How music is fighting conservatism in Washington DC

On the fringes of Washington, D.C.’s Chinatown sits the Martin Luther King Memorial Library. This rectangular structure of metal and glass is a center of community in the city, hosting meetings, workshops and — the reason I was there this particular day — The People’s Archive, dedicated to preserving “D.C. and African American history and culture.” One of the projects of this group is the DC Punk Archive, which aims to maintain the history of D.C.’s punk and local music scene from the ’70s to the present day. This evening, I was there for one of their concerts. 

Before going to Washington, I knew very little about the state of punk there. It was the first time I’d lived in a big city alone, and I wanted to explore the alternative subcultures that don’t have a strong presence back home in Ann Arbor. It was then that fate (or perhaps some algorithmic targeting) gave me an advert for a rooftop concert on the top of the MLK Library featuring three local punk bands, hosted by the DC Punk Archives.

The show was fantastic. The lineup of bands was diverse in sound and arranged to keep the energy up the entire time. It started raining before the show began, so the library moved us into an auditorium space clearly meant for single speakers or book talks. This didn’t stop the audience from moshing in the limited standing room next to the stage. As with the few punk shows I’ve been to before, the audience varied in background and age; middle-aged punks with their old-school patch vests bopped along in their seats, while a few high-school-aged girls in platform boots and ripped fishnets bounced against the walls of the mosh pit with the confidence of youth without joint pain. 

These summer rooftop concerts are one of the many ways the People’s Archive keeps the spirit of punk alive in the city. On the fourth floor of the library, they made an exhibit on the punk and go-go scene from the ’70s and ’80s onwards in Washington, and how those subcultures played a role in civil rights activism in the nation’s capital.

The DC Punk Archive uses 1976 as their starting date for Washington, D.C., punk. Around that time, bands like self-identifying punk band The Slickee Boys emerged from Washington, and a subgenre of funk music known as “go-go” was popularized in the Black community in the Washington area. The genre is often attributed to the work of Chuck Brown, also known as the “Grandfather of Go-Go.” While the D.C. punk scene was initially characterized by a hardcore, drum-heavy sound that branched into a diverse range of subgenres, go-go was characterized by groovy percussion, emphasis on rhythm and audience participation in the form of call-and-response. In 2012, the Go-Go Archives were established in the MLK Library.

Historically, Washington, D.C., was a majority-Black city up until 2011. Benefits given to white veterans exacerbated an economic divide between white communities and communities of Color who migrated to cities in hopes of working industrial jobs. These prominent communities of Color, particularly Black communities, were a source of unease for the government throughout the ’60s and ’70s as the Civil Rights Movement continued to build and these communities gained newfound political and social power. To many Black Americans, Washington was known as “Chocolate City,” and it has a long history of Black and Latino music, with famous examples being Duke Ellington, Marvin Gaye. Moreover, the go-go genre itself is a combination of funk, Black jazz, and Latin rhythm.

In D.C., the government tried many methods to remove Black people from the city and break up the growth of the Black Power movement. One of their strategies was gentrification. Citing the ongoing “War on Drugs” and heightened violence, law enforcement imposed harsher rules on poorer Black communities, enacting a wave of “urban renewal” that led to businesses buying up land in the city, only serving to further displace people of Color. While the Home Rule Act gave a level of self-governance to Washington, D.C., Congress still had control over Washington’s budget, further encouraging urban development.   

Go-go music, a symbol of D.C.’s Black culture, has long resisted gentrification. Playing it in the streets was a reminder to the city’s residents that, even as the area got more expensive and gentrified, its original Black residents were still there. Throughout the ’90s, politicians and police went after go-go, blaming the music and the culture it brought to the city for an increase in crime. As recently as 2019, new residents have tried to repress the playing of go-go in said neighborhoods, threatening to sue a MetroPCS who had been playing go-go 24/7 in the area for decades. This kicked off the movement Don’t Mute DC, an anti-racism and gentrification movement focused on D.C. and the wider Washington metropolitan area. 

The punk scene was also active and angry about the changes to Washington in the ’80s. In addition to gentrification and the continuing effects of the War on Crime, the ’80s saw Ronald Reagan’s election to the presidency and the beginning of the new conservative movement. The punk scene in D.C. was political — the exhibit was filled with protest signs, political zines, posters for benefit concerts rallying for walkable cities, rights for women and was against U.S. military operations in the ’90s. The documentary “Punk the Capital” details the various causes the community raised money and awareness for in the tumultuous times of the late 20th century. Today, organizations like Positive Force DC carry on the tradition of hosting concerts and events to raise money for various charities and causes, such as anti-racism group Washington Peace Center and We Are Family, a senior grocery delivery service. 

When comparing the political state of the late 1900s and 2024, it’s easy to draw parallels, whether it’s the increased militarization of police, a drug epidemic the government loves to leverage but not solve or the deadly impacts of U.S. troops on civilians in the Middle East. It’s comforting to see that the traditions of those who fought for a better future back then are kept alive, whether it’s through preserving evidence of the past or by practicing their methods and values in our own lives. Both punk and go-go are genres that belong to communities, and it’s evident that in Washington, those communities have survived through all the strife and struggles by taking care of their own. If you’re ever in Washington I highly recommend experiencing a concert or two and immersing yourself and considering what punk and go-go mean to you in the modern day.

Daily Arts Writer Lin Yang can be reached at yanglinj@umich.edu.

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