Wire is one of the early pioneers of post-punk, whose work has proven to be highly influential over the years. Their '77 debut album Pink Flag was a series of quick cut songs, all 21 of them, clocking at a minute and a half on average, and most of the songs wrapping up in under a minute. From that rough and scratchy starting point, they moved on to the artsy side of post-punk, exploring different textures and ideas along the way. Their more recent albums have seen a relatively smoother sound, though they still feel free to roam between a dream-poppy feel on one song, then explore some synth pop sounds, and then move on to slow-burning dirges, and so on. Wire is a hard band to get a fix on stylistically at this point, but given their reputation and the kind of career they have had, their work will always be worth a checking out.
The classics: Television, Gang of Four, Pere Ubu, Magazine, or any of the current batch of post-punk revival bands.
This is a band that has always gone quiet when they felt their material is not interesting enough. So they don't perform just to rehash.
