Wargasm

WARGASM

Going against the grain of the divisiveness of the music press, an LP by the name of Wargasm was released on the Pax label that brought together bands and artists from across the full spectrum of Punk, uniting them all under an anti-war banner.

Pax Records was the brainchild of one Marcus Featherby, a music promoter based in Sheffield who had for some time been putting on gigs at a venue called Marples in the city's centre. Featherby was a music enthusiast trying to straddle the always conflicting worlds of the music business and doing what was actually right and proper when it came to what could be termed 'Punk ideology'.

Wargasm featured 12 tracks from 12 different bands and artists covering various Punk scenes and styles: Old Punk, New Punk, Anarcho Punk, Hardcore Punk, Goth, Oi!, No Wave and straightahead Experimental. Among those included was Captain Sensible, Angelic Upstarts, Infa Riot, Maus Maus, Flux Of Pink Indians, and The System. Overall, it was a very strong album with all royalties being divided between a variety of good causes. Two tracks in particular, however, stood out.

The first, Kinky Sex Makes The World Go Round by the Dead Kennedys was similar to what Crass had done on their Sheep Farming In The Falklands flexi-disc as in depicting a situation where Thatcher achieves orgasm at the prospect of war.

Dead Kennedys vocalist Jello Biafra, posing as the Secretary of War at the State Department of the United States calls Thatcher at 10 Downing Street and advises something needs to be done about the "sluggish world economic situation", suggesting as an antidote another war be started: "The more people we kill in this war, the more the economy will prosper. We can get rid of of practically everybody on your dole queue if we plan this right."

As Thatcher whimpers with delight in the background, the idea is expounded upon: "Don't worry about demonstrators. Just pump up your drug supply. It's just like Vietnam. We had everybody so busy with LSD they never got too strong. Kept the war functioning just fine. It's easy. Look - war is money. We all agree the time has come for the Big One, so whadya say?"

Come the end of the track, Thatcher is in the throes of orgasmic delight.

The second stand-out track from the album and in fact, the best one on it by far was Statement by Poison Girls. This was an entirely new version of the song that had come as a flexi-disc with the Poison's début album, Chappaquiddick Bridge, and to say this version was extraordinarily good was an understatement.

The first third of the song saw Vi Subversa singing over an orchestral backing before leading into a classic Poison Girls/Punky thrash, then finishing with the two backings - orchestral and Punk thrash - combined. The Punky/thrash segment can only be described as sublime, coming with an added verse: "Rooted in pain, they sell their own flesh. Rooted in pain, they'll do anything for money. They deal in death, with minds that feed on hate. In fear of life, they kill without pity. In fear of love, they kill and they rape. In fear of love, they rape without pity..."

And then finishing with the same words as on the flexi-disc version: "Where are they that will cherish my flesh? Where are they that will cherish our children? The men that will say No to the death dealers? The children that can say NO to the life stealers? Where are they that will curse the death dealers? I reject the system."

The fact that such a good song was being freely donated to a compilation LP was yet further proof of what such a good band Poison Girls were. If any further proof be needed?

Apart from the music, Wargasm came with a powerful essay written by Marcus Featherby that successfully combined the anger and insight of Crass with the realities of war as depicted by Discharge. In it's call for unity it also underlined the reason behind the release of the album: 'All wars are foul, dirty and more revolting than your imagination will allow but we are still supposed to accept them. We will never persuade the so-called world leaders to stop lobbing missiles at each other as long as we continue to fight amongst ourselves. As long as ordinary people remain divided, governments and politicians will continue to use us as disposable war fodder to bolster their own importance and power.

We must take that power away from these vile people. We have to let them know that we won't accept their putrid egocentric lust. If they insist on continuing their suicidal blood bath, chuck them into a cesspool and let them sort it out themselves.

But leave us out of it. Let us live our lives in peace and friendship. We have to show them that our propaganda is as effective as theirs, by supporting the peace movements and working together for a more realistic and sane world. The next decade is OUR future, and unless we can force some changes, there won't be any future that we can even consider for our own children.

Forget your petty differences and join together and PROTEST... it is the only weapon we have, but it could be more powerful than all the bombs or politicians throughout the world.

LISTEN to this record. READ the lyrics. THINK.'