The Feeding of the 5000 | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
![]() | ||||
Studio album by | ||||
Released | 1978 | |||
Recorded | 29 October 1978 | |||
Studio | Southern Studios (London, United Kingdom) | |||
Genre | Anarcho-punk | |||
Length | 31:50 | |||
Label | Crass Records | |||
Producer | Crass | |||
Crass chronology | ||||
| ||||
Alternative covers | ||||
![]() Cover of the remastered 'Crassical Collection' rerelease |
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Select | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
The Feeding of the 5000 is the first album by the anarcho-punk band Crass. The album was recorded on 29 October 1978, by John Loder at Southern Studios and was released the same year. It was considered revolutionary in its time due to what was considered an extreme sound, frequently profane lyrical content and the anarchist political ideals in the lyrics. The album also saw the introduction of Crass's policy of ensuring cheap prices for their records. [3] [4] This album is considered one of the first punk albums to expound serious anarchist philosophies. [5]
The record was made when Pete Stennett, owner of Small Wonder Records, heard a demo that the band had recorded. Impressed by all of the material, he decided that rather than release a conventional single by the band, he would put all of their set onto an 18-track 12" EP. However, problems were encountered when workers at the Irish pressing plant contracted to manufacture the record refused to handle it due to the allegedly blasphemous content of the track "Reality Asylum" (referred to as "Asylum" on the record sleeve). The record was eventually released with this track removed and replaced by two minutes of silence, retitled "The Sound of Free Speech". This incident also prompted Crass to set up their own record label in order to retain full editorial control over their material, and "Reality Asylum" was issued shortly afterwards in a re-recorded and extended form as a 7" single. A later repress of The Feeding of The 5000 (subtitled The Second Sitting) released on Crass records in 1980 restored the missing track. [4]
Crass helped reinitiate the influence of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and the wider peace campaign in the UK with the songs like "They've Got a Bomb", "Fight War Not Wars" and the adoption of the CND Symbol at their live concerts. [6]
"They've got a Bomb" also has a period of silence within it, inspired by John Cage's "4'33"". The band have acknowledged the influence of Cage, and said that the idea of the space in the song, when performed live, was to suddenly stop the energy, dancing and noise and allow the audience to momentarily "confront themselves" and consider the reality of nuclear war. [6]
"The feeding of the five thousand" is a well-known phrase in Christian tradition, being the name of a Biblical miracle in which a small amount of food is said to have fed 5,000 people. According to the band's drummer and spokesperson, Penny Rimbaud, "We named the album The Feeding of The Five Thousand because 5,000 was the minimum number that we could get pressed and some 4900 more than we thought we'd sell. Feeding is now only a few hundred short of going golden, though I don't suppose we'll hear too much about that in the music press". [7] [3]
On 16 August 2010, The Feeding of the 5000 was rereleased as the first volume of The Crassical Collection. As well as being digitally remastered from the original analogue studio tapes, the release also contains additional artwork by Gee Vaucher, bonus material and a 64-page booklet of lyrics and liner notes by Rimbaud and Steve Ignorant. [8]
In December 2019, the band, in co-operation with One Little Indian Records, released the entire unedited 16-track master tape of the album for fans to remix, the selected results being included on a compilation album with the working title "Normal Never Was". It was announced that the proceeds from the album would go to the anti-domestic abuse charity Refuge. [9]
On 2 October 2020, the Crassical Collection version was reissued, with the bonus tracks moved to a second CD.
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
1. | "Asylum" | 2:06 |
2. | "Do They Owe Us a Living?" | 1:24 |
3. | "End Result" | 2:04 |
4. | "They've Got a Bomb" | 3:48 |
5. | "Punk is Dead" | 1:48 |
6. | "Reject of Society" | 1:08 |
7. | "General Bacardi" | 0:59 |
8. | "Banned from the Roxy" | 2:14 |
9. | "G's Song" | 0:36 |
No. | Title | Length |
---|---|---|
10. | "Fight War, Not Wars" | 0:42 |
11. | "Women" | 1:15 |
12. | "Securicor" | 2:28 |
13. | "Sucks" | 1:38 |
14. | "You Pay" | 1:44 |
15. | "Angels" | 2:08 |
16. | "What a Shame" | 1:11 |
17. | "So What" | 3:05 |
18. | "Well?...Do They?" | 1:32 |
No. | Title | Origin | Length |
---|---|---|---|
19. | "Do They Owe Us a Living?" | Ignorant and Rimbaud live at the Dial House, 1977 as Stormtrooper | 5:43 |
20. | "Blackburn Rovers" (thread track) | Ignorant and Rimbaud live at the Dial House, 1977 as Stormtrooper | 0:57 |
21. | "Heartbeat of the Mortuary" | Crass in Soho, 27 August 1977 | 1:45 |
22. | "Do They Owe Us a Living?" | Crass in Soho, 27 August 1977 | 2:17 |
23. | "Demolition" | Crass in Soho, 27 August 1977 | 1:55 |
24. | "I Don't Like It" | Crass in Soho, 27 August 1977 | 5:03 |
25. | "Pissedorf" (thread track) | Crass in Soho, 27 August 1977 | 1:05 |
26. | "End Result" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 2:48 |
27. | "G's Song" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 0:42 |
28. | "General Barcardi" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 1:08 |
29. | "Securicor" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 1:55 |
30. | "Angela Rippon" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 1:04 |
31. | "Major General Despair" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 1:20 |
32. | "Do They Owe Us a Living?" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 1:45 |
33. | "Punk is Dead" (demo) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 4:34 |
34. | "Come to Southern Studios" (run out track) | Southern Studios, February 1978 | 0:20 |
Dial House is a farm cottage situated in south-west Essex, England that has been a self-sustaining anarcho-pacifist open house since 1967. The house is located in the countryside of Epping Forest in Ongar Great Park. It has been used as a base for a number of cultural, artistic, and political projects ranging from avant-garde jazz events to helping found the free festival movement.
Gee Vaucher is a visual artist.
Stations of the Crass is the second album by Crass, released in 1979. The record, originally released as a double 12", includes live tracks from a gig recorded at the Pied Bull pub in Islington, London, on 7 August 1979. The first three sides contain the studio tracks and play at 45 rpm, while the final side comprises the live material and plays at 33 rpm. The album's title is not only a pun on the Catholic rite of the Stations of the Cross, but is also a reference to the graffiti campaign that the band had been conducting around London's underground railway system, the cover artwork depicting a wall at Bond Street tube station that had allegedly been 'decorated' by them. Although the album met mixed critical reception at first, it managed to sell at least 20,000 copies within two weeks.
Crass Records was an independent record label that was set up by the anarchist punk band Crass.
Yes Sir, I Will was the fifth and penultimate album released in March 1983 by anarcho-punk band Crass. The album is a virulent attack on then-Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Margaret Thatcher and her government in the aftermath of the Falklands War and was set nearly wholly over a raging and an almost free-form improvised backing provided by the group's musicians.
Steve Ignorant is a singer and artist.
Penny Lapsang Rimbaud is a writer, poet, philosopher, painter, musician and activist. He was a member of the performance art groups EXIT and Ceres Confusion, and in 1972 was co-founder of the Stonehenge Free Festival, together with Phil Russell aka Wally Hope. In 1977 with Steve Ignorant, he co-founded the seminal anarchist punk band Crass and served as its drummer. Crass disbanded in 1984. Until 2000 Rimbaud devoted himself almost entirely to writing, returning to the public platform in 2001 as a performance poet working with Australian saxophonist Louise Elliott and a wide variety of jazz musicians under the umbrella of Last Amendment.
Penis Envy, released in 1981, was the third LP by the anarchist punk band Crass. The album was included at #36 on Rolling Stone's "40 Greatest Punk Albums of All Time" list in 2016.
EXIT were a performance art group during the mid-1970s. EXIT members Penny Rimbaud and Gee Vaucher later founded anarchist punk rock band Crass, adopting many of EXIT's experimental/multi media techniques into Crass' presentation.
Zounds are an English anarcho punk/post-punk band from Reading, Berkshire, formed in 1977. Originally they were part of the cassette culture movement, releasing material on the Fuck Off Records label, and were also involved in the squatting and free festival scene. The name of the band is derived from the old English minced oath "zounds", a contraction of "God's wounds", referring to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus Christ, formerly used as a mildly blasphemous oath.
Last Amendment, formerly known as The Crass Collective and Crass Agenda, is the working title of a series of collaborations by ex-members of the anarcho-punk band Crass and others. Although Crass had formally split up in 1984, Penny Rimbaud, Gee Vaucher, Eve Libertine, Steve Ignorant, Andy Palmer and Pete Wright came together in November 2002 to put on a concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in opposition to the at that time proposed War on Iraq. Although they did not all appear on the stage at the same time, most of the ex-members of Crass participated in the event under the name of The Crass Collective, along with other performers such as Ian MacKaye, Goldblade, the English Chamber Choir, Fun Da Mental, and Nabil Shaban, among others.
Acts of Love is an album of 50 poems by Penny Rimbaud of the anarchist punk band Crass, set to classical music composed and arranged by Penny Rimbaud and Paul Ellis, and performed by Steve Ignorant and Eve Libertine. Released in 1985 on Crass Records, the record was accompanied by a book of 50 paintings by artist Gee Vaucher.
Flux of Pink Indians was an English punk rock band from Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, England, active between 1980 and 1986.
Eve Libertine is an English singer.
Founded 1992 by John Loder, Southern Records is an independent record label. It is based in London and until 2008 had offices in the United States, France and Berlin.
John F. Loder was an English sound engineer, record producer and founder of Southern Studios, as well as a former member of EXIT and co-founder of the Southern Records distribution company with his wife Sue. He was also the studio engineer of choice for Crass and Crass Records, and was often considered to be the band's "ninth member".
This is an overview of the Crass Records discography. (NB, dates refer to initial UK releases, many of these records have since been re-issued in CD format)
Crass were an English art collective and punk rock band formed in Epping, Essex in 1977, who promoted anarchism as a political ideology, a way of life, and a resistance movement. Crass popularised the anarcho-punk movement of the punk subculture, advocating direct action, animal rights, feminism, anti-fascism, and environmentalism. The band used and advocated a DIY ethic approach to its albums, sound collages, leaflets, and films.
There is No Authority But Yourself is a Dutch film directed by Alexander Oey documenting the history of anarchist punk band Crass. The film features archive footage of the band and interviews with former members Steve Ignorant, Penny Rimbaud and Gee Vaucher. As well as reflecting on the band's past the film focusses on their current activities, and includes footage of Rimbaud performing with Last Amendment at the Vortex jazz club in Hackney, a compost toilet building workshop and a permaculture course held at Dial House in the spring of 2006.
This is Your Captain Speaking is a three-track EP by English musician Captain Sensible, released on 2 November 1981 on Crass Records. It was Sensible's first release as a solo artist, while still being a member of rock band the Damned. It reached No. 3 in the UK Indie Chart.
{{cite journal}}
: Cite journal requires |journal=
(help)