After the barbarian tide of punk rock hit the grey walls of reality and rolled back, leaving behind a battlefield covered in tabloid headlines and furious music, there came post-punk. Grim-faced kids stared at the evil spires raising in the toxic mist, and realising that the demolition of existing structures was nigh impossible they decided to create another reality instead, out in the wilderness. They camped in swamps and hills and forests, and using whatever technologies they could find, pre-capitalistic models of exchange based on barter and gift, developed a DIY scene root of all the good indie music created since then. Inspired by the reckless spirit of punk, different tribes mingled promiscuously, the outcome of these efforts would be a thousand weird and beautiful flowers, no wave, disco punk, hardcore, industrial music.

Listening to 60 Minutes of Fear, a mix put together by true DIY renaissance man JD Twitch, and available in a ridiculously awesome package from 20JFG fave NYC purveyors of modern underground culture RVNG International, has made me think of all these things. Of the fury and the funk, of the hope and the loathing, of how indie music can, nay, should be fiercely political, true to its origins in the wild spaces outside of the fortresses of self-interest and commerce. 60 Minutes of Fear is a document that contains not just a treasure trove of beautiful, crazy, falling to pieces yet ever so strong music, but also a stark, lucid and often humorous portrayal of the times when it was created, times of fear indeed, but not so different from those we live in right now. I miss this in the indie music of these days, I would struggle to find, even amongst those bands I love the most, any sort of message which, say 30 years into the future, would help the kids understand the social and political conditions in which it was created.

We should aspire to more than psychedelic abstraction, esoteric introspection and oblique commentary, after all, when you make music you are making history.

Fatal Microbes’ Violence Grows came out almost 30 years ago, it worries me that it is more relevant to the times we live in now than any contemporary song I can think of.

Fatal Microbes- Violence Grows

The 60 Minutes of Fear mix is accompanied by a beautifully presented 10” with four edits by Twitch. They are, as you would expect, truly magnificent, we leave you with his reconfiguration of Zounds’ War, a totally pumped tribal stomper of rumbling bass, serrated guitars riffs and dialectical wailing that builds up in a brutal progression that should set any dancefloor worth its salt into righteous, revolutionary fire.

Zounds-War (JD Twitch Extended Edit)

So you know what kids, go to RVNG and order a copy of 60 Minutes of Fear. Put your money where your mouth is, the world needs more statements like this.