One Chord Wonders: Power and Meaning in Punk Rock

Dave Laing (1947-2019) was a longtime British rock critic, and his 1985 book One Chord Wonders was one of the first of its kind to treat punk rock as a respected genre of music. Laing’s book has a lot of smart insights — both about the economics of the record industry and the intentions of punk musicians:

If progressive rock saw itself as skilled labour of an artistic type (comparable to a potter or an illustrator), punk saw itself as self-expression where skill or virtuosity carried with it a suspicion of glibness. Too much concern with the forms of musical expression could lessen the impact of the substance of the thing expressed. 

The book also has a highly useful discography and bibliography. Recommended.