The Crassical Collection: Penis Envy – Crass (Southern)

WHAT DO LITTLE GIRLS LIKE TO DO?

You don’t want person – You just want woman

Eve Libertine, ‘Dry Weather’ 1981

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Throughout 1980, Crass consolidated their position as the pre-eminent forum for genuine dissent within the punk milieu. Although no album was released, the group had become a fully fledged record label, issuing the Poison Girls’ Chappaquiddick Bridge album, the first volume of the Bullshit Detector series (compiled from tapes sent to the group from the likes of the Amebix, Alternative and the Snipers – all of whom would go on to have singles issued on Crass Records), as well as singles by the Poison Girls and Zounds, the latter topping the independent chart. As Margaret Thatcher inflicted the first full year of her increasingly oppressive regime on the British populace, Crass restricted their own output to the split ‘Bloody Revolutions/ Persons Unknown’ seven-inch, which they shared with Vi Subversia and her band.

Despite the paucity of new Crass music emerging from Dial House, the group’s profile continued to grow as their gigging schedule increased exponentially – almost all of these shows being benefits with the band relying upon the kindness of strangers to put them up in spare rooms, or any available floor space. Stations of the Crass continued to sell in significant numbers, as did a re-release of Feeding of the 5000 – which emerged in early 1981, with ‘Asylum’ restored. The group continued to eschew the mainstream music press in favour of granting interviews to fanzines, and grass roots support for the band also continued to grow, with gigs being typified by the sight of scores of black clad followers chanting along, word-for-word, with Steve Ignorant.

The downside of all this is that it could viewed as a bit of a ‘boy’s club’ – like most punk bands, Crass’ audience was predominantly male and the aggressively confrontational nature of the bulk of their set gave rise to what Eve Libertine described as a ‘boot boy image’. To a degree, this had already been offset by the release of ‘Nagasaki Nightmare’ in February 1981. The song was an evocation of the aftermath of a nuclear strike, that at times resembled gamelan far more than anything remotely related to rock’n’roll. Featuring deeply affecting vocals from Eve Libertine, the track (backed by the tour de force rebuttal of church and state, ‘Big A, Little A’, took up residency at the top of the independent charts and stayed there.

Eve’s suggestion of recording an album using only female vocals struck a chord with Penny Rimbaud who felt it would challenge the group’s audience and play a role in reclaiming feminism from ‘a whole generation of women [who] had taken to power-dressing rather than power-thinking.’ The decision to record such a set was wholly indicative of Crass’ aversion toward developing anything resembling a ‘career’ – the group were absolutely aware that the new material was likely to turn off far greater numbers of existing listeners than would be potentially engaged. However, that wasn’t the point of Crass and although it’s fair to say that Steve Ignorant was initially less than overjoyed to be sidelined for an album, the group collectively committed to the project.

In addition to being an apposite response to Thatcher’s aggressive masculinity, an album of songs from a feminine perspective brought technical challenges to set alongside those of an ideological nature. ‘Compared to our previous two albums, the material brought to the studio contained a far greater sense of poetry and lyricism – which, coupled with the softer tones of women’s voices, required a much more open approach than we had hitherto had to make,’ explained Penny.

Titled Penis Envy, in, what Rimbaud describes as, ‘acknowledgement of one of many absurd concepts born of Freud’s barely disguised vagina craving’, there was a certain incongruity in Crass releasing an album of less bombastic material just as inner city rioting erupted across England in response to Thatcher’s ongoing clampdown. In truth, the album represents one half of a collision of radical ideologies – Crass’ libertarian inclusiveness set against the solipsistic capitalism of the incumbent Tory junta.

Whereas Penis Envy’s upfront feminism and often savage lyrics led to parallels being drawn with the largely unlistenable and painfully worthy Raincoats, the album’s subject matter aligns it most closely with the Au Pairs excellent debut, Playing With A Different Sex, which was released around the same time. The main difference being that Crass weren’t concerned with making anyone dance, while the inclusion of final track, ‘Our Wedding’ provides a welcome shot of the humour that Crass’ detractors so often accused the group of lacking. Indeed, Penny Rimbaud’s sleeve notes recount the full story of how the archly saccharine number was conceived as part of an artful hoax perpetrated against the gormless Loving magazine, who were persuaded to include the song as a giveaway flexi disc as part of an issue promoting the concept of matrimonial servitude. Credited to Creative Recording And Sound Services (geddit?) ‘Our Wedding’ is a miasma of cliché and interlocking synth lines, guaranteed to induce a hypoglycaemic episode in anyone bar the most witless listener.

The greater degree of musical subtlety within Penis Envy has certainly allowed it to benefit far more apparently from the remixing process than has been the case with the two earlier albums issued as part of the ongoing Crassical Collection. Although songs such as ‘Bata Motel’, ‘Systematic Death’ and ‘Where Next Columbus’ conform to some extent to the band’s existing martial template, ‘Poison In A Pretty Pill’ and ‘What The Fuck?’ (in particular) couldn’t be much further removed from any type of orthodoxy. These songs contain delicate, sometimes ethereal elements that have been brought to the fore by the remixing. Similarly, the greater clarity afforded the otherworldly ‘Berkertex Bribe’ enables Eve’s expressive vocal and accomplished pacing to be more fully appreciated than was the case on the original LP.

Although the repackaged album follows an identical format to its two predecessors, the additional extras are fairly meagre this time around – just three tracks. The tangential ‘Yorkie Talk’ could arguably be included on any of the remastered series, and bears more relation to Rimbaud’s post-Crass material than anything the band produced collectively. ‘Yes Folks’ is similarly indicative of the drummer/lyricist’s fascination with sound collage, although it is notable for a delightfully cheesy faux advert for the ‘Our Wedding’ flexi. The CD’s final song, ‘The Unelected President’ is an updating of ‘Major General Despair’ that straddles the gap between the original song and Eve/Penny’s more recent works. The track is particularly interesting as it offers a tantalising glimpse of what a contemporary Crass might be like, and we could certainly use something of that ilk in the current climate.

To order the remastered album from Southern Records:        www.southern.net/

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Originally posted 2011-04-11 17:26:43. Republished by Blog Post Promoter