Overskriften hentyder både til den predominerende koldkrigsskabte dommedagsstemning, der gennemsyrede startfirsernes ungdom, og til en alt for ukendt sang fra Liverpool, lidt længere nede her. I går postede vi en David Bowie-top-15, U2’s Bono Vox er kommet op med på foranledning af Rolling Stone. Hans sidekick og musikalske kaptajn The Edge har også måttet i tænkebox i samme sags ærinde, for det amerikanske  musikmagasins seneste playlist-specialudgave. Ud af det er kommet hans personlige top-19 (!) indenfor den mest af alt tidsbestemte genre post-punk, altså al den meget forskellige undergrundsrock, der på begge sider af 1980 udsprang i alverdens musikalske retninger, efter den første punkbølge havde skyllet en ny tid ind og sat rocknroll-stopuret på 0 igen. The Edge vil altid være en interessant mand at høre på, så her hans valg som indledende ord…

– Post-punk is an era that was very formative for me. I was 15 in 1976. I just caught the tail end of punk, but this was the music that made an impact on me, in the late Seventies and the early Eighties. It was a moment when the entire world of music was being turned upside down and given a good shake. It got a lot of people excited to start making music for the first time. But these records also had a galvanizing effect on people who were already in bands to reassess themselves and try something different. We were looking for new ways of using rock instruments like the guitar, but not in the blues tradition.

01. “Fiction Romance” Buzzcocks, 1978

02. “The Light Pours Out of Me” Magazine, 1978

03. “A Forest” The Cure, 1980
When David Bowie came back from Germany with these krautrock influences, it got a lot of his U.K. fans excited. It enabled bands like these to separate themselves from rock tradition — to use the same instruments with a different perspective. You suddenly had a pop culture injected with avant-garde ideas.

04. “Don’t Worry About the Government” Talking Heads, 1977
One of their favorite artists was James Brown. The funk element was important for them. I listened to this album nonstop as I was doing my high school graduation exams. I listened to it a hundred times in those few months.

05. “Into the Valley” The Skids, 1979

06. “Party Fears Two” The Associates, 1982
These Scottish bands were happening creatively at the time we made our first album. The bagpipes summed up Stuart Adamson’s guitar style in the Skids. Drones are a big part of Celtic- music tradition. When you attempt to create something unique to your world, you inevitably draw on what’s around you. And it seemed like everybody was adopting outlandish singing styles. Billy Mackenzie of the Associates took it as far as it could possibly go.

07. “She’s Lost Control” Joy Division, 1979
They had a huge impact on us. We were lucky to use their producer, Martin Hannett, on our single “11 O’Clock Tick Tock.” We went to London for him to interview us, and we met him in the studio as Joy Division were recording “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” We had no idea what that song would become for them.

08. “Ex Lion Tamer” Wire, 1977
They were so intent on keeping it simple — down to the wire, I guess. That was one of the punk ideals they embodied: Avoid grandiosity, keep it raw.

09. “Reward” The Teardrop Explodes, 1981
One thing we didn’t catch, because we were over the sea in Dublin, was the Jamaican influence — the ska thing, the 2 Tone stuff. The brass in this record — I remember hearing it and thinking, “What a cool move.”

10. “Seven Minutes to Midnight” Wah! Heat, 1980
We always seemed to be on the same early festivals with Wah! Heat. They were one of the great talents that got away. It’s a fantastic 45, a quintessential snapshot of the time.

11. “Teenage Kicks” The Undertones, 1978
We did a kids’ daytime TV show with the Undertones. It would have been for this, their first single, and for ours. And they were the same as us — snot-nosed, pimply teenagers. But they were writing great songs.

12. “Public Image” Public Image Ltd., 1978
There were great characters in that original band, like [guitarist] Keith Levene. They were reaching, in an unconscious way, for things — Can, Neu! — that caused them to produce powerful work.

13. “Dream Baby Dream” Suicide, 1979
It’s so simple. It’s machine-age, for sure. That’s why I was drawn to certain guitar-effects units. With synths and drum machines, suddenly you’re having this tension between the ultramodern and the traditional. It almost makes the song more fragile.

14. “Non-Alignment Pact” Pere Ubu, 1978
My older brother had rooms at Trinity College, and we used to listen to records there. The Modern Dance was one of those records that got played over and over, because it was so challenging. This song in particular stuck with me.

15. “Elevation” Television, 1977
I’d never heard guitar like it. I was intrigued by the composition — it was so sophisticated, yet so straightforward. It was like a light going on for me. I could play pretty much everything on the album, but I was blown away by where they had taken guitar-playing, while the sound was pure and simple. I said to myself, “This is what is possible.”

16. “Hong Kong Garden” Siouxsie and the Banshees, 1978

17. “Someone, Somewhere in Summertime” Simple Minds, 1982

18. “Over the Wall” Echo and the Bunnymen, 1981

19. “Release the Bats” The Birthday Party, 1981
The Birthday Party were an Australian band led by Nick Cave. This was such a racket. It was like punk had gone Down Under, and the echoes of it were even more extreme than punk had been.