At the moment I’m submerged in writing a book entitled: A Darker Electricity. It’s about my time spent on the road, in the early 1990s, with the outlawed Spiral Tribe Sound System: a collective of people who staged large, free and unlicensed, dance parties across Britain and Europe. That is until the British government accused myself and others of being the ringleaders of a new rebellion – a rebellion so dangerous in its appeal and popularity that it required a new law to criminalise it.
Never before in British history has a musical style or youth culture been singled out and outlawed in an act of parliament.
Did the money-makers conspire with legislators? Spike booze-free youth with alcopops? Ring-fence the open fields with razor-wired regulation? Lock up the open-door policy of the free festival and free party movements? Criminalise a culture – because it was noisy – or because it was free?
You can read a few excerpts from the book on the following pages. I always appreciate your comments and why not subscribe? I’m still writing, so if you were there and would like to contribute you can email me direct: straydotwaywardatgmaildotcom (substitute . and @ where necessary).
‘Mark Angelo writes with flair… his story of the founding of Spiral Tribe, its evolution and its subsequent confrontations with the Thatcherite state, presents us with a vivid slice of 20th century social history… I really look forward to this book, and whatever else he might go on to produce.’
Barbara Trapido
‘Mark Angelo is a beautiful writer and his account, told close up and from the inside, plunges the reader into the fervour of those tumultuous times.’
Caroline Brothers
‘Mark Angelo Harrison has a fascinating and necessary story to tell – an account of 90′s rave culture as it butts heads with Thatcher’s State. This is writing with a big heart, a sharp vision, a driving energy, intoxicating detail, deft craft and an insider’s authority.’
Christopher P. Wilson
