FOR A LATE PENNSYLTUCKY ANARCHIST – REMEMBERING ERIK PETERSEN IN 7 SONGS

Posted on July 20, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged Amadou Diallo, American Revolution, ballads, boycotts, Centralia, erik petersen, featured, folk, folk-punk, hardcore, John Gentle, mischief brew, morality, music, NYPD, operation ivy, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, police violence, political music, punk, Punk News, radical music, Ska, songwriting, The Orphans, three mile island, USA, West Chester.

by Chris Jarvis

Content warning: mentions police violence, state violence, alcoholism

July 14 is a day of mourning and remembrance for the punk community. Two years ago on that date, the folk-punk pioneer Erik Petersen passed away. Founding member and frontman of the iconic Mischief Brew, Erik Petersen was one of the most gifted songwriters of his generation. His music will long be remembered for its infectiousness, its unique storytelling, its wit, its rawness and its inflammatory radicalism.

Two years on, we remember Erik Petersen through seven of his greatest songs.Continue Reading

JAKE & THE JELLYFISH – LONG IN WINTERS ALBUM REVIEW

Posted on February 5, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Music That Matters and tagged album review, band, featured, folk, folk music, Invisible Llama Music, jake & the jellyfish, Joel Millerchip, klezmer, Leeds band, Long in Winters, music, music that matters, pop punk, punk, punk music, Ska.

by Sara Harrington

An acoustic bar cuts the silence as a rowdy ‘1, 2, 3, 4’ heralds in the full band and an anthemic pop punk belter: the start of something new for punks of the folk persuasion; Jake & The Jellyfish – Long In Winters. Released 26 January 2018 with a gloriously green vinyl available on Invisible Llama Music, this album sees an evolution of sound from this newly re-outfitted 5 piece (sometimes 6), as 2 new members, Derek and Omar, grace the line up. The album revels in raucous, melodic sing-alongs which you can’t help but join in with, even though you don’t know the words yet. But trust me, you will.

MUSIC THAT MATTERS – ICYMI: STÖJ SNAK INTERVIEW WITH NIELS SØRENSON

Posted on July 24, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Music That Matters and tagged Aalborg, acoustic, Billy Liar, concert, Copenhagen, danish, denmark, DIY, electronic, Frank Turner, gig, grand collapse, grindcore, Guns'n'Roses, hardcore, hip hop, icymi, interview, kollapse, Lemlæstet Fosterbræk, metal, Mighty Midgets, MTM, music, music that matters, NIELS SØRENSON, Pizza Tramp, punk, reggae, rock n roll, screamersongwriter, series, Ska, STÖJ SNAK, streaming, underground, venue, vocalist.

by Sara Harrington

Part of a series exploring great music from the DIY music scene that you may have missed.

Hi Niels, thanks so much for letting me bother you with lots of questions! How are you doing today?

No worries. My pleasure. I’m pretty good today – currently in an airport, waiting for a plane to Copenhagen where I’m going to visit an old friend and see a Guns ‘n’ Roses show. Ten year old me is stoked.

So, I’m pretty late to the game and only just stumbled across you and your musical endeavours – Can you tell me a bit about ‘Stöj Snak’ and how it started and who is involved?

Stöj Snak is a ScreamerSongwriter band from Denmark. I started Stöj Snak as an acoustic solo act around 4 years ago – basically just me recording songs in my apartment as a hobby project. It was never meant for anyone to hear.

Since then the band has grown to a four piece with drums, washboard, upright bass and other trash instruments but the attitude towards the music is still very much the same – we do everything ourselves and because it’s fun. It’s basically the antithesis to Guns ‘n’ Roses.Continue Reading

MAKE PUNK VENUES PERIOD ACCESSIBLE

Posted on June 26, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Perspectives and tagged #WomeninMusic, arts, bathroom, creative criticism, cycle, diary, DIY, female bodies, gender inclusive, genders, gig, Hard Times, knickers, menstrual cup, menstruation, music, period, personal, pub, punk, satire, share, Ska, toilet, tour, travel, underwear, venue, womb, women.

by Sara Harrington

CW: graphic imagery, menstruation

Wads of tissue swaddle the gushed gusset of my soon to be late underwear. DIY panty-lining for a DIY punk show. Tissue becomes currency as it is discovered that none of the loos in the entire venue have any – my stash acquired from the Wetherspoons further down the road. No cubicle provides the menstrual cup removing privacy of an old fashioned door. Instead, makeshift curtains swathe the space between yourself and a sorry stranger as the feat of dealing with your period in a space that assumes you do not have one trickles down your hand in all its bloody glory.

Do not have your period at a punk gig.

BLOOD, SWEAT, AND FEARS – EFFICIENT PACKING FOR TOUR

Posted on May 29, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged #WomeninMusic, Allison Crutchfield, arts, creative criticism, cycle, diary, DIY, female bodies, gig, knickers, menstruation, music, packing, period, personal, PS Eliot, punk, share, Ska, tour, travel, underwear, Waxahatchee, women.

by Sara Harrington

CW: In-depth descriptions of experiences of the menstrual cycle.

Writer’s note: For further reading I highly recommend this article by Allison Crutchfield of ‘Waxahatchee’ and ‘PS Eliot’ fame – reading it helped dispel my fears that being a woman in a band and having different needs are totally legit.

How To Pack For Tour:

Bring knickers for at least every day, have spares just in case of period mishaps. Outfits need to be nice but functional for sweating through on stage. Nothing too girly, you don’t want to draw attention to yourself. Socks – same rule as the knickers, no spares. Have pyjama bottoms, you cannot sleep in pants, it’s too weird for girls to do. De-pot all your toiletries so as to not take up too much space in your bag. Do not take up too much space. Face wash, toner, moisturiser, deodorant bar, tiny shower gel, toothpaste, dry shampoo. Do not be high maintenance. A flannel is needed for the face wash – it cannot be taken off with anything else and face wipes break you out. Flannels will get wet so hang these on a DIY clothes line erected in the van. Bring the pill. Continue Reading

DON’T FUCKING TOUCH ME – THE APOLOGY

Posted on May 15, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged alcohol, apology, art, band, behaviour, consent, creative criticism, design, DIY, faintest idea, follow, gig, groping, hug, hugs, lgbtQ+, microaggression, misogyny, music, performance, personal account, personal space, physical contact, punk, queer, response, safe space, Sara Harrington, series, sexual assault, Ska, touring, women in music.

by Sara Harrington

A series exploring women and genderqueer identities within the DIY Punk and Arts scenes. In this installment Sara Harrington depicts scenes from her own experience playing in a touring ska punk band.

DON’T FUCKING TOUCH ME

Posted on April 17, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged alcohol, arts, band, consent, creative criticism, DIY, faintest idea, gig, groping, microaggression, misogyny, music, performance, personal account, punk, Sara Harrington, series, sexual assault, Ska, touring, women in music.

by Sara Harrington

CW: verbal and sexual assault

Part of a series exploring women and genderqueer identities within the DIY Punk and Arts scenes. In this installment, Sara Harrington depicts scenes from her own experience playing in a touring ska punk band.

‘Ticket please.’
Trumpet case in hand, I try to enter the venue as my bandmates breeze on by.
‘I’m playing actually.’
This is uttered with an embarrassed air, the knock to my ego glances across my face. Fair enough, I’ve not been in the band long.
‘Oh, who are you with? There’s no guest list.’
‘Sorry, I play trumpet in the band.’
Lifting my trumpet case, I point at it awkwardly. A nod as it’s decided that I pass all requirements necessary to gain free entry to a show I’m playing. I go to join my bandmates as we pile our gear into the backroom and start setting up for sound check.Continue Reading

THE 20 BEST RADICAL MUSIC RELEASES OF 2016

Posted on January 1, 2017 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Music That Matters and tagged a tribe called quest, Against Me!, anohni, austerity, b-real, chris t-t, chuck d, climate change, cypress hill, drone warfare, dubstep, enter shikari, far right, fascism, folk, folk-punk, fugazi, gentrification, Green Day, hardcore, hip hop, Kate Nash, Lobster, Martha, michael kiwanuka, mischief brew, Muncie Girls, obama, OPS, petrol girls, pop punk, post-hardcore, post-punk, prophets of rage, public enemy, punk, racism, rage against the machine, rap, refused, reggae, reggae punk, Saul Williams, Ska, ska punk, sleaford mods, slyvia plath, Solange, Sonic Boom Six, soul, suffragettes, surveillance, taj weekes, The Selecter, The Tuts, tom morello, war.

By Chris Jarvis

Yes, yes, we all know that 2016 has been an unmitigated cluster-fuck, with rising fascism, worsening humanitarian crises and intensifying conflict. In moments of darkness, many of us turn to the arts world – especially music – for comfort, for release, for explanation. With David Bowie, Prince, George Michael, Glenn Frey, Paul Kantner, Maurice White, George Martin, Phife Dawg, Erik Petersen, Leonard Cohen, Nick Menza, Greg Lake, Sharon Jones, and too many others all having passed away, many have found music to have also fallen on dark times.

That notwithstanding, 2016 has been a year of some undeniably and uniquely brilliant music too, especially music that espouses messages of a better world, of political analysis, of radical alternatives. Here are the 20 best of those radical releases from the past year.

WOMEN AND PUNK: SHAPING THE GENRE 40 YEARS ON

Posted on May 28, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Music That Matters and tagged #WomeninMusic, Ace Bushy Striptease, Adore Life, album, autonomads, Baby Ghosts, BME, British music, Built on Our Backs, Chekhov’s Hangnail, Colour Me Wednesday, DIY, EP, From Caplan to Belsize, Goldman’s Detective Agency, hardcore, hc, In Evil Hour, Kate Nash, Kerrang! Awards, King Prawn, Laila K, Leftover Crack, Lily Allen, LP, Martha, math-rock, media, Middle Ones, MSM, Muncie Girls, music, music journalism, music that matters, No Ditching, No Man No Right, Okinawa Picture Show, Perkie, petrol girls, pop punk, post-hardcore, punk, Radiator Hospital, Resolution 242, rock, Savages, Ska, ska punk, Sonic Book Six, split, T-Shirt Weather, Tellison, The F-Bomb, the king blues, The Selecter, Treading Water.

by Chris Jarvis

Last week, Music That Matters looked at the 40^th anniversary of punk and how our understanding of its history is typically one which erases the efforts and achievements of women musicians and people of colour. Today, the scene is often still seen as a male and white space, with punk shows frequently having male dominated crowds queuing up to see white men thrashing on guitars in shabby venues.

But it looks like things are changing. 2016 feels like it is becoming a rebirth of women in punk, and critically, as if it is women of colour who often are leading the way. More women are touring, more are getting bigger stages and longer sets, and more are getting the media coverage that they deserve. Among the nostalgic reflection, this year, dozens of punk albums will be released. Some will become instant classics, others will fade from memory as quickly as they came. Here are 10 bands leading the British punk scene this year, and the women that are making them shape the future of the genre.Continue Reading

PUNK AND ERASURE: 40 YEARS LATER

Posted on May 22, 2016 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Music That Matters and tagged 7 Year Bitch, anarchism, anniversary, arts, Babes in Toyland, Bad Brains, Black Flag, Blink-182, Blood & Honour, British music, Buzzcocks, celebration, crass, culture, dead kennedys, DIY, earasure, female artists, female musicians, Ford Dagenham, Ghost Town, Goldfinger, Green Day, grunge, history, Iggy Pop, IWD, John Lydon, L7, Less Than JAke, LGBT+, Madness, Malcolm McLaren, male-centric, Minor Threat, music, music that matters, neo nazi, New Found Glory, New Rose, NWA, Patti Smith, politics, punk, punk rock, Ramones, Rancid, RAR, refused, retrospective, revisionism, riot grrrl, Robert Smith, rock against racism, Roxanne Shante, Run DMC, salt n pepa, Sex Pistols, Sham 69, Sid Vicious, Siouxsie Sioux, Ska, The Beat, The Bodysnatchers, The Clash, The Offspring, The Selecter, Young Marble Giants, zine.

by Chris Jarvis

Anniversaries are strange things. Almost exclusively, they consist of rose-tinted, uncritical and nostalgic assessments of whatever they seek to commemorate. 2016, forty years since the ‘birth’ of punk, appears no different. Expect Union Jacks, safety pins galore and excessive images of John Lydon in BBC sanctioned documentaries. Expect descriptions of how important Malcolm Mclaren was to punk’s success, claims that New Rose was without contention the first punk rock single and a neat lineage where pub rock became punk – a very British phenomenon.

Inadequate as such histories are, they are demonstrative of the problem we have with understanding punk as a cultural occurrence. Debate rages amongst fans about whether punk was ever grassroots, whether it was ever political, whether any of the anti-establishment ethos was ever genuine, or instead fabricated by an astute record industry seeking to find the new zeitgeist. Adherents to either theory will read selectively into the evidence and ignore anything which would disprove their dogma.Continue Reading

Ska

FOR A LATE PENNSYLTUCKY ANARCHIST – REMEMBERING ERIK PETERSEN IN 7 SONGS

JAKE & THE JELLYFISH – LONG IN WINTERS ALBUM REVIEW

MUSIC THAT MATTERS – ICYMI: STÖJ SNAK INTERVIEW WITH NIELS SØRENSON

THE 20 BEST RADICAL MUSIC RELEASES OF 2016

WOMEN AND PUNK: SHAPING THE GENRE 40 YEARS ON

PUNK AND ERASURE: 40 YEARS LATER

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