Venues and punk concerts in greater Leiden 1976-1982
Abstract:
Reading about Amsterdam in the late 1980s leaves as impression: Dutch punk band members lived in squats, rehearsed in squats, played gigs in squats. Was that picture the same for an earlier time, 1976-1982; and for another area: Leiden, and villages around it? Squatting, by the Comité Woningnood (Housing Emergency Committee), pre-dated punk in Leiden, and was mainly houses and other small buildings. Their maxim was Don´t squat for yourself, squat for people in need. Aimed at housing evicted and other homeless people. Not at helping bands in any kind of music to rehearse or play concerts. How about the only big squat where concerts might be possible in 1976-1982? When could punk bands play there, when not? Where did local bands rehearse? In squats, band members´ homes, pigsties or bulb sheds around Leiden, Paradiso venue in Amsterdam? How did legal music venues, like the Groenoordhal, Stadsgehoorzaal, the LVC, the Breehuys, Volkshuis, react to punk? Were foreign bands like Blondie, Crass, Poison Girls welcome? How about local and other Dutch bands? What was the role of student club buildings, SSR, Augustinus and Catena, for rehearsing and concerts? How about villages around Leiden, like Hazerswoude, the birthplace of the main Dutch first wave punk band Ivy Green, Voorschoten with its Lindehoeve venue and Wassenaar with Nieuw Nijevelt?
Bio:
Herman de Tollenaere is a Leiden University MA in social and economic history. His PhD thesis, The Politics of Divine Wisdom (1996), is about 19th-20th century colonial history in Asia, especially Indonesia. Editor of Pin fanzine, since 1978. Co-founder of Rock Against Racism in the Netherlands in 1978. Male half of lead vocals, and toy saxophone in Cheap ‘n’ Nasty, Recently, he worked about the relationship between anarchism and punk in the Netherlands, 1977-1982.
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