"The story of Crass" by George Berger - get the book

[chrisb]

I just finished reading one of the best books, in fact, probably the only book, on the history of Crass. I loved Crass, still do, but I never really understood who they actually were, where they came from and what motivated them to do what they did. This book explains all. I consider Crass to be one of the most important and influential punk bands ever. PM Press just released this book, so first, go here and buy it:

https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?l= ... tail&p=101

For good or bad, anarcho-punk originates with Crass. The depth with which they combined music, artwork, film and a crushing critique of the established press, the state, and capitalism set the tone for so many bands that followed. In today's climate of boring, apolitical, and scenester driven parochialism, we need more of Crass' spirit, and less of the ironic claptrap served up as underground rock composed of starry eyed front men who aspire to pop success. Labels that slang shit from the suburbs in their predictable sounding tripe of music/videos meant to sell more surf/skate/snow wares so that the owners can keep their sunset strip mansion's pool clean is a sad joke on the state of music in Los Angeles.

Today, the term punk is easily perceived as a joke because of the mass commercialization, but Crass, somewhat ironically, declared it dead in '78, long before it was declared dead over and over and over again, mostly just in response to the joke that the Sex Pistols became. This book really lets the band speak directly to the issues.

Penny Rimbaud, founder of the Dial House where Crass lived, rehearsed and all around created, writes about punk, the music press, and left politics in this insightful quote in the book, where the SWP type left is taken to task (Trots, etc):

Rock cannot be politicized, despite what the followers of Oi, or Marx, might say. Rock is about all of us, it is the collective voice of the people, not a platform for working-class mythology or socialist ideology. In rock 'n' roll there aren't any workers to 'wet' about. Rock is about freedom, not slavery, it's about revolution of the heart and soul, not convolution of the mind. To say that punk is, or should be, 'working class' is to falsely remove it from the classless roots of 'real rock revolution from which it grew. Punk is a voice of dissent, an all-out attack on the whole system, it as much despises 'working class' stereotypes as it does 'middle class' ones. Punk attacked the barriers of color, class and creed, but look at how it is right now, do you really think you're freed? Oi and, more recently, Skunk, have been promoted in the pages of Sounds as the 'real punk', real suckers maybe, but not real punks. Whereas punk aims to destroy class barriers, Oi and Skunk are blind enough to be conned into reinforcing them.

"Oi's spokesman, Gary Bushell, who, like Marx, romanticizes working class life whilst, in all probability, never having done a day's manual work himself, claims that 'only the working class can change society' -- presumably he realizes that his 'professional' and privileged status as a 'journalist' prevents him from being in a position to contribute to his own pet theory -- he wants to have his cake and eat it.

"Bushell's idea of what 'working class' means is nothing but a 'middle class' fantasy about a type of person who, except in the media-forms of Alf Garnett and Andy Capp, just doesn't exist. His unrealistic view of workers as cloth-capped, beer-swilling, fist-waving jokers, is a complete insult to working people of whom he, clearly, has no understanding.

"Oi would have been harmless enough if it's comic book caricature of the 'workers' hadn't appealed so strongly to the elements that, inevitably, were drawn to its reactionary views -- the so called 'right wing'. Rather than rejecting it's new and possibly unwanted following, Oi appeared to revel in its image of being 'nasty Nazi muzac for the real men'. Defending the trail of blood and bruises that it seemed to leave behind itself wherever it went, the 'new breed' claimed that 'they weren't advocating violence, they were just reflecting the way things are'. Despite repeated evidence of Oi inspired violence, it became increasingly obivious that Oi the Bushell and Oi the Bands were either perfectly happy with 'the way things were' or totally incapable of controlling the monster that they'd created.

"Get wise lads and what few lasses can stomach your exclusively male reality, you're being used by the system and the media that serves it in the way they've always used people -- like suckers. Oi and Skunk are simply Bushell's way of dividing something that he and his media cronies just can't control -- real energy, real punk. Whatever they are labelled, the 'real' punks are first and foremost one thing -- themselves. The system and the media set out to contain us within their labels -- if you fall for that trick you'll fall for the circled 'A's' in the Total Chaos Column --what a joke!"

Penny Rembaud -- Last Of The Hippies

Here's another couple of great quotes. This one is from Penny:

"We were too serious," says Penny. "And because I think people are very threatened by commitment because it actually challenges their own commitment. Stewart Home is famously known for hating us because we injected the politics into punk and took the fun out of it. I think it makes people feel guilty -- the people who weren't prepared to buy into punk as a way of life, as a movement which is about opposing the system at every level as a revolutionary front. It's like when people get aggressive about you being a vegetarian. Why? I'm not asking them to be a vegetarian. I'm just saying that I am one. People get aggressive because they feel uncomfortable about eating meat. If they don't, they don't say anything. I'm just reflecting their own discomfort."

And this from Steve Ignorant:

"Steve realizes he missed some rock 'n' roll fun by being a part of a band that put responsibility at 100%. 'From Crass, I don't have any of those anecdotes -- "Oh there was this night we got the fire extinguishers etc" -- which is the stuff people love to hear. We didn't have none of that. Just cups of tea and staying around people's houses being polite to their mum and dad."

And finally a quote from an NME writer Paul Du Noyer:

"You can't just tolerate Crass: you must either reject them outright or else prepare to get every idea in your head radically shook up -- they probably won't 'convert' you but they'll sure as hell confuse you, and often that can be the healthiest effect of all."

Get this book now...
-cb

[Flise]

What classes and where can be taken? If there are classes, would there be any in San Diego or Seattle?
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