The Chris Low Obscure Punk Tape Post…

811 comments

1. 

   Sam

   May 7, 2008 at 1:54 pm

   “Reading the threads, the predominant tone is one of an angry and unfocused nihilism which courted ugliness (to the point of seeming as if people were actively wishing misfortune upon themselves)…”

   Sums it up well I think. But this was punk before it merged with hippy, though you started to see ‘hippy punks’ in ’79, largely due to Crass. I think the whole thing became much more sensible after this with definite (anarcho) ideals. I think punk was always suicidal, in the way you describe it. Although I was never a worshipper, Sid Vicious set a fine example of how to hurl yourself repeatedly into brick walls. Shane MacGowan walked around the West End with ‘IRA’ written on his forehead. The Pistols playing working mens clubs in Huddersfield in 75 was suicidal too. I don’t think it was self-conscious or political at all, I think it was an instinctive desire to confront the tedious world we’d all grown up in. I think early punk was closer to Borat than anything political. There was a wicked, confrontational sense of humour to it that was lost later on when political lines were drawn. I remember going into a jewellery shop in Oxford Street with Wank. This sweet shop girl emerged from behind the counter and asked:

   “Can I help you with anything?”

   “Yeah…bury yourself alive”

   said Wank, which was unnecessary and unkind but fucking funny.

   There was a lot of creativity though. The Heretics tapes on this and the other page were the result of about 1 year learning to play an instrument. We covered Stepping Stone and wrote the rest of the songs. I think at the heart of punk was this idea that you had to get off your arse and do something. Punk was a very untidy explosion, and one of its strengths is that people are still unclear about what it was 30 years later.
   Anyway, this is getting all sociological. I like what Mick Mahoney said when asked about the causes of football violence: “It’s a laugh, innit?”

2. 

   Nic

   May 7, 2008 at 2:20 pm

   Yes, thinking about what you’ve written, Sam, the main difference is probably the injection of ‘anarchist politics’…

   I think that I didn’t experience the ‘nihilistic’ phase of Punk as I was just far too young: the brash swagger and posturing of ‘Punk’ was very appealing to me as a 10 year old in 1978, but it seemed redundant as soon as I heard Crass and Posion Girls (and Crisis) a year later…

   I experienced a more nihilistic aspect to ‘Punk’ later in the 1980’s, but that in itself was almost a kind of retro-nostalgia for a time which people had missed (and was – possibly – a result of the more trenchant political angle of the ‘scene’ at the time)…

   Yes, perhaps a little sociological, although I’m with Socrates when it comes to analysis…
   Having said that, I’m always ready to do the Grapple to The Users, V2 or The Scabs at the drop of a bondage strap…
   🙂

3. 

   AL Puppy

   May 7, 2008 at 2:27 pm

   Pinki – went back home in 1980, went to Stroud College took A levels then joined Stroud CND. Went with Stroud CND to Greenham Common in November 1981. Stayed on and off for three years. She became a very well know Greenham Woman – featured in film Carry Greenham Home. In 1983 she and Dave Morris (McLibel Trial) got given a house in hackney by the GLC – something to do with an anti-nuclear march from Faslane to Greenham. helped Dave ‘organise’ Stop the City. Also in October 1983 she had a son – Sky and planned to give birth at Greenham but got talked out of it -she had AB negative blood which can cause complications.

   I met her in January 84 and we started living in sin in Hackney (Upper Clapton) 1985. 1986 she went to Hackney College and got 3 more A levels. At same time involved in Stonehenge Campaign see

   http://www.horusmaat.com/silverstar/SILVERSTAR2-PG38.htm

   for how she annoyed the Druids in 1984… became an active pagan/ thelemic/ chaos magician…

   Started studying social anthropology at School of Oriental and African Studies in 1987- a very prestigious/ academic place… still a student there in 1995, had changed over to study public international law – studied Islamic Law, Indian and African Law, Law and Development…

   Meantime became an anti-road protestor at M11 and Bath… and had another three children -Elizabeth, Alistair and Callum.

   But the Campbell Buildings days plus living at Greenham and her pursuit of the road of excess generally wore her down. She died 5th January 1996 aged 33. Thanks to Dave Morris and Richard Cabut, had an obituary in the Guardian. Would have been a grandma by now – Sky has a five year old daughter.

4. 

   Mike

   May 7, 2008 at 2:46 pm

   Sam/Jake:here’s what I got from Martin (Sons Of Bad Breath):Sniper/ Sgt.H died of heroin OD Summer 1985,perhaps ’86.Martin said that he’d helped them all to squat when they first came up to Hackney in early ’80s.
   I pointed out that you were sure you saw him in the late 80’s,but Martin has a good memory.If true,makes you the Spinal Tap of punk I guess,if not then maybe he’ll make a ‘Back From The Grave’ appearance on this site!

   Jah Pork Pie:to continue the Death theme,I remember hearing that your friend and ours ‘little’ Kenny (skinhead mugger-twat up Portobello) also resides upstairs (or down,preferably,if you believe in all of that) due to the needle,circa 1982-3.Last I saw of him was in Ken Market,he’d got a swallow tattooed on his face and photographed in the Face or ID.He was from Stonebridge Pk or Harlesden,but used to fancy himself as one of the Ladbroke Grove mob.Had a friend called John,another skinhead,often known as John Big Ears,nice bloke.I had several run-ins with Kenny,once down Eagles Club where I decked him.He ran to the bigger skinheads,one of whom butted me rather ineffectually in the side of the head and uttered “I know he’s a wanker but you don’t hit skins right?”.I had to laugh,but then lambasted Mark Weller and other punks who stood by and didn’t lift a finger.Week later I came back up with mates from my local for a re-run except w/equal odds this time.Funnily enough the bald ones declined our invitation.Not long after that Kenny appeared in Warwick (pub down Portobello) with a very large cross cut into the top of his head. Apparently he’d passed out on tuinol in a Brixton squat and some ‘Jock punks’ (quote) had decided to do some wood-carving on his skull with a machete. Very fetching.I was with Womble and the Hayes punks.We laughed heartily and wished him a swift trip to the knackers’ yard.He spat
   ‘all you punks are gonna get it now!’ and departed,tail firmly between his legs.

   Somewhere I have an old page cut from a Sunday supplement magazine of the time,question:’Why do you dye your hair?’,has many old Portobello faces.I’m pretty sure Wank Stain is in there,saying “I want my hair to look like a clenched fist” or something,also those 2 rockabill kids,one blonde one dark-haired with blue tasselled jacket,don’t recall the names.Will try & find if it interests you.Dino and Mannie of Chaos still around,esp. if you frequent QPR.Paul(Raggity)-singer-stayed at Womble’s mums in Hayes for a while,not seen since.2 Sue’s:last saw them at Tony Melon’s place in Hayes,1980.Thing/Jerry (Thornton Heath):Dave Fergusson met up with him and Womble (the taller one who sung in early Rubella Ballet line-up) in Hackney recently,Dave & Womble’s kids at same school

   Nic:I have great memories of 1977,particularly the summer,great records & gigs,nice girls.By comparison 1979 was like trying to regain yer virginity:the innocence was gone.The skinhead violence (not to mention everyday insults and ignorance from straights) is hard to explain to someone who wasn’t there,and had a peculiarly London flavour.Organised bullying on a massive scale,perhaps.It combined with the bleakness of the era I think, and the nihilism you mention was also in tune with the times generally.I graduated from blues to dexys to tuinol and razorblades. Horrible,and embarrassing in hindsight.I used to come back home and people would ask ‘What are you doing to yourself?’.As someone says elsewhere,the indestructibility of youth,or at least the myth of it.Also, problems at home have the ability to manifest themselves in self- destructive behaviour.If someone said to me today:’Do you want to come to a gig tonight? there’s bad drugs,flat beer and a 10:1 chance you’ll get your head kicked in.If you survive we can doss at a squat or sit in that all night burger bar in Paddington for 6 hours before catching the milk train back to Slough’ I would laugh and stay home,but then I’m 48 years old.What’s missing is the music:99% out of 100 times it was worth the risk to hear in the flesh,and the camaraderie that went along with it.I can’t help thinking that when the violence and the nihilism dissipated,the music also got worse,or at least blander.

5. 

   Jah Pork Pie

   May 7, 2008 at 2:51 pm

   Oh man, I am so sorry to hear that life caught up with Pinki. She managed to cram a whole lot of living in though, didn’t she?

   What a sadly ironic death, when she was finally at the top of her game. Life is a fucking cruel joke sometimes.

   I thought she was older than me – but it turns out we were the same age. I’m glad she accomplished so much to be remembered by: apart from my daughter having been born I feel most of the time like I’ve done fuck all of any note since 1980.

6. 

   Jah Pork Pie

   May 7, 2008 at 3:06 pm

   Dave Fergusson: I remember him telling me that he’d had a trip on glue up the Kings’ Road and had seen a lettuce leaf float out of his ear, only to open up and reveal his brain inside! What a nice fella! He used to go out with a punk girl called Sue (from Morden) who was going out with Wank Stain when I met him.

   I’d be really interested to see the newspaper page: all my photos/records etc were “stolen” by my ex-partner in the ’90s. I saw the Sues at their place in Fulham, ’81 I think. One of them was going out with a blond-haired guy called Mick (Oliver I think).

   And I recall Kenny’s bad head day with particular pleasure! I don’t believe in the upstairs/downstairs stuff, but I’m as near as dammit sure he’ll have come back as a geeky bullied kid in beautiful downtown Detroit.

7. 

   Sam

   May 7, 2008 at 3:51 pm

   Hello Mike!

   I can say for certainty that me and Si saw Sniper in or after 1987 as I’d moved to Albion Rd from Newington Green and we saw him by Clissold park. As Si says I’ve got a very petty memory for dates and stuff. He was always sunken eyed and looked even more so. Maybe it was the Ghost of Poor Drummers Past that we saw. You never know! I’m quite surprised he got into smack though as he didn’t seem the type. God, the casualties from that period…it’s not funny.
   Little Ken was the skinhead’s skinhead. I witnessed many a mugging by him outside of Rough Trade. I remember John fondly too. He saved me from Kenny’s clutches on at least two occasions. The most memorable was one time I was off to the Electric Ballroom and jumped on the 31 bus near my parents’ place, thundered upstairs and was confronted by a whole top deck full of Ladbroke Grove skins all staring spitefully in my direction. One of those times where you’ve got to think really fast. Honour dictated that I couldn’t retreat downstairs. In a split second I saw a seat vacant next to John and sat down next to him and started chatting. Everyone but Kenny settled down and John said “He’s alright…” and the situation was defused.
   One of the Rockabillys you may be talking about could have been Sox, from W. Hampstead/Kilburn – always wore a leopard skin flat cap. Great bloke. OD’d early on…about 1981 I think. I remember him as an Ian Dury-like character, marching up to me in Portobello when I’d had my mohican done and going “What the FUCK ‘ave you done te yer BARNET!”.

8. 

   Sam

   May 7, 2008 at 4:05 pm

   A couple of other characters I remember from Portobello.

   A black kid who was kind of a Rude Boy, who would not stop talking. Everyone liked him but he’d corner you and talk your head off. I think I asked him if he was speeding once and he denied it. I think he was just one of those people.

   Taffy Bullshit. Welsh bloke who’d go on about Sid not being dead and living with Ronnie Biggs in Paraguay and other nonsense.

   I remember Dino and Lisa. One time she overdid it on something outside of Rough Trade, lay on the pavement and threw up. I remember pissing myself when Dino produced a homemade ‘Antz Hanky’ from his jacket and cleaned her up with it. Nice people.

9. 

   Sam

   May 7, 2008 at 4:18 pm

   And of course Sarma and John – purveyors of finest speckled blues.

10. 

    Sam

    May 7, 2008 at 4:30 pm

    Completely unrelated but a bad habit I aquired during this time was staring people out. Especially on the tube…you had to stake your territory through this method. This stayed with me unfortunately until I came over to the States. I was walking along in Columbus, Ohio shortly after I arrived and stared someone out who was standing in the street. As I walked past he said with a genuine innocence “What?!” I realized the pointlessness of this behaviour but this was at least 15 years after the period we’re all talking about.

11. 

    Mike

    May 7, 2008 at 4:38 pm

    Hi Sam! I will interrogate Martin further about Sniper (& no doubt drive him mad in the process!) and let you know.That Hackney Hellcrew followed the same path w/equal joi de vivre,particularly at 281 Victoria Pk Rd in Hackney.The name Sox rings a bell,that black kid talking your head off too. There was another black punk girl,Julie I think,from Forest Hill in SE London,lovely girl.Oh,and Janice from Hayes with the megaphone voice, now a University professor I’m told.Also I remember a free daytime gig at that Bay 66 under the flyover,all those punks who’d been kicked out of Derby Lodge or Camden were there w/arms in slings and battered faces.
    Maybe July ’79,later that night there was a free gig in St.Marks Park w/the Passions which I went along to with Ana Claydon.It was very peaceful and serene for some reason,hot but breezy and I was fascinated by the treetops moving under the night sky. Love to say I was on acid,but it was those shitty dexys by then I think.I can remember seeing gangs huddled beneath Slough’s underpasses on the way home,waiting for me,then reaching them and finding nothing there. Also,asking for a ‘half’ on the bus at age 19 and getting away with it, paying 10p on the tube (‘where did you get on?’ ‘last stop’ ‘name it’ ‘oh fuck off!’).More Kenny:wasn’t he one of those who attacked the Swell Maps outside Rough Trade one Saturday? Albion Rd,Stoke Newington:my old band used to play the Golden Lady down there a lot,probably around ’86-87

    Jah:get my email from Tony D (contacts at top of page),he’s got it,if not, from Sam.I’ll scan that photo page and email to you

12. 

    Sam

    May 7, 2008 at 5:53 pm

    Yeah…’paranoia’ was a word I learnt in ’79. I remember me and Si spotting groups of bald, crombie clad people in the distance, on cold, winter nights, hiding in people’s front gardens and finding out we were running away from a bunch of old men.
    If we’re talking about the same thing, that skinhead squat raid in Camden was in 1980 I think (anal broomstick rape etc…). I talked to someone who was there on Talkpunk forum and apparently it was all true. I was hanging out at Mitch’s in Campbell Buildings one time when there was a knock on the door. Seconds later her empty flat was full of Ladbrooke Grove skins. The gravity of being trapped inside a small squat with them was fucking scary. Of course Kenny started picking on some 15 year old weedy punk who was there. Once again John intervened. He deserves a medal.

13. 

    Jah Pork Pie

    May 7, 2008 at 6:03 pm

    I thought Phil was only into stuff that came out of the ground: wouldn’t touch Tuinal or speed, but smoked like a 1973 Cortina. Well surprised that he got on the gear.

    I remember that black Rude Boy too: and as you say, can’t remember anything else about him except that he seemed to be speeding his nuts off all the time!

    When Lisa threw up outside Rough Trade was the first time that I fell for Mitzi. Lisa Chucked up, Mitzi chucked up in sympathy and I went quite green round the gills with the smell of all the puke about on the floor 🙂 From then on to the Electric Ballroom for The Ruts, and fell in love while pogoing to Love Song by The Damned. Corny huh?

    Dino once got quite upset with me for clouting Wank Stain outside Rough Trade. Wank was off his nut on Tuinal and I didn’t want to see a mate go down that route (before I developed a coherent philosophy of personal liberty and the attendant personal responsibility 🙂 ) . Dino “put me right” with quite an angry lecture!

    Never liked Sarma and John. That wasn’t a nice business they were in and they were a bit too homely about it for my liking.

    I remember Jerry Thing getting mugged by some big punk/skinhead girl (mate of little Ken’s) up the Bello one day. She told him to undo all his zips and when he got to the the wrist zips on his leather he pulled a condom out. “Very considerate”, she said, “not many blokes think to use them things these days. Now where’s your FUCKING MONEY?”. Priceless!

    Sam: Whatever happened to Mike Diboll and Ian Pigg? Do you remember finishing off an incomplete “stream of consciousness” poem that Mike Diboll was knocking up on his typewriter?

    “The sucking serendipity
    of Erasmus’s wrinkly ronkly roo,
    Smelly Smegmata,
    Jiminy Carter”

    …etc

    Mike: as above, my contact email is misterwomble@hotmail.com, but if you’ve got any pics, why not send them to Tony D and get him to post them up on here?

14. 

    Sam

    May 7, 2008 at 6:26 pm

    Too much time on my hands but I’m thoroughly enjoying this. Where’s Saltiel gone?

    I do remember tampering with Mike’s poem. I also remember a hilarious impromptu jam session at 66a with me playing a tuneless noise on ’11’, and Mike standing there shouting “Ronald! MacDonald! STUPID FUCKING CLOWN!!!

    Priceless. I don’t think he approved of me or Wank because we’d laugh when ‘House Meetings’ were announced and we would go on and on in mock Scottish accents about ‘Groots noo’ and other childish, counter-revolutionary things, much to his displeasure. Another time he threatened Leigh Kendall with an empty plastic chocolate milk bottle. I’m glad he’s done well for himself though. Much too intelligent for us. I never had many dealings with Ian. He was voted off the island shortly after Mike I think. Then Tony and Mitch arrived followed by Leigh and Volker (‘The German’). I formed an alliance against Volker following his smoking my dole money and he was voted off too. But not before we introduced him to ‘National Bed Week’ – the traditional English holiday when everyone moves their beds into the kitchen for one night.

    I’ve just remembered another classic Sniper moment. It was a very boring, drugless sunday round Jake’s parents house. We were sat twiddling our thumbs in the living room and conversation had died. Suddenly Sniper recited a poem he’d obviously been working on for the last half hour:

    [Serious, Leeds accent]
    The Pistols split up
    The Clash sold out
    It was enough to make any punk
    Scream and shout
    The UK Subs have fallen apart
    The Ramones were brilliant from the start
    But now they’ve gone
    Oh so slow
    No more one, two, three four -go!

    A short silence followed by the rest of us pissing ourselves laughing. Phil’s feelings were hurt and he stormed out. I commited the work to memory. I hope it will one day see the light of day in print. God bless the man, he was priceless. There’s another rehearsal tape where he gets his foot stuck in the kick drum.

15. 

    Penguin • Post Author •

    May 7, 2008 at 10:51 pm

    Gone a bit quiet on this post then…may have to delete it through lack of interest…oh hang on 146 comments.
    Nice going people. The post to beat right now is Rosebery Ave Peace Centre at 167 comments, if it happens then this post will be the KYPP record of comments.

16. 

    Tony Puppy

    May 7, 2008 at 11:05 pm

    Excellent stuff on this thread.

    I feel like answering things and commenting but then the next post comes along and then the next one.

    This little anecdote had me laughing, but it does for me capture the way we felt about the rest of the world:

    I remember going into a jewellery shop in Oxford Street with Wank. This sweet shop girl emerged from behind the counter and asked:

    “Can I help you with anything?”

    “Yeah…bury yourself alive”

    said Wank, which was unnecessary and unkind but fucking funny.

    I know that feeling. I still have it to this day.

    Rich Kid, contact me via the ‘contact’ button up the top and let let me read your unpublished book.

    Hopefully we can come to some agreement about putting some of the words up on here.

17. 

    Jah Pork Pie

    May 7, 2008 at 11:17 pm

    66a was a helluva place, wasn’t it? I get a nice warm feeling every time I go through Finchley Road Station to this day! I remember with a chuckle the eggs filled with paint and distributed over the paintwork of several luxury motors. And the Merc garage which had its sign shot out with an airgun. Well, I say shot out: it was really more the cumulative weight of several hundred .22 shot that made it give up the ghost and fall out, I think. Of course, I should say right away that I’ve no idea who was responsible for such crimes.

    Pointing the bone, as Jake mentions above, was another favourite, wasn’t it? Some kind of an Aboriginal curse I seem to remember.

    And 66a was the place where I first learned to love wine. 2 litre bottles of Soave to be exact. I think my first completed 2 litre bottle was round a friend of Si’s girlfriend Millie’s (might have been called Sophie). I’m sure I fell briefly in love with her before the urge to vomit kicked in. Strange really, as I’d been drinking cans of Pils topped up with Big Sue’s vodka up the Bello for months. Perhaps it really was love 😉

    And Sam, what was the deal with you, Jake and Wank blindfolding me at Finchley Rd Station the first time I came up there and telling me that the guy you lived with was someone heavy in the IRA? And then it turned out to be Mike Diboll. Arf arf!

    Jake’s room was nice there: the sheets suspended from the ceiling rose – and didn’t he have one of those little papier mache “retreat cave” things from Alternative London (the Bible at the time for all things low-rent or dodgy)?

    Was Volker a drummer? I’m sure there was a full kit set up there at one point, with some nice guitar amps too – we had a jam or two when you had that SG, bit of reggae and stuff.

    Let me see if I remember the chords to Lambeth Skyline:

    Em D C G Dsus4
    Em D C G Dsus4
    Am C G Dsus4
    Am C G Dsus4

    And that natty little lead bit in the middle. Nice!

18. 

    Jah Pork Pie

    May 7, 2008 at 11:28 pm

    Jake: I’d love to see some of your book mate. And maybe we could also all get some kind of non-fiction, non-linear narrative thing together from all of our recollections?

    Certainly there’s a lot of very dark stuff, but also some stuff that has influenced my sense of humour into my 40s in a very beneficial way!

    For instance, I can’t help laughing at myself when I slept at Ruth’s place (nothing [terribly] untoward) and Mitzi knocked on the door the next morning in her school uniform (bunking off from sixth form, before anyone has a pop 😉 ). She copped the right hump and legged it down to Lambeth North Station before I could say anything. No time to put my trousers on, just grabbed the nearest thing to hand which was Ruth’s kilt. So there I am following her down in to the station and onto a packed rush-hour train full of Ivy-League suited straphangers with my eyeliner from the previous night running down my cheeks with sweat, bare-chested and barefoot, pleading to a Catholic schoolgirl to calm down and be reasonable!

19. 

    Sam

    May 8, 2008 at 2:39 am

    Good to hear from you Tony. Hope you’re doing well.

    I remember Jake’s room at 66a was very plush but I don’t remember the retreat cave. I’m sure I would have scurried in there if I’d known. As always, we started off with noble ideals. We painted everything, took the receipts down to the housing association, bought healthy food in bulk on a weekly basis etc. Jake put down wall to wall shag carpeting. His room at this stage was like a fully functioning, Jason King babe lair. This was of course the honeymoon period. Let’s flash forward to 6 months later: Me and Tony have had a dirty hit at Danielle’s. Tony is laying seige to the toilet but I can’t come out as my body is trying to remove the harmful toxins explosively at both ends. Showing true love, Mitch suspends a Sainsburys bag over the bath for Tony to relieve his bowels in. This goes on all night until we’re admitted to the Royal Free hospital in the morning. The kitchen by this time is devoid of anything save a lot of unused spices, some PG tips, a bottle of milk and some Smash. There is a large glass jar, originally intended for keeping pasta in which now serves as a container for dog ends. This is raided in times of desperation. It usually takes 4 or 5 ‘knubs’ to roll a very thin cigarette. There has been a steady leak under the sink for some time and, rather than spend precious giro money on a relatively inexpensive section of plastic pipe, we have placed a large, rubber bucket under the damaged area. This takes about a week to fill completely and usually has a greasy covering of scum on it when full. It has been named ‘The Vulture’ and is emptied out of the window onto the courtyard below. The long suffering Scottish woman beneath is by now too scared to complain. A few weeks before she knocked on the door in tears after suffering another day of 2 drumkits and 3 record players all playing at the same time. “It’s against housing association policy!” she wailed before being laughed at and having the door shut in her face. A fuse blew a few days ago and this was eventually mended by using a low E string from my guitar to complete the circuit. When me and Tony are released from hospital 2 weeks later, we go straight back down to Danielle’s. The next day we decide to dismantle the building and sell it for scrap to buy drugs so we climb onto the roof and spend all day removing the lead and hammering it into 6 inch square cubes. After destroying this vital waterproof protection we haul the stuff down the road to a scrap yard. The bloke looks at it and says: “That’s not lead mate…it’s zinc!”. The rent, gas, electricity etc…has not been payed for several months so we eventually decide to start a new life in Amsterdam and just abandon the place.

    It was a beautiful flat looking back. Huge rooms, massive wall sized windows. I don’t know when they knocked it down but like I said, there’s a shiny office block there now. A blue plaque for decadance should be put up.

20. 

    Nic

    May 8, 2008 at 9:39 am

    I would concur wholeheartedly about collating all of the posts into a loose narrative…

    The vast majority (well, almost all) of the books on ‘Punk’ in the late 1970’s focus almost exclusively on the music and little on the daily life which surrounded it (which is where the real action is most of the time)…

21. 

    Chris

    May 8, 2008 at 10:53 am

    Just out of interest – as I wasn’t around this scene at all and don’t think I know any of those mentioned above – would i be correct in assuming that during this period smack became very popular amongst the punk /squat scene?

    During my time with The Apostles and staying around a number of the squats mentioned on other threads here I never came across it apart from a few old hippy mates of Dave’s on Brougham Road.

    I notice Mike’s comment:
    “The Hackney Hellcrew followed the same path w/equal joi de vivre,particularly at 281 Victoria Pk Rd in Hackney”
    which seems strange as I stayed there over summer 1983 and none of the Hackney Hell Crew folk who stayed there were into drugs at all. In fact Olly, Martin, Alien etc were positively anti-drugs, apart from the odd bit of puff. maybe things changed later on but as I recall it the intoxicant of choice around that scene was pretty much cider and special brew.

    One funny incident I remember was when they invited either Disorder or Chaos UK (can’t remember which – some smellies from Britol anyway) to stay. Soon after I heard Andy Martin going absolutely ballistic as he’d discovered they had thrown ‘perfectly good’ bread of his in the bin so they could use the bag to buzz glue from, raising them from their Evo-stick induced stupor and chasing them all out onto the street.

    I’ve still got a load of photos from 281 I’ll have to send you to put up Pengy.

22. 

    jahpork

    May 8, 2008 at 11:37 am

    You would indeed be correct in that assumption. It’s an old chestnut, but (as was first said about [I think] John Cooper Clark’s extended sojourn on the gear)…

    They bent more spoons than Uri Geller.

23. 

    Mike

    May 8, 2008 at 11:43 am

    Chris:I meant a similar hedonistic path,rather than heroin or any drugs per se

    I’m pretty sure that in ’79 it started w/blues,then tuinol and then a few got onto the harder stuff in London.Certainly when I was squatting S.Acton estate in the late 80s people I knew in W.London had got into heroin even as we headed into our late 20’s.The drugs scene of 1979 definitely had a sinister undercurrent:if I remember,the blues vanished overnight to be replaced by Tuinol (is this in an old KYPP somewhere?) and there were conspiracy theories about the police being involved,if any one knows more to elaborate.Also I remember people banging up tuinol in a squat I stayed in one night summer ’79,or is that just my memory playing tricks? I recall one place in Fulham possibly,stayed there 2 weekends on the trot and an older woman called Kate introduced me to the delights of banging up Speed,my one and only dabble with needles.Apart from one young hippy kid they were all ‘older’,which probably meant late 20’s (a lifetime ahead when you’re 18-19),and a mixture of zombified smackheads and dessicated speedfreaks w/missing teeth.Kate was possibly had that pernicious desire to corrupt me thro’ hard drugs,whilst I was too busy doing what 18 year-olds did then,i.e.fall hopelessly and fruitlessly in love with girls my own age(she made a big thing about ‘us gypos sticking together’).Anyway,something about the place gave me the creeps and I never went back.Years later I bumped into the hippy kid in the Chelsea Potter and when I asked he waved his hand dismissively and said “Oh, they’re all dead now”.The daft thing is,apart from the violence and some seedy moments,all these people were,on the whole,very sweet and, when you’re young there’s a certain romanticism about it all which comes thro’ all that bad shit.Being on the periphery of it heightens your perceptions of such people.Sad and,as Sam said earlier,when you think of all the casualties,it’s not funny.Dear me,am getting soft in old age

24. 

    jahpork

    May 8, 2008 at 11:48 am

    I don’t think this lifestyle was exclusively Punk really, come to think of it. On the estate where I come from in south London, there were a group of guys who were into Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and all that, and they were right on the gear in the mid-seventies. I remember as a 12-year old being told to go indoors after standing on the balcony and seeing them performing an unusual slow wafting dance 3 floors below with a couple of sharps hanging out or their arms.

    And smack and Special Brew/cider aren’t mutually exclusive either: this crew were pissed up AND taking anything else that came their way too. A useful working definition of nihilism would be “not choosy”, if you think about it.

    Sadly, as with our lot, 3 of them didn’t make it. One of the guys lasted until about 6 years ago when his body just gave up on him. Nice bloke too. I’m very glad you guys are still knocking about. This is being a very good week for me!

25. 

    jahpork

    May 8, 2008 at 11:55 am

    Mike: I don’t think that’s your mind playing tricks about banging up Tuinal in ’79. People would bang up anything they could get their hands on. Tuinal, Nembutal, Seconal, sulphate, gear etc etc.

    On another thread here, I recall Bob Short banging up a barrel of INSTANT COFFEE one morning. Really. And there was a female member of our lot who used to bang up Charlie because she thought that snorting it was wasteful!

26. 

    jahpork

    May 8, 2008 at 12:01 pm

    btw, just to get back to the music for a bit…

    I’ve just d/l’d “(I’m) Stranded” by The Saints, as I remembered that there used to be a copy of it at 66a (Leigh’s or Sam’s?).

    Now that’s how an electric guitar is SUPPOSED to sound!

    Apparently, according to Wikipedia, they gradually morphed into some sort of “Classic Rock” outfit a few years back. Supertramp with spikes? Shame!

27. 

    Rich Kid

    May 8, 2008 at 12:12 pm

    Saltiels back…
    Aint read it all since I been away so might be repeating stuff.I’ll re read it all in a bit
    Still of course we’ll beat the comment count .No contest.
    About all the ‘negativity’.Not all Ldn punks were like ‘us’.
    EG the KYPP crew.And Phil & Cory etc.They were less self destructive.
    Also by 1978/9 when most of these memories are from, ‘punk’ was, inspite of the song, dead.
    That creative moment of ’76 & ’77 had disapeared.We were not doing anything new & exciting just carrying on what those older 1st gen punks had started.And although we may have pretended otherwise I think we all knew it.Punk bands were already in Smash Hits.
    Also Tuinol had alot to do with it.Its a wrecker of the first order.
    That rent boy punk ‘simon’ brought it to C bdgs and that was that.Overnight it changed.
    Good to hear that Pinky had a good albeit short life.
    Sarma?It was her who sold me the STP that I took in summer ’81.I was hallucinating for months.Dunno Sam if you remember me when we hooked for ‘brixton’?
    I was constantly fighting the urge to crawl into a hole for ever.That was one reason that I embraced ‘gear’ so wholeheartedly. It stopped those hallucinations.
    I’ve recently learned that most people who take STP dont comback.Im a lucky chap.
    Sarmas squat in Kings Cross had people fixing acid & doing stuff with their eyeballs.But they also did things like work full time in the city.It was very odd…

28. 

    Rich Kid

    May 8, 2008 at 12:14 pm

    Anyway as pork says sex drugs & rock n roll aint only ‘punk’.Theres always gonna be casualties

29. 

    Mike

    May 8, 2008 at 12:23 pm

    Jah:yes,and ‘The Bitch’ by Slaughter + Dogs,another great guitar sound if you whack up the treble.Will email that page of Portobello punks at weekend.I’m meeting Penguin/Tony about old tapes in June and by then should have dug out 3 old crates of ancient zines/flyers from back then. Sarma & John:still in W.Hampstead apparently.’Russians singer had brief fling w/her and she introduced to the 3-for-a-quid delights of instant dieting and stomach cramps,used to come and see us play at the Chippenham pub and bring along Patrik Fitzgerald.In hindsight,as you say, not a nice business but we were buying.

    Sam:definitely Kings Cross in summer ’79 re:those beaten-up punk squatters.It was on TV news and the attackers were locals,not skins.They said on the TV “We didn’t want those freaks on our estate”,wankers.And yes,John was a true saint,saved many of us in our time.Re:Sniper,I put Martin Badbreath onto this thread so maybe he’ll tell you what he knows direct,will save me money in texting at least!

    Nic:I totally agree,nearly all these Punk books say the same thing,i.e.Punk ended in early ’77 when more than 20 people had heard of it (in a nutshell).My girlfriend’s teen daughter gets very amused at my grumpy old man explosions on this.Most recently,that ‘Babylons Burning’ book by Clint Heylin(sp?) where he jumps from PIL’s 1st LP to fucking Nirvana,writing everything off inbetween,and talks about the ‘Oi/Mohican fraternity’ at a gig in 1979!!When I finished throwing the book at the cat/wall/window there was a smug,offhand line in the friggin’ Guardian about how ‘Punk was always linked to dubious right wing movements'(or words to that effect).Cue shredding/spluttering sounds and imaginary baseball bats wielded at the heads of halfwitted cafe latte-supping journos.This is why you guys should write your side of it before such garbage gets taught to kids in 30 years time!

    Jah:Bob Short banging up Instant coffee,that’s the best I’ve heard so far. Those people I spoke of earlier in Fulham (off Kings Rd now I recall) were more old hippies,a Psychedelic Furs gig was the nearest they got to punk, and they were pretty posh.As you say the drugs were in all strands of society,probably not as much as now,but certainly not limited to punks.An old teacher of mine introduced me to Dope aged 14,at start of punk it was an older gay guy shoving amyl nitrate up my nose(he didn’t get to do more).Older people were good for a bit of willing corruption I guess. Nowadays they’d read you a Health’n’Safety manual.

30. 

    jahpork

    May 8, 2008 at 1:19 pm

    Haven’t read Clint Heylin’s book (and by the sound of it I won’t bother either) but there’s a point here: if you weren’t involved in that scene (and I’m guessing he wasn’t), it was so (intentionally, by us) ghettoised that all you’d hear of it would be newspaper stories when someone died, a gig went pear-shaped (skinhead attack etc) or when the Daily Mail went into hypertension about “this poison in our midst”.

    There was so much suspicion about “selling out” at the time, that it would have been frowned upon to write anything for general consumption about “the punk club” (I don’t know if there was any academic sociology done on it – anyone know of anything?). If anyone WAS writing about it from the inside, they weren’t published in any form which allowed the public at large to get much access to it. So you can to some extent forgive Heylin for not noticing it, if he was one of Paul Weller’s “Saturday’s Kids” at the time. What’s sad about it is that someone, 30 years later, can use the passage of time to hide how little he really knew and become a soi-disant expert on the whole phenomenon.

    Or perhaps he was just writing about punk as fashion or fad. It certainly was the “youth cult” to end all youth cults, simply because by definition it was so diverse. You didn’t have to look the same as the next punk (unlike mod, rockabilly, Ted, biker etc). Much better if you didn’t, in fact. So you couldn’t tell whether someone identified themself as “punk” without asking them (I do remember Wank Stain, rather haughtily, once saying to me “I’m not a punk, I’m an alternative person”). It’s difficult to pin down something which is in constant flux, and completely heterogenous, long enough to give it a label so that Middle England can safely patronise it in the knowledge that they know all there is to know about it..

    I think what really bound us together was the idea that there was something very wrong with late seventies/early eighties Britain, and that there wasn’t, and wouldn’t be, any better “big picture” system to replace it with. Without being too poncy about it, what Lyotard described as “an incredulity towards metanarratives”. And when there’s nothing to believe in, everyone starts trying to find things to know for themselves instead, constructing their own identity. That’s when the trouble starts. And I’m glad!

31. 

    Mike

    May 8, 2008 at 3:49 pm

    Pork:I wouldn’t say DON’T read it,my opinion is not sacrosanct after all, some parts were a decent read but interspersed with bits that just irritated me.He has something against Eater,likewise Sham 69(which did make me laugh) and insists on lumping Crass in with other ‘N.London punk throwbacks’.Huh??! I’ve no comment on his writing and no doubt he’s written good stuff on other genres.Pretty sure he mentions he was in a band called the Pits in ’78 tho’,and then goes on to quote their lyrics,for fucks’ sake,suggesting yet another frustrated musician taking up his pen in anger,as they say.I don’t think much was written at the time beyond a nice piece in the Sunday Times by Jill Tweedle,who appeared to reside in NW London and had 2 young punks for sons.She details their dress sense and problems w/skinheads and street muggings.Some of her definitions of other tribes around then are a bit twee,but it was the nearest to anything accurate I read back then,at least a change from Daily Mirror shlock horror stories.My mum read it and gave it me.I found it a few years back and re-typed it out for inclusion in a fanzine me and a few friends did.It was called ‘The Loneliness of the boys who mirror chaos’ but did improve from then on.
    Jake is right,it was probably carrying on what had come 2 years before, also those not on the 24-7 trail to oblivion were the ones organizing gigs, bands,labels,zines etc.It took all sorts.As Sam said previous,one of the best things is that no-one can agree quite what it all meant/what is was about/whether it was worth anything

32. 

    Sam

    May 8, 2008 at 5:07 pm

    I’ve got to go to work. Pork…Stranded is one of the few albums (IMO) that has lasted from punk. Ed Keuper had the sound, and I agree about The Bitch too. I’d also add Better off Crazy by Skrewdriver [ducks for cover sheilding head].

33. 

    Penguin • Post Author •

    May 8, 2008 at 6:10 pm

    A while ago I was going to upload the first Skrewdriver LP, which is actually pretty good, but like you Sam, thought that what they became afterwards would not sit comfortably on the KYPP site, and so I did not bother…