[kj] OT: Ugh: Sex Pistols to begin recording new songs, possibly new LP.... :(

B. Oliver Sheppard bigblackhair at sbcglobal.net
Sat Jan 19 14:21:29 EST 2008


Well, I would, but that sounds like the sort of thing like "poet" or
"musician" that doesn't quite fit the "have to pay rent & bills" litmus
test. But, yes, I think all bands should run their ideas first through
me, personally. :)

Also, about branding, I am sorta sketchy on Factory, and I know GM and
Ford logos were on advertisements and the like for decades and decades.
Obviously the first Crass EP (technically an EP but the size was
LP-length; they did it to hold costs down and pioneered the "Pay No More
Than.." thing you USED to see on punk LPs) was on Small Wonder, not
Crass Records, though they had had Exitstencil Press -- which did the
military stencil grafitti tagging, for a number of years before '78,
maybe as early as '75, when future members of Crass were in the
avant-band Exit, which sorta kinda became Crass after they heard the
first rumblings of punk.

I suppose I am a bit miffed, like Penny Rimbaud, that Crass really did
contribute a lot that they're almost routinely overlooked for. The
"commune" they worked out of, Dial House, had been a center of musical
activity and various avant bands since '69 or so. By the time Penny
Rimbaud formed Crass out of the ashes of Exit in 1977, he was already,
like, 35, and had been doing agit prop in one form or another already,
much like the COUM transmissions people. But Penny's militaristic snare
drumming, the "Reality Asylum" dark ambient music and forays into what
would now be called ambient/experimental, or even outright industrial
"Smash the Mac," plus the military surplus/all black stuff, that was
pioneering. NME would slam Crass constantly even as they quietly adopted
that spartan Crass font look for their own papers or punk section of
coverage. "We hate Crass, but we're gonna copy their aesthetics anyway,
and never credit them."

-Oliver


ade wrote:

> You should become an artistic consultant.

>

>

>

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