The relationship between music and politics
A project by Chandni Sembhi
THE GOLDEN OLDIES
As I wasn’t alive in the 70s/80s, I needed some insight into what the relationship between music and politics was really like back then. I spoke to Crass’ Steve Ignorant about his band, what they did for politics, and how the climate back then compares to now.
Crass formed in 1977, when the Punk movement had taken off, and people decided that Anarchism (not supporting any political party) was a better offer than not just the Conservatives, but every other party around at the time. Bands like Crass, the Sex Pistols, and The Clash saw something wrong with the world and tried to change it, like Grime artists in the 2017 snap election.
As well as encouraging fans to boycot political parties, a lot of bands (not just Punk bands) campaigned for nuclear disarmament. This led to Glastonbury getting involved in 1981, 'the year of the CND support' - and this is a relationship that still exists today. The CND charity runs a stall at the festival, and will have speeches and debates organised.
Crass' gigs immersed you with information, from leaflets with political information, recipies, legal advice, and more; to TV screens behind them showing the news while they played; to inspiring artwork. It was an impressive amount of information, adorning their fans with everything they could, as the internet wasn't around, so you couldn't just Google things to get informed.
Nowadays if something happens, it'll be on social media soon after, but before the internet, these bands had to use shock tactics to get heard, and get the coverage they needed to spread their message. The Sex Pistols' famously sailed past the Houses of Parliament giving the building the finger - and it helped to raise anger in the youth at the time, and made them aware of what was going on in politics, forging a better future, and encouraging people to protest injustices - making a difference. As I said - I wasn't even a fetus at this point, so I can't say whether or not they directly affected political change - but Steve can!
A Q&A WITH STEVE IGNORANT
As well as the music, you also used to hand out leaflets, and had videos and art behind you while you played... why was this?
Well the whole idea of a Crass performance was us being really nervous and playing at about 100 mph, and with my accent, no one's gonna understand what the hell I'm saying anyway. So we thought we'd use a back projection, and we also had 2 TVs, one on either of the stage, showing a video and whatever program was on that evening. But it was a complete onslaught of information, sound, and visuals. Our idea was that even if you can't understand what's being said, perhaps you'd remember an image, or a scene from a film, just that something might stick.
What made crass support anarchism over any political party?
When we started getting a name for ourselves, we were courted by the Left and the SWP, but it just wasn't right, and we didn't see ourselves as socialists, so we stayed away from that. And then with the political climate the way it was at the time, you can the national front rearing its head in a really ugly way.
Then, we had the right courting us because we wore all black and wore sort of fancy emblems, but we said the same thing to them, we weren't a right wing party and we weren't interested in their politics. So we were getting it from all directions, and the socialists were saying 'well if you're not left wing, you must be right wing', and the other way around. We were in a really funny position getting it from both sides, because we didn't support either, we weren't anything, so we decided to call ourselves anarchists, because it seemed like the easiest way to go.
Crass had a huge influence - even banksy was inspired by you. what do you think made you so influentual?
We had no idea of what we were actually creating, we just knew people were turning up to our gigs. What we were doing was just being as honest as possible, and we were sticking to our guns. Even though in hindsight, it was a bit silly, whatever money we made, we gave it all away. We were making music and sounds, and like the artwork Banksy picked up on, it was completely unique. We plastered the records and everything with information because there was no internet at that point, we just put a lot of information across and I think that's what people picked up on. We saw ourselves as an information bureau. We were reaching people of 14 and 15 who nowadays come up to me in their 40s saying what an influence Crass had on them because of the information they'd got off record covers and stuff. I think that's what maybe made us influential.
How do you think the relationship between music and politics now compares to the 70s and 80s?
I could say that it's softened a little bit, but I'm not sure if that's the right term to use. I think there are still people having a go, but I don't think it's necessarily people getting up on stage and screaming down a microphone. I think it's probably more subtly done now on social media - especially with this bloody climate, you'd be pretty stupid to stand up on stage being as extreme as Crass were, you'd stand a good chance of being arrested or locked up in Guantanamo bay or something! The whole thing has changed. I know it changed when Tony Blair got in. Suddenly it was different to know what to be angry about. But it's not as black and white as it was in the 70s, obviously we had Thatcher and what she was doing with her government, and it was very easy to have a go. Now it's a lot more more subtle, it's almost like politicians are sales people or something, it's really weird. People go to famous people like Rihanna and say 'when are you gonna stand up and say something that's really meaningful and political then?' I'm 60 years old, am I still meant to be doing it? No one's gonna listen anyway, I'm just a boring old fart.