To develop my 'thank god for punk' theme.

Yes punk went stale very soon but it opened the door for tons of great music, and a lot of artists who are still creative.

Elvis Costello
Paul Weller
Madness
Chrissie Hynde
Ian Dury (RIP obviously)
Billy Bragg
Shane MacGowan (to a point)
David Byrne
U2

To my ears, most of the pre-punk, early 70's rock acts didn't have much going for them in the way of songs. Loads of good vibes and musicality, maybe, but very few good *songs*.

You can add many many others to that list that would probably not have had the chance to break through if punk hadn't made Bob Harris wittering on about Capricorn Records look totally redundant. No harm to Bob, mind you, he now has much better taste than he had in 76!