Anti-System may be a name known to some of you out there, if not, shame on you 🙂 Seriously though, these guys go way back, formed in the early 80's. The following paragraph is taken from their Wikipedia page.... "Formed in Bradford in 1981, with a line-up of Phil (drums), George (bass), Nogsy (vocals) and Dom Watts (guitar), the band recorded a demo whose tracks found their way onto a Pax Records compilation. Their debut release was the five-track Defence of the Realm EP which was followed (on Reconciliation Records after the closure of Pax Records) with the No Laughing Matter album and the 12" A Look at Life EP. Like some other anarcho-punk bands of the time, the band were promoters of animal rights causes, their debut EP being a benefit for animal welfare groups and prior to the recording of the A Look at Life EP there was a necessity for a new line-up as two of the original members had been imprisoned for various animal rights actions. Mark Keane and Michael Teale were imprisoned in 1986, shortly after recording A Look at Life."
Take a huge 40 year step to today and the band are back with a vengeance and renewed energy and have been for a couple of years and are sounding as punk as ever. Fast, breakneck stuff delivered with such intensity that it rips out your eyes from their sockets and kicks them into the abyss. My first listening experience of Anti-System was the two tracks that appeared on the Pax Records compilation (vinyl) album - Punk Dead? Nah Mate, The Smell Is Just Summink In Yer Underpants Innit. Remember vinyl?? The two tracks were Man's World and Breakout. For me anyway, they were the best two tracks on the album. Other bands featured were Xpozez, Mau Maus and Xtract - to name a few. My second time hearing them was on another Pax compilation, Bollocks To The Gonads - Here's The Gonads. Tracks were Schoolboy and Why Should It Happen. Again, these two tracks were full of energy, pace and anger! I was sold, I then went out and scoured the reams and reams of records in good old Skeleton records in Birkenhead to get my grubby paws on their material. I found No Laughing Matter LP (released in 1985) and In Defence Of The Realm EP (released in 1983).
Fast forwarding, I find myself in possession of a live offering by Anti-System.... Live In Durham City. A new line-up with the singer (Dean 'Nogsy') being the only original singer but saying that he has a powerhouse of a band with him with Varik on guitar and Yaga on bass. Drums are temporarily owned by Ade who does backing vocals too. I gingerly place the disc in the laptop as live albums can be hit and miss. From the second the music kicks in, it KICKS IN! Power is an understatement..... the sound engineer knew his stuff, the quality for a live recording is proper good and I assume it was later remixed in a studio and kudos to that engineer also. This is a brutal onslaught to the ears, one song merges into another with no let up, no chance to pause to catch your breath. The music picks you up, whether you are willing or not and slams you against the back wall of whatever room you're in. The louder you play it, the deeper the impression your broken body leaves in the wall. It is that severe. The addition of the dual female vocal attack adds to the violence, working in perfect harmony, the double vocal attack literally keeps punching you into oblivion.
If you like Discharge and D-beat bands of a similar ilk then you are gonna love the re-vigorated Anti-System. This has to be one of the best albums I've heard this year. It got not one but two instant replays. Two of the band now live in Poland so are obviously limited to travelling as freely as we all were before this shitstorm of a pandemic hit the world. Saying that, they are booked to play a festival in Scarborough next year. (I'll have to find the link). If I do it will be placed at the bottom of this scrawl. This is one band that I missed seeing first time around but I won't miss them this time. Words can not fully justify how good this album is. I don't particularly like 'labels' but this is about as 'hardcore' as you can get, their attack and delivery is akin to the great Extreme Noise Terror. Imagine a team of construction workers burrowing their way into your head and proceeding to jack hammer the hell out of your brain and you're close to what Anti-System are about. You have been warned!!!!
Words: DLW, Photos: Band Media
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