Since the early 1980s, popular music has become an arena for serious academic research. Organisations such as the International Association for the Study of Popular Music and the Association for Popular Music Education have been founded in order to promote scholarly inquiry and education in this area. However, canonical studies fall on the usual suspects: rock and roll, The British Invasion, punk. New wave, as a distinct genre, often finds itself portrayed as a by-product of punk, or post-punk. New Wave: Image is Everything is the latest scholarly study of this often bypassed genre. It attempts to investigate cultural and social influences that helped develop this music, and to ‘define new wave, using those social and cultural forces to better understand a popular music movement complicated in its aims and even more complicated in its ultimate effects’ (p. 7, emphasis Adkins). When new wave is described in other literature, clear markers of the style are often not determined and confusing, especially when comparisons between American and British punk are made. Adkins sets out to create a new definition to delineate the genre. The premise of Adkins's argument is that postmodern ideas were influential at the time, and therefore nowhere else was the embodiment of this philosophy better represented but in new wave. By fully exploring the postmodern concept of ‘artificial reality’, new wave artists experimented with the meaning of the ‘image’ until there was nothing left but emptiness.

New Wave is a short, but contemplative read which follows the development of this musical style through six chapters. Chapter 1 sets up a definition for new wave in accordance with postmodernism. Chapters 2 and 3 focus on the rise of new wave in the UK and in the US. Chapter 4 discusses cultural artefacts of the ‘image’ and identifies the shift towards late new wave aesthetics. Chapter 5 explores the difference between the early and late phases of new wave, while Chapter 6 examines the possible causes of its demise along with its legacy.

While the dissolution of punk left behind a slow acceptance of commercialism in the UK, the culture of consumerism allowed punk in the US to disappear quietly while new wave emerged. Adkins states that American punk was never deeply invested in a rebellious attitude like its British counterpart and therefore, ‘depending on how it is defined, it may be more accurate to say “punk” never really developed in America at all. From this perspective, the Ramones were simply a sub-genre within the new wave sound of the mid-1970s' (p. 44). Regardless, new wave allowed artists in both countries to play with ‘image’ and perceived realities. Adkins connects the development of new wave music with postmodernism by supporting his argument with references from notable postmodern theorists and philosophers such as Jean Baudrillard, Fredric Jameson and Jacques Derrida, among others. However, even though some of these great thinkers were eager to pin postmodernism's rise to MTV's arrival, Adkins is careful to state that postmodernism did not inspire new wave directly, but asserts that its ideals already existed before the dawn of the music television channel and the new wave movement. ‘These theorists were sometimes so anxious to connect MTV to postmodernism that they failed to see how postmodernism had already established a foothold in pop music before MTV had even arrived’ (p. 11).

New Wave reiterates that new wave's play on the ‘image’ and reality always leads to empty signs. However, it is not the only source to describe new wave as superficial. AllMusic.com, the comprehensive music resource which includes reviews and biographies, writes: ‘Where post-punk was artsy, difficult, and challenging, new wave was pop music, pure and simple’ (AllMusic 2015). Music journalist Greil Marcus declared, ‘Never before has a pop phenomenon appeared rooted entirely in the notion of vapidity, on the thrill of surrender’ (Reynolds Reference Reynolds2005, p. 347) and claimed that all of the Second British Invasion groups would not be remembered. Other sources described the genre as ‘vapid’. The shallowness of new wave seems to be the main focus, but could the perceived ‘emptiness’ of the genre be what is hiding its depth? (If so, this would be another postmodernist identifier.) Lyrical content found in the genre could be clever, ironic, moody, self-reflective and confrontational. The Pet Shop Boys are known for their satirical lyrics, ‘offering wry and thoughtful cultural commentary communicated by the Morse code of au courant synth washes and drum-machine rhythms’ (Ankeny Reference Ankeny2015). Two covers re-created by Pet Shop Boys were subjects for analysis in the Popular Music peer-reviewed journal. The Smiths, who were initially categorised under new wave, have become a recent academic interest owing to their former frontman's lyrics. ‘Morrissey: The Pageant of His Bleeding Heart is the first academic book to analyse literary influences on the singer and his former band’ (Robinson Reference Robinson2009). Dr Gavin Hopps, a research fellow at St Andrews University, deconstructs Morrissey's lyrics and aligns them with those of the great British poets. Morrissey's lyrics have also been analysed in the peer-reviewed academic journal, Thesis Eleven.

New Wave: Image is Everything opens the door for deeper study of a musical style that has been passed on as not only vacuous, but forgettable, without purpose or effect on present day society. It successfully sets up the possibility of a cross-disciplinary discourse for those in the humanities and social sciences. The realm of new wave taught us that we could be anything we wanted to be, and re-create reality at our own leisure, without taking the ‘image’ too seriously. Unlike its predecessor, punk, new wave created a silent revolution, which left behind an even more impactful treatment of what is real in today's culture (reality and talent competition shows come to mind). As Adkins states: ‘The argument new wave made was simple: if image always wins in the end, celebrate the image without any pretense to meaning. Privilege the “signs” of the culture – the clothes, the cars, the houses – let those signs play amongst themselves, and to hell with what they might mean’ (p. 25, emphasis Adkins).