Well, here's a bit of a weird one. In the summer of 99, I hopped on a plane to London. However, when I got there, I did NOT die, nor did book myself in at the YWCA. What I did do was spend about roughly a month in complete alcoholic abandon. I had just turned 21, was very punk, and in retrospect, about as smart as a little debbie snack. I was very much enamored with the image and idea of being a squatter. I loved bands like Filth and Destroy (actually, I still do)and I wanted nothing more than to "live the chaos" so to speak. I crossed the atlantic with a well rounded upstate delegation. Jim from Utica, Nick from Potsdam and John from Rochester. I had a girlfriend and set plans to relocate to Boston (I had travelled cross country the year before and chosen Boston as my new home)upon my return. I only stayed for a month. The others stayed much, much longer.
The first week that we were there was the most hectic and fucked up. Nick and Jim went a week before John and I, and had already broken into a building and turned it into a squat by the time we got there. It was a pretty weird scene, and something that I wasn't completely prepared for. The street was located in a neighborhood in South London called "Elephant & Castle", that was pretty dreary and run down. The entire street was blockhouses that were all squatted by people from all over Europe. Nobody was remotely punk. The guy who lived across the street was pretty bad news. He went by the name of "Boxer" and was a total wind-up artist. We'd go over to his squat and smoke hash and listen to his stories of torturing people who owed him money, and kicking the shit out of people who had crossed him. It freaked me out, but in retrospect I realize that he was probably just trying to intimidate us. Most people that pull shit like that don't go around bragging about it. He had a couple of friends who were pretty much straight out of "Snatch", big time east end villain vibe. Boxer kept telling us how much money we could get for our passports, and he had a little lackey, this little Oliver twist looking motherfucker that would follow us all over London. After a very brief period of time, shit was starting to get weird. The only other punk we knew was a a real cartoon, Sid Vicious glue head kid from Manchester known as "Skank". Skank was a total pain in the ass, and pretty much every terrible stereotype about that kind of punk rocker you can imagine. Fucking annoying. Around the time the Hashish haze of paranoia from across the street was really starting to bug us out, Skank got mad at us for smoking a bunch of his hash and attacked Jim, who smacked him. Skank ran downstairs and threw a rock through our window, so we threw his small pile of clothes and other belongings out of the window into the street. Boxer came out, poured lighter fluid on them and set them on fire. We took this as an omen, and got the fuck out of dodge that night. We spent the night in an already squatted apartment that had recently been evicted and shuttered. We decided we were fucked, as this new squat had signs warning of guard dogs and security posted everywhere outside. As luck would have it, we went to Camden town (an area of london packed with street vendors) to get a free Krishna meal and met an older punk couple who took us in for a few days. Mark and Rose were great. Rose was American (from Minneapolis, if memory serves) and Mark was extremely British, but had lived on the lower east side from about 88 to 92. He had a lot of awesome stories about hanging out with Yuppicide, C Squat, Nausea, SFA, Citizens Arrest, Thompkins square park, that whole scene. I was pumped to meet someone who had been in the thick of that particular time and place, being completely nutso for all the aforementioned bands. At some point he mentioned that he was singing for a band called Peer Pressure.
Okay. Now what's weird is, I don't have any recollection of getting this tape from him. I'm about 100% certain that I didn't. Despite the fact that I was drunk and/or high the entire time that I was there (8% hard cider in two liter soda bottles. Legal street drinking. Speed made from floor cleaner. England was trying to kill me.) my mind was pretty much a steel trap in regards to any music I acquired over there at the time, which wasn't much. My remaining 3 brain cells were very focused on lording over my two Restarts 7"s, a Forward, "While you Alive" cd and my polish Oi Polloi tape.
Sadly. I think the way I got the Peer Pressure demo was from a friend who is no longer with us. My friend Andy from Cape Cod who passed away about four years ago mentioned hanging out with Peer Pressures bassist, this french punk, who was in Boston right before I went to London. Andy therefore is the only way I could have obtained this artifact. Sadly, along with a few patches he screened, and this picture, this demo is all I have to remember the guy by.
Andy. RIP.
Even weirder is the fact that I hadn't listened to this tape until I ripped it. I'm not sure why, I've had it kicking around forever (I remember first noticing it with my tapes when I moved back to Syracuse in 2003 or so) but when scratching at my skull for ideas of interesting stuff to post related to my life, this thing popped up, and it's pretty damn good.
Overall this is above average cider, pogo punk kind of stuff with the distortion and messiness of early Chaos Uk or Disorder, combined with the ecstacy hating and anthemic qualities of later Chaos Uk or Disorder. Hehe. The first song is pretty out of tune. It doesn't matter. Just imagine if the Inmates were actually British. There's also a song in Spanish, which switches things up nicely. Last I knew, Mark was in a Band called Suburban Rebels with a bunch of punks from Spain. I saw them play at another Punx picnic in Leeds two years later. Man, those Spanish chaos punks hate them some Americans.
One last thing, when I flipped this tape over, I noticed this sticker on the back:
