Communist Party nights out in London, 1930s

From the pages of the Daily Worker, newspaper of the Communist Party of Great Britain, some dances and other social events in the 1930s.

Daily Worker Carnival Dance at Hoxton Baths with 'Real Red Band', December 1931:

Also from 1931, 'Great Boxing Night Revels' at New Greenwich Baths with 'South East London's Finest Dance Floor' and 'the Varsity Revels Band'. Plus Hackney National Unemployed Workers Movement social and dance at Holcroft Road school; Woodcraft Dance at Savoy Ballrooms in Dalston (presumably liked to radical scouting alternative the Woodcraft Folk) [source Daily Worker, 12 December 1931)

From 1934 - Young Communist League Flannel Dance at Bermondsey Library, Spa Road; Relief Committee for the Victims of German Fascism dance at Conway Hall; League Against Imperialism and Negro Welfare Association Social and Dance at the Pindar of Wakefield in Grays Inn Road. Plus some Eisenstein film nights. Also an advert for Nanking Chinese Restaurant at 4 Denmark Street, off Charing Cross Road 'the place for internationalists'

See also: Anarchist Dances in London, 1890s-1910s

 

London Life 1966: Discotheques, Psychedelic Samantha's and Francoise Hardy at the Savoy

London Life cover, 31 December 1966

London Life was a mid-1960s what's on magazine that for a little while replaced the Tatler to reflect a shift away from conservative posho style guide towards a more socially democratic swingin' London - tellingly by the end of the 1960s it had reverted to its former name and to being a conservative posho etc.

'Discotheques' were included in the listings, still quite a new phenomenon in UK so with the helpful explanation that these were 'Informal nightclubs and restaurants with dancing, usually to gramophone records. Some discothèques feature musicians from time to time'. Most of these don't sound too appetising, a lot of gambling and no doubt overpriced drinks (overpriced for the time - a goldfinger cocktail at the Hilton for 35p sounds very reasonable now!). Still wouldn't mind a time machine to check out the Flamingo or to see Francoise Hardy at the Savoy in January 1966.

London Life, 29 January 1966

And what of Samantha's in New Burlington Street, described in 1966 as 'London's first psychedelic club' promising to 'create atmosphere with machines' for people who 'want to be taken out of their minds as if they had taken LSD'. All with a talking dummy called Samantha and a dancefloor with 'powerful strobe lighting, which throws malevolent screens of speckled rays over the dancers' while 'a projector in the ceiling imprints vivid coloured slides over the contorted bodies of the music seekers'. 

London Life, 12 November 1966

Anarchist dances in London 1890s-1910s

Some anarchist social events in London area from 1890s - 1910s

1891 -  Concert and Ball at the Commonweal Club, 273 Hackney Road, E2

1898 - Soiree and dance at the Athenaeum Hall, 73 Tottenham Court Road organised by the Freedom Group

 

1899 same venue, American Anarchist Emma Goldman along with the Slavonic Tambouritza Quartet

1908 - concert and social at the the Socialist Hall, Wimbledon on behalf of veteran anarchist Frank Kitz

1909 - Concert and Ball at the Workers Friend Club and  Institute, 165 Jubilee Street E1 -  Arbeter Fraint ("Worker's Friend") was a Yiddish language anarchist paper associated with Rudolf Rocker.

1913 - Anarchist Education League social and dance at Central Labour College, Penywern Road SW5 (Earls Court) with palmistry and games as well as dancing

 (these flyers and many other treasures to be found in the Max Nettlau papers at the Institute for Social History online archive)

 

Well Hung Queer Art Exhibition at Atlantis Bookshop

'The Well Hung art exhibition' is a celebration of queer occult-themed art downstairs at Atlantis bookshop by the British Museum in London.

Untiled work by Ben Youdan

(spot Austin Spare original plus a portrait of Gerald Gardner by David Johnson)

Exhibition closes 5 July 2025

 

Free Maja - antifascist prisoner on hunger strike

An antifascist prisoner in pre-trial detention in Hungary has begun a hunger strike. Maja T. was extradited from Germany in June 2024 accused of taking part in an alleged attack on neo-Nazis at the far-right ‘Day of Honour’ commemoration in Budapest in 2023.  They have been held in solitary confinement ever since - seemingly due to them identifying as non-binary. 

Budapest Antifascist Solidarity Committee has published Maja's statement:

'My name is Maja. Almost a year ago, I was unlawfully extradited to Hungary. Since then I have been held here in inhumane prolonged solitary confinement. Yesterday, on 4 June 2025, a decision was to be made on my application to be transferred to house arrest. This decision was postponed. The last applications for transfer to house arrest were rejected. I am no longer prepared to endure this intolerable situation and wait for decisions from a justice system that has systematically violated my rights over the last few months. I am therefore starting a hunger strike today, 5 June 2025. I demand that I be transferred back to Germany, that I can return to my family and that I can take part in the trial in Hungary from home.

I can no longer endure the prison conditions in Hungary. My cell was under video surveillance 24/7 for over three months. I had to wear handcuffs outside my cell at all times for over seven months, sometimes even in my cell, whether I was shopping, making Skype calls or during visits.

The prison guards inspect my cell every hour, even at night, and they always switch on the lights. I have to endure intimate body searches, during which I have to undress completely. Visits took place in separate rooms, where I was separated from my family, lawyers and official representatives by a glass partition. During cell checks, the prison guards left a complete mess behind. The structural conditions prevent me from seeing enough daylight. The tiny courtyard is made of concrete and is spanned by a grid. The temperature of the shower water cannot be regulated. My cell is permanently infested with bedbugs and cockroaches. There is no adequate supply of balanced and fresh food.

I am also in prolonged solitary confinement. I had no contact with any other prisoners for almost six months. To this day, I see or hear other people for less than an hour a day. This permanent deprivation of human contact is deliberately intended to cause psychological and physical harm. That is why the European Prison Rules of the Council of Europe provide for ‘at least two hours of meaningful human contact per day’. That is why ‘prolonged solitary confinement’, the confinement of a prisoner for at least 22 hours a day for more than 15 days, is considered inhumane treatment or torture according to the United Nations‘ Nelson Mandela Rules. Here in Hungary I am buried alive in a prison cell and this pre-trial detention can last up to three years in Hungary.

I should never have been extradited to Hungary for these reasons. The Berlin Court of Appeal and the LINX special commission of the State Criminal Police of Saxony planned and carried out the extradition, deliberately bypassing my lawyers and the Federal Constitutional Court. On 28 June 2024, a few hours after my extradition, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that I could not be extradited for the time being. On 6 February 2025, it ruled that my extradition was unlawful. Since then, none of those responsible have been held accountable. There has been no justice for me so far.

With my hunger strike, I also want to draw attention to the fact that no more people should be extradited to Hungary. Zaid from Nuremberg, who is acutely threatened with extradition to Hungary, is currently in particular need of this attention. I declare my solidarity with all anti-fascists who are being persecuted in the Budapest case'.

'Anitfascism is self-defence'

A 'Soli Rave' for Maja in Berlin, November 2024

Colin Jerwood and Conflict

Colin Jerwood, 1962-2025

Sorry to hear about death of Colin Jerwood, lead singer with Conflict. I saw them at various places in the 1980s including Thames Poly, the Ambulance station (Old Kent Road) and Bowes Lyon House in Stevenage. A band of contradictions sometimes to be sure (what was that about using the SAS 'Who dares wins' logo never mind some later stupid remarks) but in those 1980s days nobody else could express our rage against the machine quite like them and they played countless benefits. As Crass slowed down there was a period in which they were the leading band in the anarcho-punk scene as it headed from pacifism to class war,  giving lots of bands their first releases on their Mortarhate label including several great compilations.

Conflict - To a Nation of Animal Lovers (I used to have poster from this on my wall)

I think it's fair to say that Colin wasn't all talk either, I believe he was active in the Animal Liberation Front at one time and not averse to getting stuck in to fascists. In Ian Glasper's anarcho punk book there's an account of what happened at the seminal 1982 gig at the Zig Zag squat in Westbourne Park, where Crass, The Mob and other bands played. According to Andy Martin from The Apostles, who also played that day, a group of right wing skinheads turned up with the result that; "this Asian lad – he was probably the only audience member not of white Caucasian origin – was being brutally kicked and punched by all these fascist thugs… that’s right five onto one. And what were the other members of the 500-strong audience doing while this was happening? They had formed a wide circle around the scene and watched in play out… that’s right, these anarchist pacifist rat-bags stood and watched five fascists beat up a 15-year-old Asian boy… In case you’re wondering what happened next, yes, we did surge forward to come to the lad’s aid, but before we could involve ourselves, both Penny and Andy (yes, from Crass) had jumped between us and grabbed the two biggest skinheads, and shoved them to one side of the hall. Colin Jerwood of Conflict confronted the others with less reasonable force, and threatened to put them all in hospital. Those three fascists virtually wet their knickers at the prospect' (The Day the Country Died: a history of anarcho-punk 1980-1984).

This flyer is from what may have been last time I saw them, at Clarendon Ballroom in Hammersmith playing for anti-apartheid in 1986, others mentioned on the flyer include Icons of Filth, Exit Stance and Liberty

see also: Colin Jerwood, SE London punk legend

For Peace! exhibition at Four Corners

'For Peace!' is an interesting exhibition at Four Corners gallery in Bethnal Green, based around material from the archive at MayDay Rooms. The focus is very much on the more radical end of peace and anti-militarist movements - not simply calling for an absence of conflict but challenging the existence of the military and the state's weapons of mass destruction which tick along beneath the radar of mainstream political discourse. Was anybody ever asked for instance whether we wanted a continuing massive US military base at Lakenheath in Suffolk? 

From this perspective the efforts of the Greenham Common and Faslane peace camps set up in the 1980s are seen as central, installing themselves at what is perhaps the real heart of the state - less  Whitehall than the fenced off compounds behind which it accumulates its missiles.

Abolish War! - Greenham common women's peace camp

The Faslane peace camp was set up in 1982 at the Royal Naval base in Scotland that is home to Britain's nuclear weapons-armed submarines

There is archive material from the direct action end of the 1950s/60s movement against the bomb (Committee of 100 and Spies for Peace) and from some less well known 1980s/90s activists such as those who opposed the 'nuclear colonialism' of testing sites and weapons bases.

'The peasants are revolting Ma'am' - a group of women protestors described in the Sun as a '15-strong feminist brigade' climbed over the wall into Buckingham Palace grounds in 1993 in solidarity with the Western Shoshone people whose land in the Nevada Desert was used as a testing ground for American and British nuclear weapons.

'Women working for a nuclear-free and independent Pacific' - a 1980s benefit at the Old White Horse in Brixton (later Brixton Jamm). The Rongelap survivors were those still living with the radioactive aftermath of the 1950s H Bomb tests in the Pacific.

There is also an emphasis     on solidarity movements such as the Troops Out Movement who campaigned for British withdrawal from Ireland from the 1970s to the 1990s

1980s Southwark Troops Out Movement meeting -  SNOW venue refers to 'Squatters Network of Walworth'

Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament against Trident missiles and a flyer for the 1983 'Festival for the Future' in Bristol

For Peace! at Four Corners from 9 to 24 May 2025 

Trans Liberation demo in London

A huge and inspiring Trans Liberation demonstration in London yesterday, with more than 20,000 people coming together at short notice following the Supreme Court ruling this week that trans women could not be treated as women in law or, more specifically, that “A person with a Gender Recognition Certificate in the female gender does not come within the definition of a ‘woman’ under the Equality Act 2010'. This opens the way to the exclusion of trans women from 'single sex' spaces such as women's toilets (actually it would also apply the other way round to trans men)

The demonstration started in Parliament Square but soon overspilled it as there wasn't room for the growing crowd.

It finished with speeches in a crowded St James Park (the first time I've been in a demo in this Royal Park). 

Along the way there was a river of creative signs and chants, plus a little mobile sound system pumping out gabber and drum & bass. Anyone who thinks that the Supreme Court represents any kind of final settlement of this issue can forget it. Things are just getting started...  

see previously: In defence of Billy Bragg and trans rights

 

Autonomous Astronauts: Intergalactic conferences and raves in space

On the 30th anniversary of its founding, the Association of Autonomous Astronauts will be remembered at the MayDay Rooms in London:

Saturday 26th April 2025, 2pm at MayDay Rooms:

'It’s been three decades since the Association of Autonomous Astronauts (AAA) launched the first independent space exploration programme on the grounds of Windsor Castle. Between 1995 and 2000, AAA organized raves in space, played three-sided football tournaments, built spaceship launchpads in the heart of the city, took part in intergalactic conferences and experienced zero-gravity training flights—all while mounting a radical critique of government, military, and corporate control of space travel.

May Day Rooms holds a significant collection of materials related to the group's activities, and that's why we wanted to once again look up to the stars to celebrate the AAA’s 30th anniversary. We’ll explore how the Autonomous Astronauts' original concerns resonate in today’s world—one shaped by billionaire space tourism, the increasing militarization of space, profit-driven interplanetary colonization, and a general sense of political imagination running on empty.

On the day, founding AAA members—alongside Autonomous Astronauts from France and Italy—will chart pathways into (and out of) the AAA, putting some of the group's initial ideas to the test of time, while Space Watch UK will brief us on recent developments in the UK military space programme.

Expect an exhibition featuring materials from MDR’s Association of Autonomous Astronauts collection, screenings of AAA’s archival video materials alongside a rare showing of Aaron Trinder's„Free Party: A Folk History” documentary, and, of course, a rave in space till late— with music, food and drinks! Prepare for liftoff!'

On the following day there will be 3 sided football in Victoria Park. Both these events are free but you will need to book a ticket as places are limited (Saturday booking; Sunday booking)

I will taking part in this and have contributed some of my AAA material to the archive at MDR.

The Association of Autonomous Astronauts held a series of intergalactic conferences - in Vienna (1996), Bologna (1998) and London (1999). They each included a mixture of talks, activities such as three-sided football matches, and music/parties. Here are the conference posters:

Vienna 1996

The first AAA Intergalactic Conference took place at Public Netbase in Vienna on 21 and 22 June 1996 (see report here).

The back of the fold out poster/brochure included a number of AAA texts: Space Travel by Any Means Necessary, The Dreamtime is Upon Us, Disconauts are Go, Sex in Space, Who Owns Outer Space? and Spatial Practices and Elliptical Action.

AAA speakers included Jason Skeet (Inner City AAA), Patric O'Brien (aka Fabian T., East London AAA) and John Eden (Raido AAA). The party - 'Black Hole Supersonic Practice' - featured Praxis DJ Squad, including Christoph Fringeli (The Jackal)

Bologna 1998

The Bologna Conferenza Intergalattica took place at the Link project on 18th and 19th April 1998. I wrote a conference report at the time in Everybody is a Star! no. 3.

Detail - 'Rave in Space' line up on the Saturday night

inside the Rave In Space, Link, Bologna, 1998

Detail - contact list of AAA groups from back of poster:

London 1999

'Space 1999: ten days that shook the universe' took place from 18th - 27th June 1999. As well as a conference it included many events across different venues as part of a 'festival of independent and community based space exploration'. Events included taking part in the J18 Carnival Against Capital  and a Summer Solstice gathering on Parliament Hill.  Some Space 1999 texts are available on Internet Archive.

Previous AAA posts:

Everybody is a Star! - Disconaut AAA

Mission accomplished but the beat goes on: the Fantastic Voyage of the Association of Autonomous Astronauts

Summer Solstice 1999: AAA on Parliament Hill

Military out of space - AAA at J18 Carnival Against Capital 1999

AAA at Brixton Reclaim the Streets 1998

Skinheads as Independent Travellers in Space

We were brought up on the space race, now they expect us to clean toilets

AAA texts on Internet Archive