Tag Archives: Crass

Get plugged into the solstice

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Want to see the Sun rise over the heel stone at 04.52 am tomorrow and enjoy some true solstice vibes from the comfort of your own home/bed?

Feeling a bit too long in the tooth for standing in the cold all night, and listening to the sound of early morning drumming workshops with no sleep is not the aural delight it used to be? Tune into the above youtube for some genuine solstice vibes piped to you via the internet. Put on your best Stonehenge slippers, have some tea and toast ready and watch that magic moment when the sun rises.

A Happy Solstice to you all, whatever time it is where you are and wherever you’ll be celebrating the solstice.

We love the stories of the good old days when Ken Barlow used to turn up at a Stonehenge solstice and you could sit on top of the stones and watch whilst Hawkwind played “Silver Machine” as the sun came up. All for Free! Unfortunately we didn’t go to any of the festivals there but attempted it once and missed it by one day. The convoy was driving off when we got there.

Big up Wally Hope by the way, organiser of the Stonehenge Festival. Without him there would be no Crass and without Crass there would be no Crass-like Anarchic seed sowing method that we use.

Where were you in 1982?

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Over the last few days the Cardoon up near the house has been expanding on its neat purple tufts. We don’t grow them to eat but for their great punk rock-like hair arrangement. Talking of the loveable spikey tops, the other morning on Bandcamp we read a great piece on Crass and Anarcho Punk (here) and there was a nice quote from Penny Rimbaud “Crass said that there is no authority but yourself… You know, live your life, find your own garden, and then share it.” We love that quote!

Crass played Birmingham once and the story goes they brought their own PA, support band, fanzine stall etc making it a great DIY event. The only let down of the night was that the beer at the gig was awful. That led to a rumour that the band took the DIY ethic to the nth degree and brought a load of their own home-brew to the venue. We doubt that very much as how much beer would they would have to transport from Dial House in Essex up to Birmingham to keep a few hundred punks happy? If only Crass did produce their own lager. Imagine how good the graphics would be on the bottles/cans too?Another plant we don’t use in the kitchen is Marjoram. We originally bought a plant from Shannon’s as we thought it was an alternative to Oregano and it’s spread like crazy. The bees and all the other winged insects that flock to it in the hot sun certainly love it and it’s well worth having in the garden to keep those insects happy and the masses of flowers look great too!

What a difference a day makes (again)

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We popped down to the compost heap just and the whole garden is well frosted over (above).  We wonder how those giant garlic bulbs are doing? Will a couple of days worth of a covering of polythene actually help save said bulbs? The foxglove plugs are still in pots on the windowsill waiting until we “build” a coldframe.

It’s funny as yesterday was a bright and sunny day and nowhere as cold as today. We went out with our good mate Mark B for a south London stroll which took in the only pedestrian railway crossing in London at Angerstien Wharf (here), Jools Holland’s studio and the Saxon Tumuli at Greenwich Park (top half of the above photo above). Even though in this John Rogers’ video here (at 20 mins in) the artist Andrew Kötting mentions Julian Cope told him they were pre-Paleolithic.The change in the weather today reminded me of many years ago when we went to Fordham Park Festival (here). We met an old punk bloke in his late 50’s wearing a biker’s jacket with a well faded Crass symbol on the back. He was ranting and raving about all of the estate agents, coffee companies and cupcake vendors who were fuming that they couldn’t have stalls at the site (“We don’t want all those capitalist b’s ruining our festy”). He reckoned they all got together the day before and with a bit of alchemy, influenced some bad weather to fall on the site (It was tipping it down all day even though it had been glorious sunshine the days leading up to the festival). We love that idea that with a bit of influence and getting around a table you can change the weather. Can we have some heat this week then?

Faith in humankind restored yet again

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Laptop soundmanYesterday was spent in good company, with a couple of hours of gardening followed by a visit to this year’s Fordham Park festival. It’s on a smaller scale than when Orbital played there many years ago but it’s nice to hear on a Saturday afternoon some mad punk bands thrashing it out, entertainment on the lovely named “Recknaw” stage (what does it spell backwards?) and being with local characters in a packed tiny tent loving a sound system playing top tunes (who ignored from us here at weeds to dedicate one to “anyone who’s left their washing out.”)

Multimeters in the dance © Marc Bultitude

Multimeters in the dance © Marc Bultitude

There was a welcomed absence of artisan flat whites, workshop tea, craft ales and ethically-sourced bagel sellers but they had their revenge in the end so we were told. 

A bloke in his late 50’s (in an ill-fitting biker’s jacket with a faded Crass symbol on the back) explained to us that the estate agents, coffee companies and cupcake vendors who couldn’t get on site all got together the day before and with a bit of alchemy, influenced the bad weather we were currently having. He might have been right as it tipped it down most of the afternoon after a week of glorious sunshine. “Boo hiss” to them!

lewisham motorcycle team

We’ve now gone back in our memory to festivals and fetes of old. Where the army motorcycle display team do that “pyramid” thing and the local police dog handlers let off big alsatians at sheepskin-wearing “villain’s” wearing big padding on one of their arms. Ah, those were the days…

Shabba on a pushbike, OK*

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Bens bike

*Sung to Crass’ “Banned from the Roxy”

A big shout to our old friend Ben M for getting in touch with a pic of some nice bike rack-style recycling using one of those plastic mushroom trays mentioned in the “Left out for the binmen, OK” post last month. The bike is carrying some healthy plants on their way to his well tidy allotment in Leyton (below). I wish my garden was as weed free as that! Clever use of a plastic tray, ta Ben. Please send us your pics showing your usage of a mushroom plastic tray to onedeckpete (at) gmail (dot) com

Ben's allotment

Shabba Ranks – Big Time – Greatest Creation rhythm