Arrogance demo 1987

Back with another 75p demo tape from an old anarchopunk band called Arrogance. Now that's a good name for a band and I'm surprised it hasn't been picked again since. I don't know much about that English lot though... They were from a small town near Gloucester and judging from the ad for Apostles Lp's in the tape, it is safe to assume the bands were somewhat related. In fact, Arrogance reminds me quite a bit of Statement, an excellent band who shared an Ep and an Lp with the Apostles (edit: and indeed, it is mentioned in Armed With Anger that the bloke behind Statement also played in Arrogance. I am a genius, I know).

The lyrics are unofrtunately not included with the tape but from what I can gather Arrogance sang about your average anarcho issue: religion manipulating people (you got to love the "Bloodshed from bullshit" slogan), nuclear weapons, the rich ("Another fat rich man"), the system being unfair, animal rights and so on. The sound quality is not exactly the clearest but you can still hear every instrument and it's not a chaotic mess (well, it's still punk-rock). As aforementioned, Statement is a relevant comparison (a couple of guitar leads do point to them), there's definitely some Conflict as well and the singer's voice is sounds angry and threatening while keeping the necessary level of snottiness (not unlike Anti-System's vocals on "No laughing matter"). The distorted guitar is not really loud or heavy as the songs are driven by the bass. Overall, it is quite fast apart from a couple of Exit-Stance-ish mid-tempo numbers.

As you will be able to see, the artwork is made up of rather cheesy drawings but I suppose that's what makes them so good. The intro of the tape, a spoken-word piece, has actually been reprinted in the booklet and is a call for unity among anarchopunks. I am not sure who they were refering to, but apparently there were pretty big quarrells between punk factions, one of whom had even printed stickers criticizing the other one (now that does sound like a Conflict story, doesn't it?). Arrogance asked for the bickering to stop and for more meaningful and productive actions, which is all very honorable but slightly useless when one keeps in mind punks' love for rumours.

On the whole if you are looking for mean and angry, even dark at times, English anarchopunk, Arrogance might very well be your catch of the week. And to quote them "END THIS FARCE, BECOME A FORCE". Priceless.

End this farce, become a force!