CRASS
anything about, they quite rightly thought that we might have access to more damaging information.” There was also a visit to Dial House from people claiming membership of the German Baader-Meinhoff gang. Penny Rimbaud: “A woman turned up here with her young daughter, who looked like her young son. By then, Baader-Meinhoff had all but collapsed, but there were still cells. She and her daughter did bank jobs. They turned up one day on pushbikes. They were having a relax in Britain, and in Germany they were doing bank jobs, to finance the cells.” They informed Crass about this, which in the circumstances seems a ridiculously foolish thing to do. Penny continues:“People did openly tell us things. Because of our reputation, we were privy to that sort of information. People told us things, which often we didn’t want to bloody well hear.” Meanwhile, of all the movements for social change, the rise of the peace movement in Western Europe had led to its mainstream wing, CND, enjoying a massive rise in popularity and influence. George McKay:“Around that time, there were a number of different music contributions to the movement. One of the big ones was Glastonbury Festival. From 1981, Glastonbury was organised through National CND offices – through CND’s national structure and organisation – and that’s one of the key reasons why Glastonbury became successful . . . remember, there were only three Glastonbury festivals held during the seventies, and the one that most resembled what it became, the 1979 event, a fundraiser for the UN Year of the Child, was something of a financial disaster. Over the eighties, the usual figure quoted is that Glastonbury gave CND something like a million pounds, and that really helped support things.” George McKay: “Because Crass bolted the CND symbol onto the anarchy symbol, they made that connection more explicit. But there were a lot of other things going on too – in November 1983, there were 102 peace camps up and down the country, inspired by Greenham Common women, for instance. Crass had a role to play, but I don’t know I’d want to overstate it.” Of all those involved in the peace movement, Crass were among the
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