Sheepfarming in the Fucklands....

I'm still too much of a punk to pass Thatcher's death by without comment. I hated this woman long before I knew the details of her reign as Iron Chancellor (er, Lady...): Quashing the miners' strike. Starting a pointless little war in the Falklands that killed hundreds of Argentine peasants. Vicious class war against the poor, non-whites, and anyone who refused to subscribe to a mythologized, authoritarian view of British history. A successful campaign to push the British political spectrum so far to the right that Tony Blair won in the early '90s on a platform that wasn't much different from Thatcher's original platform in '79. Hopefully she's burning in hell with her good pal Ronnie. Together those fuckers and the oligarchs they fought so successfully for set the scene for the Second Gilded Age.

Anyway, in the early 1980s punk rock was still capable of speaking the truth about a given time and place, and I don't know of better testimony from the reality of Thatcher's England than British punk from about 1980-84. Crass exemplified that shrillest, most dogmatic but also fundamentally decent and humane response to Maggie's reign of terror. While the British press bombards us with tales of how great the Milk Snatcher was, tune into this classic bit of hysterical rage and don't believe the hype:

Soft Drinks-Pop Stars in Their Pyjamas EP (1981)

Lots of people think that "anarchopunk" always and everywhere has consisted of a bunch of black-clad idiots twisting stupid noise out of their instruments, while just barely avoiding alcohol poisoning.
       A lot of people forget, however, the weirdo end of the early '80s anarchopunk scene. Rudimentary Peni spearheaded the "we're into reading Bakunin but also getting destroyed on acid and vodka" end of the Crass scene, and this 2-song 7" is a product of RP's drummer and a few other freaks who happened to know Nick Blinko.
The only thing I can really compare this to is Sleeping Dogs: retarded, synthesizer-based music somewhere between ranting synthwave and electronic punk. Dig it or not, it's certainly an oddball gem.

So erotic..... Check EBay for this, but I'm guessing there's like 200 copies worldwide. If you wanna know more about Rudimentary Peni, check this out.

BornDead/Consume split 12" (2003)

Anarchopunk is a drug like any other: You come home feeling like shit. As you do every day. So you put on that [insert bad, vaguely political band name here-"Riot _," "Anti_" will suffice] record. As the trashed guitar notes and d-beats begin, you start to feel a rush of pure, self-righteous anger. It's a sea change from that futile, impotent fury usually following a normal day.

This self-righteous anger feels good. THEY are the enemy, it's THEIR fault, fuck THEM! We're gonna FUCKING OVERCOME, COMRADE! After all, you're just an oppressed wage slave tryna make it through the day, right?

Pretty soon, you're dancing around your room in a paroxysm of self-righteous indignation, shakin' yer fist and promising yourself you're gonna finally sit down and read that Bakunin reader gathering dust under your Aus-Rotten LPs.

But all good things must come to an end, and when the needle lifts on side B, you start to come down...aw, man, you've still got all those boring, non-political, very un-self-righteous problems you had before putting on your studded leather jacket-bills to pay, girl/boyfriend troubles, hate yer parents...fuck man...

Oh, this album? It's great. Easily one of the best political hardcore albums of the '00s. Fuck it. Anarchopunk is a great drug. I just prefer crushed Adderal and cheap beer, these days.

God save the queen.... This should still be available from here. Will, from Born/Dead, does a really sweet blog, Cold War. Check it out.

Arctic Flowers/Spectres split 7" (2010)

I don't listen to much anarchopunk these days. I like the politics, I like the music, but I fucking hate the scene. Living in Portland on and off for two years, being surrounded by black-clad trolls whose politics didn't really extend beyond yelling at people for eating meat, was almost enough to shift me to the Special Duties end of the Crass/Special Duties split(almost).

So I'm pretty out of the loop on the Northwest anarky scene that spawned this 7". Both bands have been around for awhile, though, and this is an enjoyable two-song split. Arctic Flowers goes in for bass-driven punk with somber, lecture-style vocals; Spectres moves more toward the glam rock end of the glam-rock/post-punk hybrid they've been mining every time I hear them. Crank it up and hum along and feel self-righteous if your Sunday is as grey as mine has been.

...is not what she seems!  Charged/Distorted Rex only pressed 500 copies, so the split's disappeared into the hands of EBay trolls by now, I'm sure. Neither band gets out of the Northwest much, I think, but peeps 'em if you're in my neck 'o' the woods!

*EDIT, 1.6.14: I re-up'd the file, get it HERE.*