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Wapping Autonomy Centre (also known as The Anarchist Centre) was a self-managed social centre in the London Docklands from late 1981 to 1982. The project was initially funded by money raised by the benefit single Persons Unknown/Bloody Revolutions, as well as benefit gigs by Crass and The Poison Girls.
The centre was set up in a rented space in Metropolitan Wharf, Wapping in 1981. The initial costs were paid using funds raised from a benefit single. It was a split single composed of Persons Unknown by The Poison Girls and Bloody Revolutions by Crass. [1]
The warehouse had been suggested by Andy Martin from the anarchist Little A printers who worked in the building. [2] Like later squatted centres, it had no alcohol or music licences. [3]
During its short lifespan, the Autonomy Centre became an important focal point for the anarcho-punk movement in the UK and Europe. Most of those involved with the project were anarchists who participated in protests and direct action against targets such as vivisection laboratories, the meat industry and the policies of then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The Kill Your Pet Puppy collective organised events. [4] Some of the bands that regularly played at the centre included Anthrax, The Apostles, Cold War, Conflict, Rudimentary Peni [5] Hagar the Womb were formed in the toilets. [6]
Albert Meltzer records that the centre was "Ronan Bennett's brainchild." He goes on to say that "the punk support, especially from followers of Crass and Poison Girls, was substantial. Punk has lasted a couple of decades, long outlasting the proposed club. With the punks' money came the punks, and in the first week they had ripped up every single piece of furniture carefully bought, planned and fitted, down to the lavatory fittings that had been installed by Ronan from scratch, and defaced our own and everyone else's wall for blocks around. In the excitement of the first gigs where they could do as they liked, they did as they liked and wrecked the place. Loss of club, loss of money, loss of effort. End of story." [7]
The centre eventually folded when the benefit parties failed to pay the rent. [8]
Many of those involved with the centre went on to become active at the Centro Iberico, a squatted project with similar aims and ethos in west London. [5]
The centre also inspired other squatted self-managed projects in London such as the Ambulance Station on Old Kent Road, Molly's Café on Upper Street and the Bingo Hall (now the Garage) at Highbury Corner. [9]
Penny Rimbaud from Crass commented "It was a good try. We’d made all this money to defend Persons Unknown and it wasn’t needed. I think it was something in the region of ten grand, which was a lot of money in those days." [10]
Anarcho-punk is an ideological subgenre of punk rock that promotes anarchism. Some use the term broadly to refer to any punk music with anarchist lyrical content, which may figure in crust punk, hardcore punk, folk punk, and other styles.
Gee Vaucher is a visual artist.
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. This album is considered one of the first punk albums to expound serious anarchist philosophies.
Steve Ignorant is a singer and artist.
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.
Youth in Asia were an early 1980s UK anarcho-punk band from London. They were differentiated from many other bands within that scene by their prominent use of the synthesizer. The band's first live performance was in Brussels in December 1981. They played several gigs at squatted venues, including Crass's squat gig at Zig Zag in London, and the Wapping Autonomy Centre with other bands including The Apostles, Crass, Flux of Pink Indians, Twelve Cubic Feet, The Mob, Poison Girls, Hagar the Womb, Riot/Clone, DIRT and others.
Eve Libertine is an English singer.
The Poison Girls were an English anarcho-punk band from Brighton. The singer/guitarist, Vi Subversa, was a middle-aged mother of two at the band's inception, and wrote songs that explored sexuality and gender roles, often from an anarchist perspective. The original Poison Girls line-up also included: Lance D'Boyle (drums); Richard Famous (guitar/vocals); Nil ; and Bernhardt Rebours (bass/synthesiser/piano).
Kill Your Pet Puppy was a UK punk zine that ran for six issues between 1979 and 1984. It was edited by Tony Drayton who had previously produced Ripped and Torn fanzine, which he started in October 1976 and for 18 issues until 1979.
Stop the City demonstrations of 1983 and 1984 were described as a 'Carnival Against War, Oppression and Destruction', in other words protests against the military-financial complex. These demonstrations can be seen as the forerunner of the anti-globalisation protests of the 1990s, especially those in London, England, on May Day and the Carnival against Capitalism on 18 June 1999. They were partially inspired by the actions of the Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp.
The Apostles are an English experimental punk rock band, who developed within the confines of the 1980s anarcho-punk scene in the UK, but did not necessarily adhere to the aesthetics of that movement.
Ronan Bennett is a Northern Irish novelist and screenwriter. He is best known for his work as showrunner, writer and executive producer of the drug and gang-related crime drama television series Top Boy. His other writing credits include the 1997 crime film Face, the 2009 Michael Mann crime biopic Public Enemies and the 2017 BBC historical drama miniseries Gunpowder.
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 in its albums, sound collages, leaflets, and films.
Hagar the Womb are an English punk rock band, originally active in the early 1980s and part of the anarcho-punk movement. In hiatus from 1987, members went on to form We Are Going To Eat You and Melt, with vocalist Julie Sorrell. A 2011 compilation of their back catalogue brought members back into contact with each other, and invitations to reform and play gigs and festivals led to Hagar The Womb gigging again from 2012. The band released a new EP in 2016.
Self-managed social centres in the United Kingdom can be found in squatted, rented, mortgaged and fully owned buildings. These self-managed social centres differ from community centres in that they are self-organised under anti-authoritarian principles and volunteer-run, without any assistance from the state. The largest number have occurred in London from the 1980s onwards, although projects exist in most cities across the UK, linked in a network. Squatted social centres tend to be quickly evicted and therefore some projects deliberately choose a short-term existence, such as A-Spire in Leeds or the Okasional Café in Manchester. Longer term social centres include the 1 in 12 Club in Bradford, the Cowley Club in Brighton and the Sumac Centre in Nottingham, which are co-operatively owned.
Andrew "Andy" Palmer, also known as N. A. Palmer, is a British musician and artist. He was the rhythm guitarist for anarcho punk band Crass.
Centro Iberico, London, in the 1970s was a Spanish anarchist support centre, which after moving into a squatted school building in Notting Hill, London became a self-managed social centre, a live venue and a studio.
Let the Tribe Increase is the only studio album by English anarcho-punk band The Mob. It was released in 1983, through record label All the Madmen, and is considered an early example of the anarchopunk genre.
121 Centre was a squatted self-managed social centre on Railton Road in Brixton, south London from 1981 until 1999. As an anarchist social centre, the venue hosted a bookshop, cafe, infoshop, library, meeting space, office space, printing facility, and rehearsal space. Organisations using the space included Food Not Bombs, Anarchist Black Cross prisoner aid chapters, an anarcho-feminist magazine, a squatters aid organisation, and an anarchist queer group. Regular events at 121 Centre included punk concerts, a women's cafe night, and a monthly queer night. The centre kept a low profile and was one of the longest-lasting squats in London.
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