By SoDak
On June 3, 2025, I was listening to Conflict’s new record, This Much Remains, enjoying the back-and-forth vocals between Colin Jerwood and Fiona Jayne Friel. While Conflict was not the most innovative band, they helped set a standard, as far as anarcho-punk music. They consistently delivered fast-paced, fierce hardcore, loaded with driving, distorted guitars, and pounding drums. Colin’s vocals, sometimes shouted, mixed fast talking and singing, with a melodic touch. They were loaded with emotion, including anger, love, and sarcasm. They demanded attention. After listening to This Much Remains, while reading the lyrics, I started the record over. As the title track was playing, I read that Colin had died the previous day at the age of sixty-three.
I immediately recalled the first time that I heard Conflict in the mid-1980s, when I bought both It’s Time to See Who’s Who (1983) and Increase the Pressure (1985). As I played “No Island of Dreams,” I felt like I was thrown into a crowded mosh pit, packed shoulder to shoulder with hundreds of other punks, moving to the cadence of Colin’s vocals. It was a release of energy—a type of musical ecstasy. The flood of songs about struggles for justice, animal rights, anarchism, and anti-fascism were intoxicating. I got chills listening to “From Protest to Resistance,” as the distorted guitar starts the song, followed by the slow chord progression and the building drums, leading to relentless drive, when Colin yells, “No, no/There’s no fucking way/That anything’s going to change/It depends on you and you now/We can protest ‘til death, they won’t listen/Don’t sit back and think it will happen/They won’t give up what they have robbed/Stand up and resist.” Passionate and desperate, certainly. Importantly, there was also the realization that active resistance is necessary. This aspect should be plainly obvious, given the fascist fucks today trying to impose their will. The song ends, “If we’re to stand the slightest chance we must unite and fight/We must never give up/Make sure our message ain’t forgotten/‘Cause if they won’t fucking stop/Then we’re gonna fucking stop them.”
Love of Conflict also serves as a beautiful bond with my friends Wayne and Craig, as we spent many hours listening to their records. Two of my favorite Conflict records are The Final Conflict (1988), on which Steve Ignorant from Crass is a co-vocalist, and Against All Odds (1989). Today, I am going to listen to the former, as I am eager to hear “I Heard a Rumor” and “The Cord Is Cut.”
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