Revisiting American hardcore punk rock

by Euan Kerr, Minnesota Public Radio

Twenty-five years ago American punk rock went hard core.

St. Paul, Minn. — During the years between 1980 and 1986 groups of teenagers all over the US got together to play loud, frenzied music, to dance violently, and generally scare their parents.

Steven Blush and Paul Rachman were in the thick of it. Blush promoted punk gigs in Washington DC, while Rachman filmed a lot of the early hardcore gigs in Boston.

Blush wrote a book about the time, called "American Hardcore." Now he and Rachman have made a documentary of the same name. When the pair came into the MPR studio's recently, Blush told Minnesota Public Radio's Euan Kerr they made the film to fill a gap in musical history.

Broadcast Dates

• Morning Edition, 10/19/2006, 6:47 a.m.