The Apostles / Primal Chaos / Black Flag / The Heretics
Man about town, obscure punk enthusiast and general good guy, Chris Low late of Political Asylum, The Apostles, Oi Polloi, in the 1980’s and The Parkinsons in 1990’s, handed this tape to me on his birthday along with a load of others. I have uploaded this late because it is unfortunately been dubbed / copied onto tape by horrid mono means, i.e it only comes out of one speaker…bummer! Two other tapes Conflict at Brixton Ace 1982 supplied by Mark ‘Vegas’ Palmer starts off stereo then clicks into mono. Sadly to say Lugworm supplied a cassette tape recorded from Spaceward Studios of The Mobs LP recorded there. Not interested in The Mob LP as such but there is an alternative mix of ‘Stay’ which I was absolutely interested in. This track also plays on one speaker. Point of fact – nothing wrong with my cassette playback system!
Any how, I do not like putting up faulty or mono cassettes onto this site, but this has to be an exception because of the rarity value. The Apostles, Primal Chaos, Black Flag, and The Heretics all for the price of…well nothing. Not sure of the history of the tape, no doubt Chris will comment on it. Not sure of the line up, track listing or anything else. Again I hope Chris or his chum Nic will comment. On the B-Side of the tape is a Flux live gig and a Napalm Death practice. All I the info I got what was written on the tape itself, just band names basically. I actually have not heard this tape yet cos wifey needed me to do something so I just let it play…hope Bucks Fizz does not come on half way through the recordings!
Info from Nic:
The Apostles:
Pete The Plectrum (later formed part of ‘The Hunt’ on the first LP)
Some Men Are Born To Rule (the first song the group ever wrote)
Antichrist
? (This isn’t from this time period if I remember correctly – it features the drum machine: is it ‘The Island’, Chris?)
Solidaridad Proletaria (This is the original title at the time of recording: it was later changed to ‘A New World In Our Hearts’ and was re-recorded on both tape and vinyl)
Killing for Peace
Proletarian Autonomy (later re-recorded on tape and vinyl)
Time Bomb
Stoke Newington 8 (later re-recorded on tape and vinyl)
Primal Chaos – Rehearsal 1982:
Systems Slave (This isn’t part of their ‘Fighting for a Future’ rehearsal tape)
Black Flag – Rehearsal 1981:
The Master Race (Earliest version of this song that I heard)
Waiting for the All Clear (later recorded by The Apostles, but this version features Matt Mcleod on vocals
The Heretics – Rehearsal 1980:
No Character
Jake from Heretics on stage with Iggs of Crass 1979
The Heretics
Nuzz
May 8, 2008 at 6:12 pmBrave man Sam.
Penguin • Post Author •
May 8, 2008 at 6:15 pmOne more comment and this post gets the record of comments (so far) on a single post, who’s up for it? Come forward…
Nuzz
May 8, 2008 at 6:22 pmWhat the fuck went on there? didn’t mean to post that then, where was I …that’s it.. Brave man Sam, Skrewdriver always divide opinion, a case of their earlier work being of far better quality and about the music, not the far right bullshit of their later work. These comments have been great reading, total punk rock voyerism, love it glad yer all still here to tell the story. It’s history, but not as we know it. Shit whats going on here the mighty ‘guin has nipped in while I’m typing, might as well tell him what a top fucking knotch job he’s doing with all the music, and everything, plus a new born chick. The old birds got stamina. Go on post the Skrewdiver album, dare ya!
Penguin • Post Author •
May 8, 2008 at 6:29 pmBlow your horns…Nuzz get’s us over the line with 168 comments. Cheers for the support btw! Skrewdriver maybe, maybe…
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 7:23 pmRe: Skrewdriver… They had a good sound, but I can’t separate out the politics from the music. As much as I like the sound of Wagner, I can’t separate out the politics from that either: it’s what it symbolises for me.
Reminds me a bit of that old method of winding up right-on lefties in the mid-late 90s: turn up at a dinner party having first bought a bottle of really good South African wine, and steamed the label off it. Hand it to the host on the way in, then once everyone’s got a good gobful of it you mention that it’s South African. This spurs a good old lefty middle-class back-slapping discussion on how “it’s soooooooo marvellous that the black people of that land can now enjoy the fruits of their wonderful country’s beautiful viticulture, and we don’t have to boycott their goods any more”.
…to which you chime in loudly “Enjoying it? It is a good drop, eh? The ’82 was a great harvest!”
Splutters into napkins all round! Got ’em every time. And, of course, the wine was really a ’93 or something!
@Mike-> “Was Punk worth anything?” Well, on the surface the answer has to be a short “no”. But then that’s exactly what the ’79 onwards version was meant to be, wasn’t it? Nothing that people in nice suits in big offices could commodify. There were no big bucks to be made in signing bands who weren’t wilfully offensive, like the Pistols had been, but were just wholly unattractive to the vast majority of the population. You couldn’t spin the idea of Crass or The Heretics to kids in discos with shiny suits, could you? The “don’t believe anyone and don’t buy anything” demographic is not a big buck for the marketing boys!
And you couldn’t sell the ‘tramp punk’ image either (though a few charity shops probably made a few quid out of us – has anyone else noticed that charity shops don’t price their clothes for the poor likes of us any more: we’re not the ones they’re trying to help any longer!)
If anything, late punk was broad-brush anti-capitalist – so the less it was worth monetarily, the more it succeeded. If it turned anyone on to the idea of being suspicious of governments and big organisations, or got them to read a few books or go on a few demos, then it was worth quite a lot.
And it promoted the idea of individuality, of making your own identity. How far it’s succeeded in this respect, though, I don’t know: it’s been the basis of niche marketing strategies ever since – try to promote the product as unique, or at least customisable, to the individual punter. Punk also spawned a lot of “entrepreneurs” who were only in it for the money through kudos bit. And in breaking down nationalised industries and deregulating the private sector (I know, we only used to be able to get a telephone in one colour from the GPO and it took 3 months to get installed) we end up with the spectre of poor folk not being able to afford their privatised water bills.
But at least people don’t trust politicians any more: look at the trust ratings for all of the political parties’ leaders these days. And election turnouts. “Don’t vote, you’ll only encourage them” was what we used to say, wasn’t it? I watched something on TV the other day with Winston Churchill actually filling a national tour of football stadiums with people who wanted to hear him speak. Well, we know they’re all lying bastards now, don’t we?
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 7:27 pmMike – I remember that Jill whats her name article. The essense of it was (going back to The Boys Goyshe) ‘what’s all the fighting about….learn to live with your neighbours…compromise a little’. Reading the Heretics interview the ’12 minute tape fault’ was probably me slagging off soul boys endlessly. It seemed to mean something at the time but looking back on it…who really cares? London’s changed a lot. Lydon said in his excellent autobiography that it was like a bunch of villages back then. The way kids dressed in Islington was completely different from the way we dressed around our way but it was only a couple of miles up the road. You could spot an outsider immediately.
A few people also say in his book that the heroin came into the scene with The Heartbreakers in ’77. As the first visible English punk junkie, Sid Vicious was apparently in love with that whole sleazy NY/VU doomed junkie image and bought the whole thing hook, line a sinker. To be honest, I think we fell for it too. It’s very romantic to play Russian Roulette with your life at 18 years old. There was that Irish guy Billy I used to score off who lived in W.Hampstead. One of his regulars was this ex-skinhead, probably in his early 30s at the time who took a shine to me. “‘Allo…it’s me skinhead mate!” he used to say. We were both there one time and he looked at me seriously and said: “Don’t get like me. You can stop now…don’t get like me, I can’t quit”. And he wasn’t being dramatic, he was dead serious. And it stayed with me, although it took another couple of years to stop. Very rare for junkies to do that. He planted a little time bomb in my head. Anyway, this is getting maudlin again. Where’s Si and his hamsters when you need them?
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 7:32 pmOkey dokey read em all now.Its a really good collection.
Pork d’you mean the offy slug and me turned over?
Anyway as said he’s turned up last year.Been in California teaching yoga…
Hate to say it but Rich kids best toon is live version of ‘rebel girl’ by bikini kill.Not even from our era or British. How sad is that??
Nuzz
May 8, 2008 at 7:42 pmHa, ha, ha lets round it up to 170. Nic started these comments with a run down of the tracks on the tape, and between there and here we’ve gone through a journey of drugs, squat punk doom, despair, fun, frolics and positivity to end up at Skrewdriver, ha, ha, ha, I laugh because I remember Andy Martin from the Apostles writing about ’em somewhere, just been through their EP’s and sure enough crammed on the sleeve of The Giving of Love Costs Nothing EP there it is some writing about Skrewdriver. These comments seem to have travelled a full circle, just thought I’d let ya know. Now back to yer memories please….
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 7:47 pmJake: never heard ‘rebel girl’ – will have to see if I can BitTorrent it.
Not sure about the offie: don’t want to give too much away… as you so delightfully put it in a post above, “I really cant mention the specifics as its still not ’settled’”. Let’s say that there was a discussion involving the feasibility of redistributing wealth from a well-known purveyor of licensed victualments. I decided that discretion was the better part of valour on that mission, in the end! Did you ever meet Slug’s mate Randy? If so, I think you’ll know what I mean.
That’s a coincidence that Slug’s been teaching yoga, btw. I’ve had me head up me arse for years 🙂
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 7:57 pmIf anyone else wants it, I’ve just seen a torrent with “Rebel Girl” in it on IsoHunt, called “The L Word 1-4 Music”. A few gigabytes of stuff, and some of it looks really good.
Nic
May 8, 2008 at 8:08 pmhttp://chawedrosin.wordpress.com/2008/01/18/bikini-kill-rebel-girl/
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 8:16 pmbest punk toon that is
So the fun bits
At that age each year is different but
’78 ;The music.
Was brilliant cos I started to go to gigs, which was in itself superfine, & discovered a scene that i could, as they say, relate to.
’79 ;The scene
Met sniper started squatting .Met a brilliant crew.
Discovered speed.Sam you’re to blame for that.Thanks to ‘tiny’.Then later found smack.(its fun kids…)
Both me & wank were looking for it .
’80: The theory
Courtesy of Mr Stain found Malatesta & started reading serious anarchist thought.Discovered ‘rising free’ moved away from ‘punk’ went to loads of anti fascist counter demos , New Cross march etc.even started a ‘riot’at the anarcho picnic that year .Think it was Tony D who was getting nicked for pissing in the flowers and I felt that the anarchos sitting on grass should get off there arses.We destroyed 2 cop bikes that day …
Discovered how much fun chuking stuff at the old bill was.
’81 :The practice
For me the highlight of the whole thing.It was what I at least, imagined that punk had been on about.
After the second brixton riot [robbo,sam, wank, slug ,rich kid,]slug got nicked immediately (the idiot…), & banged up;sam & wank got quite badly beaten by them nasty boys in blue.Somehow robbo & I didnt.
3 out 2 left in.Later on in dalston I got put through a plate glass windows by some friendly local boneheads.So me out.
By the end of that July, the uprising had been put down, we were all fucked , end of story. Punk/Anarchy/revolution over.
It was all fun (except in my case STP)
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 8:24 pmApols for the multiple posts, but I just remembered another character from Campbell Buildings: Pip. NZ guy (come to think of it, probably a mate of little Debbie, the other Kiwi there) who was a lab technician during the day.
If Pip ever reads this, I’d just like to say “Cheers for the drink mate!”
I think it was his 21st birthday and he didn’t have any dough for a proper piss-up, so he brought home a massive brown flask of lab alcohol (methanol I suppose).
He went up the market in The Cut and got some specky oranges and apples that were gonna be thrown away, then bought a couple of bottles of that crap Spar orange squash (nice and bright orange, before they banned the tartrazine to prevent the littluns getting all hyper. I fucking hate kids [mine excepted of course 🙂 ])). He then got a big galvanised bucket and poured the alcohol and squash in, then chopped the fruit up, slung it in and called it ‘punch’.
Now, I presume he’d sold the family collection of Royal Doulton china for a block of red leb or something, because all he had to drink this dodgy mixture out of was a stack of those thin plastic watercooler cups. I got up to his place (top floor, extreme south-east end of the estate I think) early doors. So I got to taste the first mouthful. I dunked the cup into the bucket, and as I was examining it for clarity and bouquet, something strange happened… the bottom fell out of the cup. I mean, it had dissolved it.
Now, as a man of 45, if I came across any food or beverage that had this sort of an effect on its packaging, I’d leave the vicinity with as much haste as if Harry Shipman had winked and offered to give me a flu jab. But no, I was 16. And at 16 the bottom of the cup falling off meant “Hmm, this’ll be good strong stuff then! Have loads.”
I went next door and got a china mug, filled it and downed it. A few more people turned up and I got chatting for a bit. When it was time for another drink, I got as far as about the third gulp, when my world went very strange indeed. I got tunnel vision (literally) and could only just hear what was going on in the room. Then it started spinning violently. Managed to convey to Mitzi that I needed out of there, and she said I could stay at her Dad’s place (I think).
Got down to the platform at Lambeth North and waited. Now, you know the noise the train makes when it’s coming up the tunnel? Sort of ‘roaring’? My poor addled brain associates this with dragons, which does nothing to settle me. As the train comes out of the tunnel and up the platform, the bit on the front that said “Queen’s Park, Bakerloo Line” was replaced by a set of those big red and white teeth exactly as painted on the front of the Airfix P-54 Mustang fighter plane. And then they came out of the front of the train and tried to bite me. 3 inches from my boat race! Doors open, and Mitzi says “come on, we’ve got to get on”. “Noooooooo!” I gibber, “I don’t want to get in the dragon’s stomach, it’s gonna eat me”.
Mitzi, very coldly in my opinion, turned to me and said “your choice love, but this is the last dragon of the night and if you don’t get into this one’s stomach there isn’t another dragon till half past six in the morning”.
Now, as funny as that is, you’ll remember that earlier in this story I said I got up to Pip’s place early-ish. And I couldn’t have been there that long between drinks. So it must have taken me 3 hours at least to get from his flat to the station (200 yards?) What the fuck I did in between I have no idea to this day.
Alcopops? They’ve got no fucking idea today 🙂
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 8:35 pm@Jake-> Just listened to ‘Rebel Girl’. Catchy, but my track of choice is 999’s “Emergency”. Can’t beat “I’m back, in full attack, never give in until they crack” to my mind. 999’s Tuesday night gig in that whole week in 79 that they did at the Marquee is just about the happiest I’ve been in my life apart from my daughter’s birth, I think. The Thursday and Friday were pretty damn good too!
Funny thing, mentioning that one likes 999 is sometimes worse among punks of our vintage than admitting to liking Skrewdriver. “OOOHHH no, they were New Wave!” and that sort of thing. I luvved em!
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 9:02 pmJake – I remember that day scoring speed from Tiny. It was just one of those perfect days that all come together perfectly. It was high summer, smell of exhaust fumes and sweat. I think we (Devlin’s little brother was with us) walked to Maida Vale just for the sake of walking. We spotted some girl you knew by the station who you said was a dealer. No luck so we decided to move on to Portobello. You stopped at this Elgin Avenue squatting place on the way, then we got to Portobello. We spotted Tiny in a record shop, who I vaguely knew. I asked him if he knew where we could score some blues. “Yeah, how many do you want?” he said. We took said blues and waited and waited for them to come on. Nothing. We both got a bit glum. We were walking along All Saints Rd when you went “Fucking hell! This is fucking great!” (like a foul-mouthed Tony the Tiger) and started leaping up and down singing the bass line to Death Disco. At the same moment the two Annas walked around the corner. We went back to Anna Claydon’s, arranged to meet them the next day to go to The Electric Ballroom. Went home, listened to The Saints for hours, went to the pub. It was like a whole world opening up. Notting Hill’s spitting distance from where we grew up but it seemed like a different planet. I think that’s the kind of innocence that Mike was talking about that you can’t really reclaim. You’d meet people and feel this instant bond. One thing that annoys me about the coffee table punk histories is that it comes across as so ‘cool’. I think the great thing about it was it was still about this raw excitement at that point. People really weren’t self-conscious.
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 9:25 pmNah 999 were great. ‘quite disapointed’ etc EP .
other fun bits.All the places i lived (not punk but including 107, sorry mate..)except Campbell bdgs.If there’d been another punk squat in ldn i wouldve gone there.As I said, was ok b4 the tuinol changed it overnight.
I didnt mind the scousers, pork it was indeed a wild nite that one with the flame thrower you made..Madness but good.Then tuionol & all of a sudden previously ok people turned tosser.(nice with bloos mixed in a , oh never mind.)Didnt even mind the teds though the boneheads were a fucking menace(anyone remember what happened to that lot in camden town,it was fuck cant remember there names, oh joe, rex maybe(?) and his crew,anyway it was a very nasty buisness, orafices/wood very very brutal)
Actually i recall now that that was one of the reasons why everyone made for Campbell Bdgs.
So more fun bits; urm places i lived in;living off our wits outside the law;looking like wanks ‘clenched fist’ hair(he did say it) & knowing that still in that post punk period it stood for something anti establishment; travelling to other punk places’ dam , paris;punkettes;goblins;glue;graffiti;fanzines;wearing make up; being in the best underground band ever;gigs & a damn good pogo;mini riots at gigs;feeling like I was gonna take off the first time i had blues & amphetamines generally.An underated drug.reading tales of beatnic glory by candle light at St Monicas;speeding for days there;Ruth wheeling me about the high road in a wheel chair, me dressed in a leotard, the girls having done me make up.Bob & mitch & others in hysterics.A group of boneheads on the way to the footie spot us.They try to smash their way out of their coach.We’re on the ground in fits of laughter;begging, i loved it always ;did what it said on the packet.later.The monday group getting on the front page of the nationals possibly because wank & me looked tooo ‘abnorm’ to go on a ‘ political intervention’.It was a fun punk moment; the may day 1980 anracho picnic was fun punk moment; charging the NF in Trafalger Sq & getting nicked for it.The rozzers saying ‘we has to nick you, you got orange hair’
Bloody buggers…
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 9:29 pmIt was a very sociable movement looking back. For the most part you’d spend hours sitting around in people’s bedrooms playing singles and chatting. How quaint is that? It’s important to remember music wasn’t transportable then. I used to spend all day at work in the BBC canteen waiting to go home and listen to some new single. You wouldn’t hear it on the radio and there were no walkmans or even ghetto blasters. So it was like this divine secret.
Another thing that amazes me with hindsight, is that there was only 10 years between My Generation and Anarchy in the UK.
Old fart alert.
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 9:33 pmSam how can you remember the details? Wild. Devlins little brother Lou, I just cant recall him being there. And that poem about punk Sniper recited? How can you remember that? I remember the incident him getting upset (poor guy he was just out of armley) but not the reason .
(btw its Devlin RIP too..)
That day singing death disco.Fantastic. more to say but I gotta go
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 9:37 pmI’ve got a photographic memory for details but I get told off by Susan for forgetting my cellphone every day. I remember a book you were writing called ‘The Mammalian Syndrome’.
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 9:42 pm“So the fun bits
At that age each year is different but
‘78 ;The music.
Was briliant cos I started to go to gigs, which was in itself superfine, & discovered a scene that i could, as they say, relate to.
‘79 ;The scene
Met sniper started squatting .Met a brillaint crew.
Discovered speed.Sam youre to blame for that.thanks to ‘tiny’.Then later found smack.(its fun kids…)
Both me & wank were looking for it .
‘80: The theory
Courtesy of Mr Stain found Malatesta & started reading serious anarchist thought.Discovered ‘rising free’moved away from ‘punk’ went to loads of anti fascist counter demos , New Cross march etc.even started a ‘riot’at the anrcho picnic that year .think it was Tony D who was getting nicked for pissing in the flowers and I felt that the anarchs sitting on grass should get off there arses.We destroyed 2 cop bikes that day …
Discovered how much fun chuking stuff at the old bill was.
‘81 :The practice
For me the highlight of the whole thing .It was what i at least, imagined that punk had been on about.
After the second brixton riot [robbo,sam, wank, slug ,rich kid,]slug got nicked immediatly(the idiot…), & banged up;sam & wank got quite badly beaten by them nasty boys in blue.Somehow robbo & I didnt.
3 out 2 left in.Later on in dalston I got put through a plate glass windows by some freindly local boneheads.”
Then the shopkeeper appeared…..
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 10:10 pmHe did?It was at night, thought it was closed.I was bleeding a lot still up & down from the STP and thus fighting terror. You (You were still limping from your massive bollock courtesy of an old bills trunchionne in Brixton) lot stayed on & eventually found them boneheads in the chinky. You’d met a local crew of blacks by then. A few bricks got thrown & then the old bill were called and it was a bit of a massacre?
It was ‘cos of that STP that I got put through the window.
they saw our lttle posse &
bonehead to me
“what you doin?” I’m thinking ‘i dunno’…
“lookin for a riot?” Whoops..
” I ll give you fuckin riot” and he did .
if I’d been my normal -more grounded- self, STP induced honesty might not have seemed the best course of action…
I mean someone asked why what we did was so negative & not fun.
Yeah it wasnt all ‘nice’ but we had some fuckin adventures. And thats what we wanted.
Pork you remember that lot of hells angels on waterloo stn early hours of the morning. Loads of us like 12. 3 of them. Ok maybe 5.
We ran. Man they were scary. I mean they were ‘men’.I felt about five when that one guy with the horns said ‘okay punky c’mon’
He was smiling as he said it..
I imagined him biting my head off & feeding to his mad old lady in some weird biker sex game…
Anyway Sam that day when we got our first blues. It was a glorious innocence. It was all new. But we wern’t innocent, we knew what we were doing.We knew that from that day we’d go ‘all the way’. I could see it in your eyes…
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 10:13 pmI remember an epic walk with you Jake back from that squat near Nag’s Head. It was freezing cold and about 3am. I’d had it in my head the whole way that the only thing I wanted in the world was a jam doughnut. I wouldn’t shut up about it despite protests from you. We were walking along the Finchley Rd when this van pulled up in front of us, delivered a large bag onto a doorstep then sped away. Upon closer examination the bag contained about 10 freshly baked jam doughnuts. You can’t make this stuff up you know.
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 10:22 pmthere is a chapter of the mamalian syndrome .As the STP wore off my writing got worse…
I remember just sitting at typewriter on automatic. Typical ‘artist’ story but i felt i was merely a conduit for the words..But i couldnt keep it up.
I’ve got ‘the book’ out but my scanners gone troppo. Im in the midst of changing computers anyway.When its done I’ll get scanning & emailing or we can use some other method.
Maan how can you remember the name of it ? Thats too wild.
Pork if its the one we did it was a ‘pakki shop’ [P C, moi?] but we nicked all the booze n fags.A great night out (Robbos misdermeanor was proper nuff sed) From Lager to Yoga?
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 10:27 pmSorry, the ‘shopkeeper’ is a Mr Benn reference.
“But we wern’t innocent, we knew what we were doing. We knew that from that day we’d go ‘all the way’. I could see it in your eyes…”.
That gives me the willys I must confess.
Yeah, we got a right hiding after the Chinese Restaurant thing in Dalston. I got a riot stick full in the mouth and Keith got a beating too. But, you know, we had been hurling bricks at them all day so fair’s fair. I think what you said about it being an adventure is right really. I don’t think it was any kind of revolution and the causes for the riots in 81 are still a bit obscure (from a white person’s perspective anyway). Looking back on it, I have to say I find the politics of the time embarrassing. And I am still a bit bemused to see ‘punk’ and ‘stonehenge’ used in the same breath. But that’s just me.
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 10:28 pmSam I do remember that.
[I think i started my conversion to christianity on that night.]
You need to get this all down .Well it is eh? That might have been the first time I walked across london at night. Epic. And the emotions I recall as I write now are of awakening & loss. And a sense of the infinate. Something deep.
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 10:29 pm[I think i started my conversion to christianity on that night.]
sos only joking
Rich Kid
May 8, 2008 at 10:39 pmyou mean Mr Bean or Tony Benn?
Im well lost
anyway , yeah i know that you felt/feel that the punk/hippie dichotomy was real.But we didnt even know Mr Rotten had been an acid dealing long haired hawkwind fan before he cut his hair.
Many of those early punks had squatted as ‘hippies’
The main difference between the 2 movements was well, 10 years & also the hippies obsessive love of ‘the countryside’ & its [pagan] manifistations.
But there were many similarites.I spose it’d be truer to say that Goth & hippie were closer.But where does Goth stop & punk begin?
But then I would say that , eh?
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 11:03 pmI mean Mr Benn:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM0PEgA04AU
“Back in Festive Rd the children were still playing as usual…”
Sam
May 8, 2008 at 11:26 pmYou’ve got me thinking but the wife’s home and I need to make homemade play doh with the boy. However, if you’ve not read Joseph Porter’s account of punk/squatting/anarcho politics you should. The funniest and truest account of punk I’ve ever read:
http://www.blythpower.co.uk/genesis/index.htm
I loved this:
MANIFESTO OF THE ANARCHIST PARTY 1980
As adopted by comrade Porter on his Ascension to anarchist grace.
1. DOMESTIC POLICY
THE GOVERNMENT: Don’t vote, it only encourages them. All politicians are crap, and are oppressing the people. There is no difference between the political parties. They are all mad and want to drop the bomb. Only the police and the army are keeping them in power: e.g. why are their several regiments in central London, if not to keep the people down. All governments are fascists, which is why you shouldn’t vote, because whoever you vote for a government gets in. If we had Anarchy, then things would be much better, as no one would oppress anyone else. We are against the government.
THE POLICE: The police will beat you up and kill people, especially the SPG who are murderers, e.g. Blair Peach. The police are only there to keep the government in power. If we had Anarchy we wouldn’t need police, because crime is caused by the government and advertising, which makes people feel inadequate. We are against the police. They are big brother, and soon it will be 1984. You must always be careful when dealing with the police, as if you wind them up they will plant drugs on you. It’s a well known fact that weights of dope have been found with fingerprint dust on them, which proves that the police are selling on the drugs they confiscate.
THE ARMED FORCES: Like the police, the armed forces are only there to help the state keep control. We don’t really need an army as the Americans have enough for everyone. All soldiers are fascists and really stupid, if they get killed in Ireland it’s their own fault as they shouldn’t have joined the army in the first place. They are only there to keep the people down. We are against them.
THE CHURCH: The church is only there to keep the people in their place, by telling them what they should do. Religion is the opium of the people. If we had Anarchy we wouldn’t have churches, as the people wouldn’t need false hopes. The government and the church work together to keep the people down.. All servants of the church are fascists. We are against them.
THE ROYAL FAMILY: This is just another sop to keep the people down. Every time it looks like things are getting bad for the government, they have a royal wedding, or a baby, and it keeps the people happy. We are against royalty.
WORK: Work is just another way in which the government keeps the people down. Work is crap and wears people out so they don’t have any energy to fight the system. People who work are all blind sheep and wage slaves who are helping to keep the government in power. People shouldn’t do crap jobs for rich bosses. If we had Anarchy, people would only have to do the work for themselves, so they wouldn’t mind it. Not working is an act of revolution against the state. We are against work.
WAR: We are against it.
AGRICULTURE: Everyone should grow things, and you shouldn’t keep hens on battery farms as it is cruel. We are against it.
THE DOLE: “Do they owe us a living? Of course they fucking do!”
2.FOREIGN POLICY
IRELAND: We should get the troops out now, as they have no right to be there. It’s really good that the IRA blow things up as they are oppressed. Being English is really crap. We are against it. We recognise no nationality, which is just a way in which the governments keep control. Like national insurance numbers which are all linked to police computers. England is oppressing Ireland which is wrong. We support the Irish against the British, unmindful of the contradiction inherent in lending our support to nationalists.
THE MIDDLE EAST: It’s all the fault of religion and the CIA, who are probably in control of the American government, and hence the British government, which is just a puppet. We are against Israel, because it oppresses people, but guardedly as we don’t want anyone to suspect that we condone the holocaust. Anyhow, if we had Anarchy, then none of it would have happened in the first place, as there would be no religions and nationalism and stuff. NB. The CIA caused AIDS by having sex with pigs in Africa actually.
SOUTH AFRICA: This is really bad as the blacks are oppressed, and it’s their country. We (the British) invented concentration camps in South Africa in the Boer war, so we should be careful what we say about the Russian labour camps. We have them in Ireland too.
RUSSIA: Of course it’s really bad that there is oppression in the Eastern Bloc, but we’re just as bad (see above) as we oppress the Irish. The cold war isn’t as bad as the government makes out, but it’s a good way of keeping the people down by making them scared. Also, it enables the government to justify the presence on English soil of American troops, who are really here to keep the state in control. While not agreeing with governments and armies, and being against the soviet system, we have a secret fascination with their uniforms and tanks, which look really cool on the News at Ten – in fact we haven’t quite gotten over our childhood love of military hardware, but will endeavour to suppress it as it is not Anarchist: thus, when we see news reports on foreign wars, we resist the temptation to blow our cover by saying things like “Oh look, there’s a Phantom/Harrier/Mirage”, or whatever warplane it may happen to be. This is occasionally frustrating, as we are still very much children in some respects, but we are against war.
AMERICA: “I’m so bored with the USA,” but don’t quote The Clash if Crass are listening. America, of course, wants to rule the world, e.g. Vietnam etc. and we are against it.
IRAN: They have had a revolution and kicked out the Shah, which must be a good thing, also they are against America, which we are too. We don’t know whether to support them or not, as they cut off people’s hands, so we will wait until we hear someone else, maybe Crass, talking about it, and then decide what our policy will be.
TERRORISTS: They are against state control, so we support them. We don’t condone violence, but sometimes it has to be done, and things blown up: e.g. Guy Fawkes who was the only person ever to enter parliament with honest intentions – even though he was a mad religious extremist, which we are against, blowing up the houses of parliament was a good thing.
3. SOCIAL POLICY
FOOD: Crass are vegetarians – so is Steve – we’ve never met one before, and it seems a bit extreme. Apparently there are people called ‘vegans’, who are even worse. We see no reason to stop eating meat, but we are united behind the idea that white bread is crap.
MUSIC: This is an important tool for social change, and our endeavours should reflect this. All songs should be against the state, and everything else is just rubbish used by the government to keep the people down.
CLOTHING: Crass dress only in black, and so shall we.
DRUGS: More people die from Aspirin actually. Besides, they are illegal, so taking them must be against the state.
RACISM: Although we don’t know any black people, and do not understand their culture, we feel guilty because they are oppressed by white people like us, so we will support them.
SEXISM: As above. We feel guilty because we are members of the oppressing gender, so we will support women and hope that this will make them want to sleep with us.
GAY RIGHTS: We support this – but not, you understand, because we are in any way gay ourselves (we are not doing this, we stress, because we want them to sleep with us, but because they are oppressed).
STRIKES: Even though we are against work, and write fanzines about what a bunch of hopeless blind sheep the people who do it are, we support strikes as they are against the government, even when people are on strike to save their jobs, which we can’t see why they would want. If we had Anarchy people wouldn’t want to strike as they would be working for themselves and have everything they want. When the dole office goes on strike it’s really good as they just send you cheques without having to sign on.
NEWSPAPERS: These are all crap as they are all run by the government and tell lies to keep the people in their place – or so we have heard: we’ve not read one for years, as they are boring.
TELEVISION: Telly is the opium of the masses! It keeps the people brainwashed and in their place. While they are watching rubbish on the telly, they are drugged into senselessness and present no threat to the system. Television is also the insidious means by which the state implants its propaganda into the people’s brains. We only watch telly to jeer at how crap it is. We will watch it until closedown, and then we will stay up and play backgammon until the dope runs out, because we don’t have to get up in the morning, unless it is giro day.
THE SYSTEM: We are against it. We will smash it.
That’s about it.
ANARCHY! PEACE! AND FREEDOM!
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 11:32 pm@Jake-> no , this was a different offie, definitely! And I DO remember those vikings at Waterloo! “GRAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRVVVEEE!!” one of them shouted for some reason. And to this day when I see a biker I think of that word! Terrifying bastards.
The blues were great, weren’t they. That taste of aluminium you got in your mouth about 4 hours later was well worth it for knowing everything and wanting to tell everyone in the world about it, wanting to explore, wanting to make friends with everyone. Right up till the comedown. Then everything went into reverse. I knew nothing, couldn’t tell anyone that I knew I knew nothing, didn’t want to be near anyone.
Then, happily, they tell me 25 years later, after a bucketful of E’s in the 90s, that I’m manic depressive and that stimulants really aren’t the sort of thing I need AT ALL, like ever. If there is a God, he’s got a fucking strange sense of humour, I can tell you! But they really were the ultimate 16-year-old’s drug. “Teenage Blue”, Weller said!
I remember going round your parents house once and speeding me tits off. Went to go upstairs to the toilet and there was a table there. Now the only thing I ever made in woodwork at school was a spatula which fell to bits in the frying pan when I brought it home. I can’t remember who it was (Phil, maybe) who came out of the front room some minutes later, only to be collared by me telling him (over about an hour) in very intricate detail how we could and should turn it into a sofa bed. Everything down to the kind of thread we’d need on the screws, and the angles of the joints. Where it all came from I dunno, but it sounded perfectly convincing at the time!
I think, as I hinted at above, that the difference between punk and any other “cult” (for want of a better word) was that we didn’t see that being anything better to replace the system with, we just wanted autonomy. Not to be bothered (with anything or by anyone). The hippies had “naturalism” and the goths had the supernatural to keep them content that one day all would be better. We didn’t. We lived in that moment. Maybe there’s something slightly akin to Zen (very loosely) in that. There was certainly (in our case drug-induced) Enlightenment as an end to our suffering.
@Sam-> Weren’t the riots mainly about SUS? And didn’t anyone who looked a bit away from the norm suffer from that? I just don’t know what they were intending to achieve (though I guess it did hasten the eventual enactment or the Police and Criminal Evidence Act, which was a good thing).
Tales of Beatnik Glory! I was only telling my girlfriend about the story of the guys with the eye dropper needle and the “direct brain flash” the other week. Ouch!
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 11:47 pmRemembered a bit of a song I wrote while stoned in the 80s as a paean to Campbell Buildings and that lovely few weeks of spring/summer before it all went very bad. When we used to go skin up on the roof and stare out at nothing much but blue sky for a long time!
(Reggae Beat)
“Think I got the munchies
Gonna buy myself a bun
And a bottle of banana milk
And drink it in the sun (in the sun)
Roll me over in the clover
Twist me, spin me, change yer luck
I been rolling on that rooftop
So I couldn’t give a fuck”
Okay, Wordsworth it ain’t, but I’d defy any of the Last Poets to outdo it after eating a sixteenth of soap bar!
Penguin • Post Author •
May 8, 2008 at 11:47 pmSAM – Josef Porter’s writings ‘Genesis to Revolutions’ are all up on THIS site – all the chapters…Like you say an hilarious account.
jahpork
May 8, 2008 at 11:57 pmSam:
“Another thing that amazes me with hindsight, is that there was only 10 years between My Generation and Anarchy in the UK.”
…and, looking at the list of UK No 1 singles for 1986, there were only 10 years between Anarchy In The UK and Nick Berry’s “Every Loser Wins”, Wham’s “Edge Of Heaven”, Chris de Burgh’s “The Lady In Red” and A-Ha’s “The Sun Always Shines On TV”.
We were nothing more than a statistical blip, after all!
As Peter Cook’s inimitable Sir Arthur Streeb-Greebling said…
Do I feel pride? Oh yes, I feel nothing but pride:
An empty pride,
A hopeless vanity
A dreadful arrogance,
A stupefyingly futile conceit.
But at least it’s something to hang onto!