“I don’t want to be confined”: Patti Smith explains why she rejects the punk label
“In art and dream, may you proceed with abandon. In life, may you proceed with balance and stealth,” Patti Smith once quipped. As someone who has been long associated with leading the punk movement, her attitude and ethos seem a little more complex, with punk sensibilities residing most heavily in her musical sensibilities as she continues to shun the seemingly restrictive label.
Smith’s inextricable connection to the punk branding began in the 1970s, despite the fact that she, for the most part, overtly avoided the notorious, drug-infused rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle it encouraged at the time. Rather than becoming an outsider, however, her refusal to become at one with the raucous goings-on resulted in her being perceived as a more calculated but effortless entity who waded through various musical spaces, revolutionising everything she touched.
Beyond her most famous eras, Smith could be viewed as an embodiment of the punk ethos from an early age when she rejected small-town life in favour of a more exciting adventure in New York, a journey which led her into the same space as many high-profile names, like Andy Warhol, Allen Ginsberg, Edie Sedgwick, and others.
After discovering some of her favourite musicians and bands of all time, like The Velvet Underground, Smith never looked back, and her life was enriched by anything that made her dance and feel alive. As she once put it, “I loved to dance, and you could dance for hours to the music of the Velvet Underground.” The band would become one of her pathways to discovering artistic rebellion, but, in her mind, it all meant so much more than just that.
During an interview in 2012, she explained her thoughts on the punk label and why she has such a hard time accepting it or even feeling connected to it. When asked what punk meant to her, she rather bluntly replied, “It doesn’t mean anything to me. It’s like, what is rock ’n’ roll? You know, these are just labels.” This might seem somewhat deadpan, but she did go on to explain her reasons for feeling so lethargic about the whole thing.
“Jackson Pollock used to be very frustrated because people called him an Abstract Expressionist,” she opined. “Yes, it’s an interesting term, but he did not want to be confined to being an Abstract Expressionist.”
Discussing the punk label, she added: “I don’t want to be confined to – you know, people get very disappointed that I’m not still making punk-rock records. I mean, I’m 65 years old! […] To me, the idea is to keep evolving, keep exploring. That’s true freedom.”
Although many aspects of Smith’s career are undeniably categorical of the punk attitude and the movement as a whole, it seems her entire issue with the concept stems from its reductive connotations, especially as, in her view, art is meant to centre around exploration. “I think there is beauty everywhere,” she said. “When I first came to London and met all of the English punk-rock kids and saw the way they dressed and the clothes that they designed and all, I thought it was a wonderful world. It was free – and not without intellect”.
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