Poison Girls - Total Exposure

POISON GIRLS - TOTAL EXPOSURE

"Never mind The Bomb, who's got the biggest cock?!" So began Poison Girls' second album, Total Exposure, a live recording of a gig played in Edinburgh at a venue called the Lasswade Centre in July of 1981. Thrown out at the audience almost as a challenge, the question was effectively setting the scene for the evening's entertainment.

Poison Girls were never ones for equivocating or for messing around so immediately hauled the audience out into the deep end by launching into their most well known song, Persons Unknown, delivered on this occasion with a twist. Rather than the swirling vortex as played on the Crass label 7" single release, the tempo was being upped and topped-off with the near operatic backing vocals of bassist Bernhardt Rebours, instantly turning the song and subsequently the gig into a joyous celebration.

Most bands, of course, would always save their most well known song for last, played usually as an encore but not for Poison Girls such hoary rock'n'roll traditions. They instead were coming out fighting like a heavyweight boxer, delivering knock-out blows that immediately sent the audience reeling.

"State control and rock'n'roll," continued Vi Subversa without so much as a pause between songs "Are run by clever men. They build you up and they break you down, you're on the dole again. State control and rock'n'roll are run by clever men. It's all good for business, we're in the charts again - Ha ha! You know it's true but what can you do? You look for a gap to get out of the trap it's a vicious circle, try and break loose. Break out of the trap! Get out of the noose! You know it's true but what can you do? What you're feeling is a human being not this year's thing or last year's thing. This year's thing or last year's thing oh state control and rock'n'roll are run by clever men... And anarchy is this year's thing."

The same upbeat pace continues through to the song Tension, taking in Old Tart's Song and Bully Boys and by this point in the proceedings it's apparent to all that Poison Girls are the holders of a bright but very subversive intelligence. Alongside the sheer enjoyment, the dancing, the tunes and the sheer exuberance of the gig it's clear that a dialogue is going on. Questions were being asked, ideas floated and preconceived notions challenged: "The tension between what you do and you don't do, the tension between what you can and you can't do. The tension between what you will and you won't do - oh, what you won't do! Tension is how you spend most of your life, the smile in your eyes in spite of the lies... If you had wings my love would you fly? If you knew that you never would die would you live - would you try?"

There was no sense of preaching from the stage or in any of the lyrics, just an urge to the listener to open up, be brave, and dare to talk openly, dare to act honestly, and dare to reveal their true self without fear of ridicule or insult. Just as Vi Subversa - a middle-aged mother singing on stage as part of an Anarcho Punk band - was doing: "Total exposure - total abandon. Total exposure - total control."

By mid way into the gig (and mid way into the album), the ice has not only been broken but smashed to smithereens with band and audience alike fully at ease with each other and 'freed-up'; this being the point that things get interesting.

"My greatest moments," said Vi in an interview with the NME "Are the moments when I've done really tender bits, live, to quite ferocious-looking audiences, because what I'm doing is to address that tender part in those people. And when that actually works, it's really moving."

So, much slower songs such as Other and Daughters And Sons are played without losing grip of the audience and in fact, causing the grip on and the bond with the audience to tighten. This is when Poison Girls get intimate, though it comes with a caveat as Vi declares in the song Fucking Mother: "I'm not your fucking mother and I'm not your fucking whore, I'm not your baby sister or the girl next door. You can roll your eyes to heaven for a virgin to adore but there's someone right beside you, who could ask for more? As you eye each other up for a fuck or a fight."

Then it's full steam ahead into the last lap of the gig with the band calling out in unison during the song Dirty Work, "We don't want your dirty war! We don't want your dirty war!"; before ending with the song Alienation, with guitarist Richard Famous stating "There's no choice for you, no choice for me," over and over again as Vi counters with two very simple questions: "What you gonna do about it? What are we gonna do about it?"

Total Exposure was a snapshot of Poison Girls at the top of their game though so fluid were they that there was no chance of it pinning them down or capturing them for posterity. From their very start, they were always an impossible band to pigeon-hole and though their politics were solid and steadfast, their constant twisting and turning made them an extremely unusual if not challenging prospect.

Years later, Penny Rimbaud would say: "Poison Girls were an absolutely extraordinary group of people led by a very powerful feminist voice, as in Vi Subversa - a brilliant poet. They were a complete equal to us (Crass) on every level. They talked personal politics, we talked social politics. They were talking about the real issues as in how do you get out of bed in the morning, where as we were talking, 'well, I've got out of bed, I've had my coffee, I've had my 38 cigarettes and now I'll talk politics'."

Released on their own XNTrix label, Total Exposure marked a turning point in Poison Girls' trajectory, having announced with the release of the album that they would no longer be partnering with Crass: "By the 97th gig," Vi explained "It was becoming clear that Crass's commercial success was obscuring what we were doing. If you're in a partnership and one partner becomes dominant... the classic example is a marriage. It became clear we had to get out of that. I never wanted to be a wife - certainly not Crass's."

Sadly - but rightly - it was something that had to be done. The Crass/Poison Girls partnership had fired untold imaginations and was the catalyst to launch a thousand bands but the popularity of Crass was eclipsing what Poison Girls were doing, meaning they were starting to be viewed as a support act rather than a force unto themselves. Both bands would have been aware of this which meant it was an unfair situation for both to be in. Poison Girls could easily have played it safe and rode along to see where things might lead but of course, they weren't the kind of people to do that.

It was a brave move and what better way to signal change was afoot than by the release of Total Exposure on Poison Girls' own label? An exceptionally good live recording of an exceptionally good band that bared them to one and all - the cover sleeve being see-through and the vinyl clear - showing they had nothing to be ashamed about, nothing to hide, and everything, in fact, to be very proud of.