Punk rock has always been about breaking the rules. Whether in the form of outlandish stage antics, anti-establishment subject matter, or the abandonment of traditional songwriting, punk and counter-culture have been invariably intertwined since its origins in the mid-70’s. That ethos is still very much present in the bands at the cutting edge of punk in 2021. The late 2010’s proved to be a hotbed of creativity for the genre, and this year alone has seen excellent releases from acts like Squid, shame, and Black Country, New Road (not to mention a punk-adjacent album by prog rock group black midi). These songs are noisy, nervy, shameless, frantic and above all mindbogglingly creative.

Despite initially being associated with straightforward song structures and stripped back instrumentation, punk has evolved considerably over time to require several subdivisions. Today, most acts take influence from art punk, post-punk, and post-hardcore, which are confusingly named and nebulous terms to describe often overlapping genres. Generally speaking, art punk casts a wide net over music that is rooted in the stripped-back instrumental minimalism of punk rock while aspiring to higher artistic ambitions through clever interplay or the incorporation of influences from other genres or cultures. Post-punk and post-hardcore music by comparison evoke more specific sonic profiles: post-punk is usually reserved for bands which focus on atmospheric and often melancholy tones, whereas post-hardcore draws from the intensity and aggression of hardcore punk without compromising on songwriting complexity.

The point of these labels isn’t to box artists in, but rather to describe new musical styles as they are created. Post-punk, for example, was used to differentiate the innovative sound of Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures from punk albums just a few years older such as Nevermind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols. Post-hardcore came about as a way to separate noise-focused bands like Black Flag from the progressive sound of those that came later, such as At the Drive In or Unwound around the turn of the millennium. Of course, at some point the collective punk audience decides no more divisions are necessary and so the likes of Squid, Idles, and the rest of their contemporaries are described as some intersection of all three sub-genres.

This playlist was initially supposed to center on pop punk music, drawing from releases by PUP and Jeff Rosenstock in 2019 and 2020. Most of the punk releases in 2020 that I enjoyed, though, were more experimental in nature; I discovered Protomartyr after the release of Ultimate Success Today, and the ferocity of Dogleg’s debut Melee pushed the selections further from pop territory. Then, one of the first albums to catch my ear in 2021 was shame’s Drunk Tank Pink, released in mid-January and proving to be the first in a string of avant-garde punk releases of the year. February saw the debut from black midi protégés Black Country, New Road, delivering on the hype built from their 2019 single “Sunglasses.” However, it wasn’t until the release of Squid’s Bright Green Field in May that I became convinced of the direction for the playlist (although the standout “Narrator” actually came out in January as well). The final piece of the puzzle was black midi’s own highly anticipated second album, released in late May to immediate acclaim.

While meant to highlight the currents in the modern punk scene (hence the title), I decided to round out the playlist with some other artists I haven’t yet had the chance to feature. The time around the turn of the millennium was a high water mark for post-hardcore, with fantastically creative output from bands like Unwound, At the Drive In, and Refused. The post-punk revival was also a major movement in indie rock in the oughts, so I also threw in a couple of songs from early in the careers of Interpol and Arctic Monkeys that fit the bill. I couldn’t resist adding some timeless classics from the progenitors of post-punk, like “Marquee Moon” and “Disorder,” either–certainly not millennials, but far ahead of their time.