Brains on the asphalt: Three punk expressions of crisis

Abstract

Since its crisis-marked beginnings, punk’s relationship with anarchism could be described as ‘complicated’. In spite of the wide use of the word and the circled ‘A’ symbol, not every artist considered anarchy in its political meaning of radical egalitarianism and libertarian socialism. This article explores the ‘impulse of anarchy’ in punk, as considered by Edoardo Sanguineti, as a more-than-political aesthetic phenomenon present in all avant-garde poetry (and arts in general) in modern history, consciously or not, whose ultimate goal is to change life and modify the world. Through this perspective, the article presents a comparative analysis of three expressions of crisis by three different punk groups from three different European countries, in three different languages: ‘Možgani na asfaltu’ (‘Brains on the Asphalt’) in Slovene by Berlinski zid from (then) Yugoslavia, ‘Lasciateci sentire ora’ (‘Let Us Hear Now’) in Italian by Franti from Italy and ‘Crisis’ in English by Poison Girls from the United Kingdom. The article will thus try to contribute to the understanding of anarchist and anarchic influences in coping with crisis under international capitalism and bourgeois hegemony.