The Ian Curtis memorial thread

here's some relevant links:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/feb/27/never-mind-swastikas-secret-history-punky-jews

an entire academic paper here:

http://usir.salford.ac.uk/23153/2/Punk_%28IWM_2009%29.pdf

I'll finish off with a quote from Hebdiger's Subculture : The meaning of Style " We must resort, then, to the most obvious of explanations - that the swastika was worn because it was guaranteed to shock...The signifier (swastika) had been willfully detached from the concept (Nazism) it conventionally signified and placed in an alternative context ( ie punk music)...it was exploited for an empty effect."

https://www.punk77.co.uk/groups/punkswastikafashion3.htm

that Hebdige book is so good. I found a copy lying in the street decades ago, having never even heard of it, and was amazed at how well thought out it was.

in the late 70s/early 80s? who did this? the sex pistols were on a huge night-time talk show with a member of the crew wearing a swastika. what was comparable in the US at the time? I can't think of anything.

One of their fans, you mean?

granted punk wasn't as big here as it was in the UK at the time, but you didn't see the NYC or LA contingents (such as they were at the time) running rampant with this imagery like the UK did

'Running rampant' lol.

Dick Hebdige OTM, nothing to do with Ian Curtis's dad.

dumb question, but how deep was the knowledge of the holocaust back in the '70s? i mean how all-pervasive was the awareness of it at the time, vs now. obviously people knew about it, they knew about the cost since the histories and the statistics and what not were out there, but at the same time back in the '90s i certainly remember knowing people who weren't fully aware of the details of its execution and the true horror of Nazi evil til much later than one would imagine. like til they saw Schindler's List or something.

i wonder if it felt a bit more abstract and removed then in a weird way? This isn't to excuse ignorance, i'm more wondering about how aware people were at the time of the full scope.

multixp, what about these guys. Given that half of the band were Jewish, I suspect it's because they thought it looked cool rather than any attempt at provocation and zero chance of any genuine identification with them.

https://botw-pd.s3.amazonaws.com/styles/logo-thumbnail/s3/0018/9377/brand.gif?itok=rGTpQ4ja

Curtis seems to have gone a bit farther than the armbands and fashion statements though - the name of the band, the lyrical references, the EP sleeve, the anti-immigrant Tory politics. By contrast with an avowed idiot like Sid Vicious it seems like in Curtis' case there was maybe more there. idk.

KISS logo is a stretch as a Nazi ref imo.

xp

more like an SS logo...

https://p1.liveauctioneers.com/368/76396/39963210_1_x.jpg?version=1&width=512&format=pjpg&auto=webp&quality=50

One of their fans, you mean?

yes, this was what I meant by "crew", as in "entourage" or "gang of supporters"

but the lyrics aren't sympathetic so much as a morbid curiosity. I never read the wife's book so didn't know about the voting, but I don't see that showing up in the music.

yes I am familiar with the SS emblem thx

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/kiss-nazi-logo_us_577430ade4b0bd4b0b13779c

yes, this was what I meant by "crew", as in "entourage" or "gang of supporters"

And that counts as the band putting Nazism 'front and centre' does it? Not to mention all the other leading UK punk bands who were doing the same?

how many pics of Sid wearing his swastika shirt do you want me to post

like are you seriously arguing this was not a thing in UK punk at the time, I am confused

xp i don't think it's a stretch, which at the same time doesn't mean Kiss are sympathizes. just morons.

do you want me to google "Siouxsie Sioux swastika" for you

KISS are definitely morons lol

xp

from the pdf I linked:

British punk was not being particularly innovative on this score, and its penchant for
swastikas can be directly traced to the early American punks, and in particular, I’d suggest,
to Dee Dee Ramone, who grew up in postwar Germany and became fascinated by the Nazi
paraphernalia such as gas masks, helmets and machine gun belts that still littered the former
battle fields in the German countryside.

Yes, I am arguing that this was nowhere near as big a thing as it seems to be in your fevered imagination.

that's horseshit, Dee Dee never wore a swastika or any other Nazi regalia onstage, and it sure as hell isn't on any of the Ramones LPs or posters or artwork. And they have a grand total of two songs about Nazis, one of which came out much later and is decidedly anti-Nazi

where were these early American punks with Nazi shit on, that did not happen

Asheton is like the lone standout, and even that wasn't really in public afaik

obligatory "not all punks" quote:

Activist, artist and punk chronicler Caroline Coon recalls rehearsals for the 100 Club's first punk festival in 1976. Malcolm started handing out swastika armbands he'd had made. Siouxsie of the Banshees put one on right away and some of the Pistols seemed ready to follow suit. Aghast, Rhodes blurted out that if anyone wore swastikas onstage, they couldn't use the Clash's instruments as planned. The Clash backed him up. The gig went on. No swastikas.

so it was far from accepted, even back then

How big does it need to have been? Several of the big name UK punk artists (Vicious and Rotten, Sioux, Capt Sensible, Poly Styrene, Billy Idol) clearly made use of swastika imagery, which a quick GIS will probably turn up. 4xp

I would also argue/question that UKs response to nazis and world war II was very different than the states. I mean, we hear a lot about the greatest generation, but I feel like maybe we had a lot less baggage. We went over there, kicked as and came back to word domination and domestic peace. The brits post WW2 had the results of the blitz and greatly diminished world power. No?

It's not that clear because I've never seen Capt Sensible, Poly Styrene, Billy Idol making us of swastika imagery - not saying that they didn't.

regarding the American punks, also from that pdf, sorry it formats a bit weird:

The hardcore punks The Dead Boys, for example, presented The Ramones with Nazi Mother’s Crosses
as gifts for helping them to settle into the city: this was the new band’s way of showing The Ramones
that they belonged.
And it didn’t stop there. After one gig the lead singer of The Dead Boys, Stiv
Bators, is said to have shaved a swastika into a fan’s pubic hair with a razor, then led a naked
rampage round the Chelsea Hotel, draped in a Nazi flag and carrying a whip while singing
the song ‘Springtime for Hitler’ from the Broadway musical
The Producers.

I imagine all the Nazi memorabilia in the US had been bought up by Hell's Angels anyway!

https://www.punk77.co.uk/graphics/swastika/damnedswastika.jpg

https://www.punk77.co.uk/graphics/swastika/poly.jpg

Re Idol, there's this but I didn't find the actual interview: http://rockdirt.com/billy-idol-interview-turns-icy-after-nazi-confession/12330/

I did not know that about the Dead Boys (who I’ve never listened to tbh). Interesting! I doubt Joey was stoked about getting an iron cross lol

Cps

Xps

I guess that's actually Styrene's friend who's wearing the swastika there, tbf.

Well, first of all, I don't think that's Capt. Sensible. Secondly, that looks like Chrissie Hynde wearing the swastika, Poly Styrene is the mixed race woman in the middle. THirdly, and I hate it to seem as if I'm defending these idiots but Siouxsie and Billy Idol were not big name punk artists when they were traipsing about wearing swastikas - they weren't even in bands.

(xp) I think it's Chrissie Hynde!

Two other sources on Sensible fwiw but yeah, I was hasty about Poly Styrene:
https://books.google.ca/books?id=tAKSNLj1wGEC&pg=PT150&lpg=PT150&dq=captain+sensible+swastika&source=bl&ots=BJs7unYs5M&sig=D05bVD7zms-5Xa-a7dwUZqi5WWQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwijubLo8dTfAhWr6IMKHan_AWUQ6AEwEHoECAIQAQ#v=onepage&q=captain%20sensible%20swastika&f=false

https://books.google.ca/books?id=4GN8DwAAQBAJ&pg=PT129&lpg=PT129&dq=captain+sensible+swastika&source=bl&ots=wd9eLslbXj&sig=zFrgY66_X0ZvRenNQBCdPfRJypU&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwijubLo8dTfAhWr6IMKHan_AWUQ6AEwD3oECAEQAQ#v=onepage&q=captain%20sensible%20swastika&f=false

lou reed's iron cross hair.

I don't know about Capt. Sensible, seems out of character for him, my point was that this was not 'running rampant' on the UK punk scene and was mostly confined to the Sex Pistols and their early entourage - apparently encouraged by McLaren in a spirit of epater les bourgeois.

So where does JD fit into that schema?

Lou Reed said that iron cross haircut was supposed to be a flower lol

Joey Ramone being Jewish would seem to be a knock on his Nazi cred

THirdly, and I hate it to seem as if I'm defending these idiots but Siouxsie and Billy Idol were not big name punk artists when they were traipsing about wearing swastikas - they weren't even in bands.

― Never Turn Your Back On Virginia Woolf (Tom D.), Friday, January 4, 2019 1:43 PM (fifteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

also I understand what Tom is saying, there was a point when "punk" was what? 200-300 ppl in London?

(xp) McLaren was Jewish and he was, apparently, handing out swastikas to all and sundry.

So where does JD fit into that schema?

I think partly a clumsy provincial stab at what various arty-farty London poseurs and provocateurs were up to, partly a more morbid interest in a dark subject and, possibly, an interest in the ideology... from Curtis.

I can't really see Hooky reading Mein Kampf tbh.

he'd do lines on it though

Didn’t the Skids also get into some bother for using nazi imagery for the Days In Europa sleeve? Also they had a record called Strength Through Joy and their logo in the early days echoed the SS insignia

“The Aryan thing?” says Jobson. “I thought that sleeve looked great – but I was probably, I dunno, 18 then. But is it in the songs? I don’t think it is. I mean, there’s a song called The Olympian and there’s a sense of Europe… To be fair, I think what had happened is that we’d gone to Europe. We’d gone to Amsterdam and it was such a modern place. Britain during the 70s was still kinda like, post-war, even London – you almost felt like you were still on rations. But Amsterdam felt modern. You had all these Bauhaus buildings and everything – and then you’d go to Germany and it had all been rebuilt and was sparkling and exciting. It made a big impression on me that there was this other place out there that was full of excitement and possibility and much more about the future than the past.”

interestingly, there's a bit about pre-Bromley Contingent UK punks and Nazi fetishism in this Clash bio I just started reading (Marcus Grey's "The Last Gang in Town", which is ok but hardly great, frankly). I had never heard of this London SS nonsense, but Grey frames the Nazi-dabbling as being tied to Bowie/Stones positioning Nazi imagery as both decadent and transgressive, specifically cites Guy Peellaert and Cabaret. Also notes that it was engaged in by Mick Jones and Bernie Rhodes, despite their Jewish heritages.

Sad to read how afraid he was of being mocked by audiences for his epilepsy on the upcoming american tour. Hadn't heard that before. I like to think he could have had a long and healthy life but I don't know how much the best treatment and attention could have done.