This Is a Message to Persons Unknown: The Story of Poison Girls

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Flesh and blood are what we are, flesh and blood is who we are, our cover is blown.

This Is a Message to Persons Unknown is the first book to explore the history of the legendary band Poison Girls, from their first gigs in Brighton, through their years of touring DIY venues across Britain and Europe, documenting their peerless collection of vinyl releases, the dissident campaigns the band supported, and the uncompromising political statements Poison Girls voiced on record, in print, and through their singular visual aesthetic. A band every bit as formative to anarcho-punk as Crass were, Poison Girls offered a passionate, heartfelt rebuttal to punk rock’s Year Zero protestations. While their musical roots predated punk, their songs blended punk’s ferocity, with a sense of wit, creative ingenuity, and emotional tenderness. Formed in 1977, with a line-up that spanned the generations, Poison Girls were fronted by the redoubtable Vi Subversa, a lyricist, songwriter, and singular vocalist. Armed with a message of anarchist self-reliance, Poison Girls confronted the misogyny and ageism of countercultures and opposition movements just as fiercely as that of the capitalist war state. Through the dark decade of Thatcherism, Poison Girls’ path of most resistance took the band in a very different direction to that pursued by Crass, with some unexpected and revealing results.

Combining original interviews with surviving band members with a participants’ history drawn from the pages of contemporary zines and papers, this comprehensive history of Poison Girls is richly illustrated with photos, posters, record sleeves, and ephemera drawn from the personal archives of band members, including numerous evocative images of the band at work and at play. This Is a Message to Persons Unknown presents the full story of an unparalleled group of radical musicians and artists who saw in punk the opportunity not just to rage against the machine but to create something new and extraordinary.

Praise

"Why the fuck did I have a Crass shirt in high school but didn't hear about their peers, Poison Girls, until recently? When we do the meaningful work of digging back through the past and shining a light on women artists, we are making right past wrongs. Legendary all-male bands are only legendary because we gave them proper attention (sometimes exaggerated and undeserved) at the time, allowing their status to grow and their contributions to be oversold. But when women-centric bands are ignored or dismissed while active, their contributions not valued, it says less about their abilities in comparison to their peers and more about the insidiousness of sexism. Who else is missing from the history books? This Is a Message to Persons Unknown ensures Poison Girls will not be forgotten."
—Shawna Potter, front-person for War On Women and author of Making Spaces Safer: A Guide to Giving Harassment the Boot Wherever You Work, Play, and Gather

"This Is a Message to Persons Unknown,an instant anarcho-punk classic, delivers the full history of Poison Girls, a band that exploded punk’s boundaries, making shrapnel of the movement's sexism and ageism. Combining engaging prose, carefully curated photos and flyers, and interviews with band members alongside rare ephemera, this essential book illuminates Vi Subversa as the original punk parent and captures her band’s legacy as one that didn’t just play music; theyliveda challenge to oppressive systems, inviting others to do the same."
—Jessica Mills, author of My Mother Wears Combat Boots

"I've been waiting for this book for a very long time, both as a fan and as an academic, and Richard Cross delivers magnificently. This Is a Message to Persons Unknown gives us a vivid (and gorgeously illustrated) account of how Poison Girls arrived where they did, both musically and politically—and it had me listening to Chappaquiddick Bridge, Where's the Pleasure, and Songs of Praise with new and much deeper appreciation. This is the serious and detailed attention that Poison Girls' expectation-defying story has always deserved."
—Hugh Hodges, author of The Fascist Groove Thing: A History of Thatcher's Britain in 21 Mixtapes

"This Is a Message to Persons Unknown is a thoroughly researched, informative, and engrossing history of the band who were comparatively overshadowed by their friends and fellow punk revolutionaries, Crass. This long overdue book sets Poison Girls in their place as one of the most creative, diverse, and original of the anarcho-punk bands. Their music was less ferocious, their lyrics more personal, their attitudes and appearance less adaptable to pigeon-holes than many of their contemporaries, and for that they stood out as a unique and essential part of the DIY movement."
—Dick Lucas, vocalist of Subhumans

"Typically, in America, Poison Girls' music flew under-the-radar, though they existed as a poignant, disruptive, and impactful portion of the UK protest-punk scene. This compelling, well-designed book is a welcome undertaking, saturated with details and context, from avant-gardism to anarchism, as well as news clippings, buttons, DIY flyers, stencils, and amateur photographs, that help shed light, both textual and visual, on their particular and effective brand of insurrection. Just as the band challenged gender, age, and music codes, This Is a Message to Persons Unknown stimulates readers to think beyond bland punk "history" fare that often masks complexities and nuances. This narrative unveils their power and influence, but does so in a gripping prose that makes no one wonder why their first single on Crass Records sold 20,000 … in one week. Our reorientation is now complete.
—David Ensminger, author of Left of the Dial and Visual Vitriol

"The true poison in the machine, it's great to finally have their inspirational tale told."
—John Robb, author of Punk Rock: An Oral History

About the Contributors

Rich Cross is a researcher and writer on British and European protest movements and counter cultural resistance, particularly from the anarchist and libertarian traditions, Cross has published and presented extensively about the UK’s original anarcho-punk scene. He has edited the The Hippies Now Wear Black website for well over a decade, documenting both the history and the continuing creative dissidence of that scene's most resilient troublemakers.

Alec Dunn is a designer, printer, and nurse. He coedits Signal: A Journal of International Political Graphics & Culture and coauthored It Did Happen Here: An Antifascist People’s History. He is a member of the Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative.

Erin Yanke is a self-taught documentarian with thirty-five years of projects. She regularly publishes zines and occasionally produces podcasts and films. She was a coauthor of It Did Happen Here: An Antifascist People’s History.

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