Punk Tees: The Punk Revolution in 125 T-Shirts

by Martin Popoff

For fans of music and edgy fashion, this is the story of punk, told by the people who lived it and the shirts on their back.
The punk revolution wasn’t just music—it also shaped fashion, especially the ripped, often handmade T-shirts emblazoned with provocative slogans. Punk Tees captures this youthful revolt through the people who lived it and the clothing they wore. It charts the evolution of punk, T-shirt by T-shirt, from the genre’s roots in the 1960s through its zenith in the mid-1970s/early 1980s, to its legacy today. Moving from the Ramones in New York, to their British counterparts the Sex Pistols, to Metal Urbain in Paris, to bands in Germany, Australia, Scandinavia, and Japan, this book illuminates what punk culture really meant. Included are original interviews with fans discussing their own customized punk T-shirts, as well as with punk’s key influencers.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Design, History

192 pages, Hardcover

Published October 18, 2016

About the author

At approximately 7900 (with over 7000 appearing in his books), Martin has unofficially written more record reviews than anybody in the history of music writing across all genres. Additionally, Martin has penned approximately 85 books on hard rock, heavy metal, classic rock and record collecting. He was Editor-In-Chief of the now retired Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles, Canada’s foremost metal publication for 14 years, and has also contributed to Revolver, Guitar World, Goldmine, Record Collector, bravewords.com, lollipop.com and hardradio.com, with many record label band bios and liner notes to his credit as well. Additionally, Martin has been a regular contractor to Banger Films, having worked for two years as researcher on the award-winning documentary Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage, on the writing and research team for the 11-episode Metal Evolution and on the ten-episode Rock Icons, both for VH1 Classic. Additionally, Martin is the writer of the original metal genre chart used in Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey and throughout the Metal Evolution episodes. Martin currently resides in Toronto and can be reached through martinp@inforamp.net or www.martinpopoff.com.

Reviews

[Benjamin Kahn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn't even get through the whole first chapter before I decided that there wasn't really a book here. Just a random collection of t-shirts, most of them not that interesting. I skimmed forward a bit before I gave up on it. I will admit, I'm not a huge punk fan, but the first chapter dealing with pre-punk and early days t-shirts seemed a real stretch.