Punk culture

While the general public agrees that the Sex Pistols were punk--they were dirty, vile, low-class, and they sang crass lyrics--their aesthetics were originally brought into punk by the New York Dolls, by bringing the street into their performance. The New York Dolls were from the New York City streets; they were mediocre musicians, unglamorous, and not at all phantasmagorical. They removed the hierarchy and the bourgeois elements from their performances that had been established by previous New York City bands like the Velvet Underground--who performed as high-class, elitist artists. The New York Dolls destroyed this hierarchy, allowing the audience to join them. So, all the aesthetics that are associated with punk are the physical, visual, and auditory manifestations of the original scene and unity that began with the New York Dolls.