawk-sporting singer Walter “Wattie” Buchan, of the long-running U.K. punk band The Exploited, collapsed onstage during a performance in Portugal.

Buchan, 57, was taking part in the Tour of Chaos with Hatebreed and Napalm Death at the Republica Da Musica venue in Lisbon when he became unwell.

It is thought the singer will be kept in hospital and the East Kilbride band have cancelled all gigs until at least May. A video from on Thursday night shows Buchan having to stop midway through a song before slumping to his knees.

The Exploited became instantly infamous with their 1980 debut single “Army Life” (Wattie is a military veteran), and unwittingly coined an enduring slogan with the title of their debut LP Punks Not Dead. Controversy continued to find the uncompromisingly anti-establishment band when they released the essential Horror Epics, featuring the song “Maggie,” the single most succinct, direct, and vulgar anti-Thatcher anthem ever crafted. Do I even need to tell you to turn the volume down if you’re at work? Do I even need to tell you just skip it altogether if pottymouth makes you feel faint? I thought not.
 

 
Below, an unlikely Top of the Pops appearance from 1981:

Posted by Ron Kretsch
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02.17.2014
09:52 am
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Earnestly square local news series on punk rock, 1983
02.13.2013
10:47 am
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image
This man will explain punk to you
 
While 1983 may feel pretty late to “break” punk as a cultural phenomenon, Los Angeles Fox affiliate KTTV put together their five part feature covering the recent onslaught of California Hardcore as a bold new movement, and understandably so. Like every generation of olds before them, the historical patterns of youth culture were suddenly forgotten, since apparently this was the first time kids ever got rowdy to music their parents didn’t understand.

The initial event covered was a riot at an overcrowded show with The Exploited (who they just call “Exploited”), and LA legends Channel 3, The Vandals and Youth Brigade. “Did the punkers start the battle, or were local Hispanic gangs at the root of the problem?” (Was that some sort of popular racist rumor surrounding punk?) And yes, they say “punkers.” Over and over again.

It. Is. Adorable.

It’s unclear just how self-aware the actual copywriters of the story were. At times, they seem to be placating older audience, acknowledging that these kids are downright out of control; at other times they insist they feel the riot was an isolated incident, borne of poor planning. Later, as they start trying to chronicle the evolution and trajectory of punk, it becomes fairly obvious that they’re making a concerted (if ham-fisted) effort to treat it with legitimacy and gravity, rather than sensationalism. What do you know? WTTV cares about the kids?

Ah, the mysteries of punk! What can we know for sure? Only that this reporting is predicated on the existence of a media that appears to have never been young in their lives!
 

Posted by Amber Frost
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02.13.2013
10:47 am
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