Punk rock doesn’t trigger images of Mecca during the Hajj or fasting during Ramadan. Likewise, Islam doesn’t exactly bring to mind pictures of spiky haired, angst-ridden youth slam dancing to the sounds of bands like Discharge and Anti-Nowhere League, all within a subculture that’s against authority and embraces chaos.

Yet since the publication of the novel “The Taqwacores,” by Baltimore native Michael Muhammad Knight in 2004, a scene described as “punk Islam” has emerged, inspired by “burqa-wearing riot girls, mohawked Sufis, straightedged Sunnis, Shi’a skinheads,” according to www.taqwacore.com

Following up on the book’s success, a new documentary film, called “Taqwacore: The Birth Of Punk Islam,” documents the bands and fans of this scene, highlighting the vibrant creativity of young punk rockers and Knight himself as they face many obstacles.

The movie is split into two parts; a 2007 tour that takes the bands around the United States in a green bus that’s spray painted with slogans like “Fight War Not Wars” with little camels on the sides. Bands include such acts as The Kominas, The Secret Trial Five, Al-Thawra as well as musicians like Omar Waqar and Knight himself, as the movie is interspersed with him doing spoken word about his life and the book.

The second half documents the bands and Knight traveling to Pakistan – where many of the musicians were either born or their parents emigrated from – as they bring punk rock there and Knight explores the different Islamic sects there.

There are hilarious moments on the tour, as they deal with anti-Muslim racism, on the one hand – the deep stares from passing motorists and a Detroit show at Small’s canceled because of “the Muslim thing.”

On the other hand, they deal with intolerance from conservative Muslims, culminating at the Islamic Society of North America conference, which ends in a ruckus as cops tell one of the bands to either leave or be arrested.

In Pakistan, Knight revisits a Saudi-funded mosque that he studied in 15 years before, at a time when he was searching for answers after getting in touch with his father, who was an avowed white supremacist. He recounts his reaction to his father’s racism which was getting involved in a stringent form of Islam and studying in Pakistan, then returning home to – in his words – abuse his mother. The movie ends in a successful punk gig in Lahore on a rooftop.

“Taqwacore” was an attempt to fictionalize the coming together of these two cultures, and finding common ground, and – as one musician put it – to give the finger to both cultures. Taqwacore (a play on the word hardcore, an angry form of punk) is a fascinating and entertaining look at a scene born in the imagination of one man, and how a small group of creative minds made it real.