Never mind the old b*****ks, NU punk rules

As the recession bites, commentators decry the lack of music expressing the frustrations of the age. With an industry ruled by clone-producing impresarios, churning out pretty teenagers warbling about their love lives, that's no surprise. But as with the slumps of the Seventies and Eighties, bands are emerging in London's underground telling raw stories from the street with a spirit and sound of which punks of old would be proud.

Six months ago, I and the others packed into the Purple Turtle in Camden, were astonished by the sight of Danny Onions, 27-year-old lead singer of The Meat And Onions Gang (named after an old street gang in Bermondsey) as he took to the stage in a cotton smock and pyjama bottoms, the needle for a drip visibly poking from his arm.

"I just broke out of hospital to play this gig," shouted the docker's son from Bermondsey. "So you c***s better enjoy it!" And after a thrilling noisy set he went straight back there, a cab waiting with its engine running to return him to treatment for a drink-induced blood infection that's left him partially blind. Last month, after another gig at The Water Rats on Gray' Inn Road, they added that venue to the list of places that have banned them for their rowdy behaviour.

With songs like Children Of The Credit Crunch, about the unemployed making babies as there's nothing else to do - having a "bunk-up before breakfast and quick one before lunch" - The Meat And Onions Gang belong to a growing scene of working-class bands singing about their reality that also includes Turncoat, Gorgeous George, the Skets and Rum Shebeen.

"Black kids are expressing themselves with grime and drum-and-bass," says Danny Onions, "but right now, no one's really talking about being poor and white in London apart from people like us."

"I grew up listening to The Clash, Rancid and The Thunderers," says Jamie Dineen (aka Turncoat), 25, a tour cycle guide from Wimbledon. Like they were, he's angry about the way society demonises the young: "Look at the riots. For 10 years the media has told young people they're scum, so they're going to act like scum when they get the opportunity."

His song, Port Arthur, compares the heavy reaction to such crimes with the deportations that were once meted out for minor offences.
Charlie Leman, 23, of Gorgeous George, calls his band "Balkan chavs" who address the life they see. "We sing about people we know, hard-working people who struggle to put food on the table. We do it with a naughty chavvy vibe," says the painter and decorator from Morden.

John Curd, who's promoted punk music since 1976 - including The Clash, Blondie and The Ramones - says the situation is ripe for this music. "Politics is bollocks, they all talk crap. There's a load of very angry kids out there, who need a re-emergence of music with attitude."

Turncoat and Gorgeous George will perform with The Meat And Onions Gang as they begin a monthly residency at Alleycat on Denmark Street on October 27.