Though it was a massively polarizing movement, you can’t say straight edge didn’t have a lasting impact. It’s one of a handful of rock genres that’s distinguished solely by extra-musical criteria (see also: riot grrrl, queercore, Christian rock)—any given straight edge band sounds like any other hardcore music of its era, but it was set apart by an *ethos* expressed in the lyrics and lifestyle choices of its practitioners rather than any discernible musical difference, and you hardly needed to be an initiate to know what that ethos was: avoidance of drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, and sex.
Brought into existence by and named for a song by Minor Threat—literally a 45 second laundry list of behaviors of which that band’s vocalist Ian MacKaye disapproved—the straight edge movement blew up in the early- and mid-‘80s, and depending on where you stood, either offered an exemplar and support system for clean living to hard luck kids who may otherwise have been lost to substance abuse, or offered a gang-like milieu from which holier-than-thou meathead boys could violently act out against people who weren’t like them. Obviously, Minor Threat never intended to spark an international youth movement, let alone be seen as guilty by association with its violence, and it’s interesting to see OG straight edge bands distance themselves from the sometimes appallingly judgmental later-wavers. Seven Seconds’ Kevin Seconds, for just one example, has articulated discomfort with the movement. Which makes sense, as his was one of the more positive bands—their “Walk Together, Rock Together” was a specific call for unity and tolerance.
Though it’s a smaller movement now than it was in the ‘80s and ‘90s, straight edge still persists, with consumption of animal-derived products often joining the list of prohibitions, and with social justice advocacy becoming more central to the code. It’s a long-lived, crucially important, and storied scene that deserves a deep dive, and fortunately, straight edge finally has its own Please Kill Me—the new book Straight Edge: A Clear-Headed Hardcore Punk History is a 350+ page oral history of the genre/movement, told in first-person by the scene’s movers, with a foreword by Gorilla Biscuits’ Anthony “Civ” Civarelli:
Straight edge isn’t something I take lightly—that’s why I’m thirty years into it. I still don’t need a drink to get loose or wild. I don’t need drugs to feel comfortable or fit in. Straight edge gives me strength to deal with things head on, with no buffers, crutches or masks. I have no clouded judgments or excuses to hide behind; just brutal, clear-headed reality. I guess that might be why I come off as an asshole sometimes, with little patience for bullshit, but I’m not perfect. I’m just Civ.
As a component of its exhaustive history of the scene, Straight Edge is profusely illustrated with performance photos and a metric shitload of classic concert fliers. The fliers, like the music, avail themselves heavily of various hardcore tropes—there’s a familiar cut-up ethos at work in the genre, and the distinctive crustiness of the era’s copy machines both dictated and dominated their overall feel. The book’s publisher, Bazillion Points, was extremely cool about letting us share a generous lot of them with you. Clicking on an image spawns an enlargement.
While you’re considering straight edge books, 2006’s Straight Edge: Hardcore Punk, Clean Living Youth, and Social Change and 2010’s Sober Living for the Revolution offer differing perspectives and insights.
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
Hardcore health: Cro-Mags frontman’s juicing and smoothie advice
‘Adderall Highway’: The new video from New York hardcore all-stars gone psych, Dead Heavens
Jesse Malin on ‘New York Before the War’ and his early days with Heart Attack: a DM interview