Crass Collective Community Crashpad Cash Crisis! (1 Viewer)

pete

chronic procrastinator
Staff member
Since 1999
Joined
Nov 14, 1999
Messages
62,901
Solutions
3
Location
iPanopticon
Website
thumped.com
This comes to us courtesy of Southern Records, so it's probably safe to say that it's all above board & not a scam...

----------------------------------------------------

You may be among the many people who know of DIAL HOUSE, if only because it was home to the infamous anarchist punk band, CRASS. Although over the years some members of the band have moved on, three remain at DIAL HOUSE, maintaining their anarchist lifestyle and sharing it with what over time has grown to be a massive extended family.

When we first rented DIAL HOUSE thirty years ago it was a derelict, rat infested dump with a rubbish heap for a garden. Nonetheless, we could see in it the possibility of making real our dream of setting up a communal creative and theraputic centre. Having completely renovated the house to include studio, print-rooms, a rehersal space and workshops, we created an organic garden that enabled us to be largely self-sufficient. The more we expanded, the more we were able to share.

From the outset, in 1967, the lifestyle at DIAL HOUSE has sought to offer residents, guests, visitors and the broader community a workable alternative to the all-pervading consumer ethic. For over thirty years, the DIAL HOUSE community has shared its vision of possibility and hope against a culture in which personal greed has become an accepted norm.

CRASS was perhaps our most renowned enterprise, seconded by the creation of the first STONEHENGE FESTIVALS. These were public expressions of the more personal ideas which had always been shared by the community. For the last 12 years DIAL HOUSE has been under siege from various uncaring landlords who, believing that they have the right to profit from the love and care we have invested into the house, have sought to evict us from our home. The most powerful of those landlords was British Telecom who after a five day Public Enquiry we were able to beat off. It was our first major victory in a war that wasn't over. British Telecom sold the property on to Peer Group, a London based development company. Having twice failed in Court action against us, Peer Group have now decided to put DIAL HOUSE up for auction on the 23rd January 2001. Not once in their six years as Landlords have they attempted to open up a dialogue with us over a sensible price on the house. The auction is Peer Group's last ditch stand.

If you know anything about CRASS, you will know that despite selling thousands of records, profit was never on the agenda. As long as there was food in the garden a roof over our heads and friends to share time with, we were happy enough. Not surprisingly enough, we are now broke as we were thirty years ago and consequently haven't got the necessary funds to
make a bid for DIAL HOUSE.

Obviously we would love to be able to buy DIAL HOUSE so that we can ensure a future for what it has come to represent. It would be unrealistic to imagine that any future Landlord would be any more sympathetic than Peer Group. Our way of life, after all, is the very antithesis of capitalist greed.

For too long we have had to suffer at the hands of Landlords whose only interest in DIAL HOUSE was its material value. For too long we have had to put aside our desire for radical change simply to be dragged through the Courts or to conform to the limiting legal restrictions of our Tenancy Agreement. We want to grow personally and to expand our operations, but
know that unless we own DIAL HOUSE it will not be wholly possible.

Our current dream is that DIAL HOUSE should continue as it always has been, as a 'safe house': a space where there is a welcome, where there is a bed for the night, conversation, food and the possibility of sharing ideas. On this foundation we want to expand on DIAL HOUSE's traditions of radical creativity, offering its facilities to an ever wider public.

We would like to arrange workshops covering a range of alternative activities from healthcare courses to literary weekends; to offer studio and rehersal space to visiting artists and musicians; to organise formal discussions and debates to contribute towards the ever growing
international radical dialoguel to arrange gigs, film and art shows, readings and debates in the local village hall; to widen our own field of visions and at the same time to involve the local community, most especially the young.

Any capital raised through these activites could be re-cycled back into DIAL HOUSE for further projects. We would like to open a website to broaden the network, open the house and garden to new activities and new thoughts, open our hearts to a new vibrant future. Parallel to this dream, a Trust would be set up of around half a dozen interested individuals, made up of residents and non-residents, who would meet regularly at DIAL HOUSE to guide and administer the overall policies and agendas of its running. In addition to this, the permanent residents could pursue their personal work - painting, writing, music-making, gardening etc...

So, that is the dream, but the reality remains - we're broke.

To ensure a chance of a successful bid, we need to raise something in the region of 80,000 GBP : a huge sum of money for us. Because we are desperate, we are taking a course of action that we would not normally contemplate - in short, this is an appeal to anyone who might have lived at, visited, supported or had any interest in DIAL HOUSE and what it represents to somehow contribute towards buying it.

CAN YOU HELP?

Contact details :

Dial House
Ongar Park Hall
North Weald
Epping
Essex CM16 6AE
tel/fax +44 (0) 199 252 3854

email : [email protected]

Cheques can be made out to Penny Rimbaud.

Thank you.
 
sounds like a good cause but what about other squats and safehouses that get closed down all the time and didn't have crass living there ??
 
Penny Rimbaud has to be a made up name. |Has to. as for punk actually meaning anything...ha ha ha ha ha. ask a punk to dig into his pocket?? not fucking likley

anyway, i reckon it's government scam. i mean DIAL house sounds like the DAIL. am i rite? huh?
 
Shut up you ignorant ScumFuck you wouldnt recognise a good cause if it kicked you up the arse
 
Why not help out by buying a copy or two of Penny's recent autobiography, "Shibboleth:My Revolting Life"?

You can mail order it from Southern at the URL below:
http://www.southern.com/southern/shop/list-rlse.cgi?band=PENNY
 
yawn.

what indeed makes this a good cause... what who cares if a load of soap dodgers you've never met get to live in their own filth for a little bit longer?

and buying a house? way to capitalist, MAN.

gawd, you're all so egotistically self righteous. why do you give a fuck?
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Activity
So far there's no one here
Old Thread: Hello . There have been no replies in this thread for 365 days.
Content in this thread may no longer be relevant.
Perhaps it would be better to start a new thread instead.

21 Day Calendar

Mohammad Syfkhan 'I Am Kurdish' Dublin Album Launch
Bello Bar
1 Portobello Harbour, Saint Kevin's, Dublin, Ireland
Mohammad Syfkhan 'I Am Kurdish' Dublin Album Launch
Bello Bar
1 Portobello Harbour, Saint Kevin's, Dublin, Ireland
Bloody Head, Hubert Selby Jr Infants, Creepy Future - Dublin
Anseo
18 Camden Street Lower, Saint Kevin's, Dublin, Ireland

Support thumped.com

Support thumped.com and upgrade your account

Upgrade your account now to disable all ads... If we had any... Which we don't right now.

Upgrade now

Latest threads

Latest Activity

Loading…
Back
Top