I'm not massively into punk, as sadly becuase of the actaully style it self, its open to any muppet that fanciesd a bit of DIY punk, and has no intrest in politics, or the dada movement, some one who's never even browsed throug Burroughs books. Having said that, there are some real greats, like The dead kennedies, Mission of Burma etc etc.
dave: I said they make music to SELL, I didn't say anything else. Ofcourse to sell, means to get more listeners, and the easiest way to do that is to give them what they already like.
In my humble oppinion, you should make music that you mean or are enjoying making... You can always say it's not that simple. and that musicain need to make a living, yes they do, but they dont have to do it by writing contrived, cleaned up, ultra politically correct, clichies about relationships (ahem Backstreet boys). if musicains need to make money, there are plenty of ways to make it out side the main stream.