Known for their nomadic lifestyle and disruptive energy, free party movements operate outside the fringes of conventional dance music subcultures. Its counterparts are not a product of club culture, nor is it completely DIY. So, what is this anonymous and mystical movement about? Together with Spiral Tribe co-founder Mark Angelo Harrison, we explore the cultural and artistic impact they had on the movement in the 90s and what aspects remain relevant today.
Spiral Tribe: living outside the system
A legendary name in the free party community, Spiral Tribe spawned in the squats of Westbourne Park, London. Their involvement in the nomadic citadel Castlemorton Common Festival of 1992 led to thirteen arrests, ignited one of the longest court cases in UK history, and had the British government brand them as ‘techno pagans’. What later led to the introduction of the Criminal Justice Bill and Public Order Act of 1994 was a legal attempt to put a stop to the united ecstasy generation by banning the succession of repetitive beats on common land. Yet, Spiral Tribe’s UK exodus pushed them to continue to breach the peace, spreading their anarchist hardcore sound across Europe, first by hosting techno picnics, which cacophonously morphed into teknivals most noted for their monstrous wall of bass bins.
Spiral Tribe, much like their new-age traveller predecessors, envisaged a life outside the system. But, instead of exploiting their disenfranchisement to escape society, they worked tirelessly to reimagine alternative routes to building a community which magnetically repelled neoliberal ideals. It was an attempt to turn imagination into reality and to continue the quest for free space.
Building the myth through symbolism
Spiral Tribe didn’t begin under the guise of a carefully constructed philosophy. ‘The idea that we had some foreknowledge of going into things with a philosophy or with any idea of what we were doing would give the wrong impression. We were just a group of friends who had discovered the amazing equality that the acid house, rave, and early techno scene immediately created.’ These are the words of co-founder Mark Angelo Harrison. Leaving the vivid Hacienda memories behind (which were only a five minute walk from his home in Manchester), he travelled to London with his brother and satisfied his creative mind by finding full-time work at a printer. Whilst experimenting with the technological machinery, Mark’s fascination with a spiralled ammonite fossil unearthed the idea of ‘chaos as self-organising’. The spiral grounded itself as its own entity, rather than being a representation of something else.
Mark’s background in graphic design inspired Spiral Tribe’s iconic visual identity including the unexplainable enigmatic code ‘23’. ‘It was an enigma, a little tangent, that may or may not have any significance to the individual.’ Yet, as the collective expanded their message across the free party scene, 23 became a cult symbol of the free party underground, or as Mark would put it, ‘it was our pirate flag’. Pirate radio stations were a symbol of underground resistance, historically rooted in unlicensed broadcasting for music that wasn’t aired by the BBC and later on commercial radio. This attitude behind pirate radio heavily influenced Spiral Tribe, whose sound system was built for the people.
Building on this principle, Mark continues: ‘The number 23 marked free space, it took off the lid of one’s belief system. Because hey, what is a belief system? Why create a false ceiling of political or religious belief? Belief systems are just controlling constructs. So anything outside that construct could be equally ‘real’.’
‘So we decided, as they were going to paint us as outlaws, that we would embrace that'
Against the status quo
To be part of the spiral meant to be a relentlessly consistent force to keep the party going. ‘It was our awakening as young people growing up into adulthood. We were guided by the vacuums, not only in the empty buildings, but also in society and the gaps in the community.’ An era that has been media-shadowed by the popularity of ecstasy uniting a generation, the underlying context for this exists in sociopolitical fragmentation. 'Everybody meshing together really touched on this part of being human. This is something that our classist system had taught out of us and until that point that system was the only thing we knew.'
Chemical collectivism lifted the veil and ran through the veins of Spiral Tribe’s incorporeal anatomy where a young Mark experienced the personal revelation of what a fraud the construct of neoliberal capitalism is and the colonial history attached to it. ‘Through the realisation of the weaknesses and the illegitimacy of the status quo construct, we experimented with constructing other possibilities and empowering people through imagination.’
The romance attached to the new age traveller communities often relished in celtic myths to add magic and mysticism to their countryside voyages. Whilst Spiral Tribe did cross paths with folklore (a cultural phenomenon embedded in the storytelling roma traveller communities), they mostly kept their mission rooted in acknowledging the disdain for societal depravity. Instead of existing in an escapist vacuum, it was ‘bringing the youth out of the locked down urban areas into the beautiful, deep and mystic green of the British countryside and connecting nature with this already very highly energised enthusiasm for life’.
Going into the countryside was a double-edged sword because you could sense the manipulation and privatisation of the land against the beauty of its natural existence. This terra-technic mindset joined the dots between the foreshadowing of technological progression with the historical landscape. ‘It was coming from a very deep place, almost as if it was coming up out of the ground, out of the old mines that we were partying above.’ The sensitisation to the history and abuse of the land paired with the police chase outside of urban areas, amplified Spiral Tribe’s way of being as they unearthed the myth of democracy. ‘So we decided, as they were going to paint us as outlaws, that we would embrace that’.
Radical creativity
Building a new reality through the power of creativity was enough for Spiral Tribe to be getting on with. They never initially intended to be political. Mark explains that he used to be against direct opposition believing that it only exacerbated two-party politics. ‘We were refusing to go into that arena. We just insisted on creating our own space outside of that control. But it's a bit of a paradox. Taking that space is in itself a political act, and there is no escape from it.’
This unintended action extended into their creative practice, more often than not living by an ‘organic flow’. The collective chose to wear military combats and drive ex-Soviet trucks purely from a practical perspective and what was available to them. It was an aesthetic that began when one of the members found industrial rubberised matte black paint in a skip outside a warehouse they were squatting in London’s King's Cross station which they painted their trucks with. This monochrome winged pentagram style became an inspiring reference point for the free party circuit.
Radical creativity
Building a new reality through the power of creativity was enough for Spiral Tribe to be getting on with. They never initially intended to be political. Mark explains that he used to be against direct opposition believing that it only exacerbated two-party politics. ‘We were refusing to go into that arena. We just insisted on creating our own space outside of that control. But it's a bit of a paradox. Taking that space is in itself a political act, and there is no escape from it.’
This unintended action extended into their creative practice, more often than not living by an ‘organic flow’. The collective chose to wear military combats and drive ex-Soviet trucks purely from a practical perspective and what was available to them. It was an aesthetic that began when one of the members found industrial rubberised matte black paint in a skip outside a warehouse they were squatting in London’s King's Cross station which they painted their trucks with. This monochrome winged pentagram style became an inspiring reference point for the free party circuit.
As the collective underwent radicalisation, the patriarchal reference points they hijacked became representative of Spiral Tribe’s anti-authoritarian mentality. This ranged from their military gear and shaved heads, to the design of their flyers which continued the punk cut-and-paste method that had them stick out amongst the new glossy A3s from other promoters. ‘Regardless of how much belief you place on these symbols, they are archetypal. They do resonate within our society. So to rework them was very powerful, and then the authorities were throwing them back at us. By oppressing us, the authorities were amplifying the legend.’
For Spiral Tribe, it was more important to create their own system or experiment with creating their own. Warehouses were the ideal experimentation ground and acted as liminal spaces to establish a sense of community. ‘We were living in this sort of empty community because the community itself was locked out of its own city, so we were shaped by these vacuums in a big warehouse.’ At that time, Shirley Porter was the gerrymandering conservative MP of the London district Westminster who pushed out marginalised and labour-supporting families using brutal tactics. Members of Spiral Tribe squatted the idle warehouses with an enigmatic veneer to hide from the police and, along with their sound system, invited people in.
Existing in a DIY bubble doesn’t enforce change on its own
The people’s sound system
Welcoming anybody to join their parties, Spiral Tribe became known as the people’s sound system. ‘The Spiral Tribe story has something universal that people can relate to; they're free to play their style and they don't have the financial or the social pressures to fit a particular template of behaviour.’ However, they refused to hold onto the halcyon days of the acid house era or any sort of nostalgic reference points. Their fierce hardcore techno outlook pushed the sound forward. As long as it was futuristic, anyone could play. This didn’t come from a place of ego, but rather from a place of dedication to the underground. Pirate radio stations, Spiral Tribe, and a few other underground parties were the only communities at the time where you could hear the forward-thinking style of proto jungle (back then known only as breakbeat). These spaces and communities characterised what it meant to encourage this forward continuation. ‘If you managed to get through the police roadblocks and across the muddy fields and you turned up with your record box then you would get a play.’
This didn’t only exist in the DJ sphere; Spiral Tribe had an underground distribution network of vinyl and a community studio which helped them pay for life on the road. ‘We were the owners of our own production, building and creating the reality around us’. Not only did this help keep the party going (and themselves). Their work heavily influenced and funded others to create their own version of reality, by starting studios, getting equipment, and building sound systems.
The pirate radio ethos carried throughout Spiral Tribe’s activities, so much so that Debbie Staunton, a community-driven leftist part of the collective, saw the advantage of using an info line as a free internet network to join people from different sound systems. Alongside this, Mark started the Advance Party which was the political wing of Spiral Tribe in light of their court battle that led to the introduction of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act in 1994. The purpose of this collective action was to keep the fight against authority going in the UK whilst Spiral Tribe continued to spread their creative energy in Europe. While resistance and creative intention co-existed during this period, it exposed the reality of politicking within an already corrupt system. Mark explains how spy cops infiltrated the Advance Party and the collective imploded on itself. It was a geographical parallel that exposed the differences between living outside the system versus fighting the system.
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The double-edged sword of living outside the system
Striving to live outside of the system is a countercultural way of living and being, to resist what already exists, and what defies so many of us. Being ‘outside’ isn’t to leave behind and ignore what is happening. It’s an active decision that rejects the dehumanisation of society, and demonstrates how resistance and allyship can be truly lived. ‘The free party is something that offers that positive energy in a very constructive way. It's not about escapism, it's always been about struggle and always been about the sheer force of determination to hold the community together, rather than buying into the leisure industry.’
Hedonism is a buzzword heralded by those who look back at the so-called golden years of electronic music through rose-tinted glasses. Whilst it’s more than appropriate in definition, the very nature of hedonism exists inside a nebulous vacuum, with those engaging in it being blissfully unaware of the struggle of the soil we’re stomping on. ‘That's the real issue here, to almost pretend that you are somehow autonomous and independent when in fact you're just sort of hiding away from the problems and not building anything alternative’. Parallel worlds aren’t indicative of escaping and forgetting, they rework and reclaim what power dynamics have taken from us.
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However collectively powerful music can be, it still presents a naivety when faced with crises, as ‘fighting an entire system is not something that can be solved by grassroots collectives in isolation’. Anarchist and/or political movements that operate in subcultural music and arts risk only existing as symbols of resistance and solidarity rather than inciting any motivation for real change. This calls for greater collectivism with cross-pollinating skills, industries, and people who can influence policy making and convince others who exist and breathe in political polarities. ‘I’m optimistic that there will be a moment pretty soon where there will be an even greater rejection of the system that has damaged and exploited so much of the world, and the greater possibility of us being together as humans and stewarding this planet in a responsible way.'
The relentless free parties of Spiral Tribe are often retrospectively glamorised, with images surfacing that represent the escapist mythical building of higher states of consciousness. Of course, this style of travelling/partying existed for those who chose to perceive it like this. And in many cases this was an accurate representation. But for Mark, being part of Spiral Tribe involved a lot of labour, what he describes as ‘gifting free parties’ to people. ‘It’s quite twisted politics that some people seem to feel that to operate 100% outside of the system is the only way to do something. And if you take any wage for the work that you do, you somehow break the code of authenticity, which of course is absolute bullshit. The workers should be fully compensated for the labour that they put in.'
The idea that earning a living from a lifestyle that is rooted in radical action is some sort of evil sin, only enforces the myth that living outside the system is a truly viable reality. Profit is a dirty word, but reimagining the ways in which profit can be radicalised to help change said systems is a far more sustainable approach. ‘Some people took it as a badge of honour to claim being 100% out of the system. But the truth of the situation is that, regardless of our internal belief system or politics, we are all completely insulated within a matrix of supply lines that are run by the capitalist system.'
Cracks in the concrete: lessons for collectives now
Existing within the free party community as a form of resistance doesn't have as much weight as its initial ideation and inception. This is because free parties are more accepted now on a cultural level. Before, there was a lot of scepticism and demonisation and when Spiral Tribe were first operating, they were on the tipping point of the collapse of the Thatcher government. ‘Our idea is perhaps a little antiquated as there is now less of this force field, there are now cracks in that concrete.’ It is crucial now that collectives manifest their ideas through actions that can make a tangible and positive difference, over any conceptual theorisations and phantasmagorical worlds.
With this, it’s important to keep in mind that existing in a DIY bubble doesn’t enforce change on its own, but it acts as a creative exploration into what alternative worlds can look like, encouraging different perspectives, conversations, and cooperation as part of interchanging fluid communities. ‘I would hope the legacy is nothing more than the DIY ethos, that we did break down the walls just enough to get a glimpse that if individuals get engaged in what's going on, connect with their creativity, and collectively activate, then all things are possible.'
‘A Darker Electricity: The Origins of The Spiral Tribe Sound System’ by Mark Angelo Harrison is now available at Rush Hour.
