It's Up To You

I spent part of last night re-living my youth, or my 20s at least, playing the Blaggers I.T.A. DVD "It's Up To You".

One of the best gigs I have seen was the Blaggers at The Garage at Highbury Corner (in 1994 or 1995?) I think they finished the gig with "Ten Men Dead" as it was St Patrick's Day. The Blaggers were also important as a band because they walked it like they talked it - I can remember having the dubious honour of being trapped in a tube carriage with them as the police moved us, quite involuntarily, from east London to west London on the day of the Ian Stuart Donaldson memorial gig in London in 1994. We had all enjoyed an exchange of opinion with Combat 18 in Bow. C18, for all their hype in the media, were humilated that day.

The quality of the DVD is actually pretty poor, but the spirit and atmosphere makes up for that. The 12 tracks are divided between live concert footage and Promo videos, whilst the title track has some good clips from the "Battle of Waterloo" - one of Anti-Fascist Action's finest hours - added in. It is hard not to be sad when you see the clips of Matty Blagger, who died very young. A reminder that drugs can take the best of our people, as well as some of the worst.

I got my DVD from a stall at a gig, but you may still be able to order it from the producers, Insurgence Records.