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James Spooner talks about Black Punk Now : Code Switch More than a decade since B.A. Parker last dabbled in the Black punk scene, she heads to a punk a show, and remembers a question from James Spooner: "What is more liberating than a mosh pit full of smiling Black faces?" Parker talks to James about what it means to be a Black punk, creating the Afropunk Festival and its evolution, and a new anthology he co-edited called Black Punk Now.

Code Switch

Where are the Black punks now?

Where are the Black punks now?

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Left: James Spooner, co-creator of Afropunk Festival and co-editor of Black Punk Now. Right: Black Punk Now cover art. PR Agency hide caption

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Left: James Spooner, co-creator of Afropunk Festival and co-editor of Black Punk Now. Right: Black Punk Now cover art.

PR Agency

More than a decade since she last dabbled in the Black punk scene, host B.A. Parker heads to a show in Brooklyn and is reminded of something she read recently: "What is more liberating than a mosh pit full of smiling Black faces?" The quote comes from James Spooner, the co-creator of the Afropunk music festival.

In this week's Code Switch, Parker talks to James about what it means to be a Black punk, and about how the Black punk community continues to create its own space, despite the mainstream coming in to corporatize and cash in on their cache. Now, he and co-editor Chris L. Terry have released an anthology called, Black Punk Now.

This episode was also produced by Xavier Lopez and engineered by Josephine Nyounai.