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King Mob: A Critical Hidden History
A highly personal, deeply political, coldly analytical and achingly optimistic account of what some consider to be one of the most important English political groupings of the 20th Century and beyond.
The psycho-mythological legacy left behind by King Mob, nowadays often tied up with its assumed influence on Malcolm McLaren/the Pistols and Punk Rock (and via it's wider Situationist context, Factory Records and the Hacienda) far outweighs the physical imprint they left behind in the form of six glued together copies of it's often wildly and deliberately provocative publication, and the iconic graffiti left up around West London and beyond.
From a radical working class perspective, Dave Wise (helped by brother Stuart and longtime collaborator Nick Brandt) gives a first hand account of the (loose) formation of King Mob after their core members were excluded from the Situationist International by the schism-happy Debord in 1967. (Not, unfortunately, as the story used to go, after Debord came to London looking for the crack squad of pro-situ streetfighters he'd heard about, and found Dave and Stuart W. sat in front of Match of the Day getting on the lager- it never happened). "A Critical History ." celebrates their attempt to move "from the Situationist salon to the street," whilst not shying away from identifying tactical, strategic and theoretical holes in the groups day to day actions, as seen by brothers Dave and Stuart.
Plans to blow up waterfalls, getting arrested on demos dressed as pantomine horses (the back end got off in court, on the grounds he didn't know what the front end was doing seriously), sharing oversized baked bean costumes with ultra-Maoists on Vietnam marches.
Getting high and hungrily devouring Coleridge, De Quincey, Rimbaud, Marx, De Sade, Breton, Joyce and Hegel. Pissing over the lectern whilst declaring the death of art at the 1968 English Surrealist convention, being (falsely) put in the frame for the 1969 Newcastle School of Art firebombing; perhaps most infamously dressing up as Santa Claus in Selfridges toy dept, Xmas 1969, and watching the chaos of consumerism unfold before them as crying children had the King Mob freely-gifted toys wrenched from their arms by confused and desperate employees.
There was never any danger of King Mob withering quietly on the vine of ritualised opposition, but the downturn of the early 1970's and the apparent end of any hope for imminent social revolution as the "forthcoming horror of a totalitarian free market society of pseudo-individualism" hoved into view, hit some of them harder than they could have imagined.
As more financially independent King Mob individuals drifted off into the warm embrace of various strands of bourgeois counterculture, others faced up to the harsher realities of the "capsized utopia." Some didn't make it through, as an at times unintentionally moving epilogue here recalls.
Dave Wise spent the next thirty five years combining casual work on the buildings with travel and immersive writing on everything from the Portugese Revolution to Punk, from deep-ecology to the Inner City Riots of 1984. As he continues with this "maimed praxis" into his seventies, "A Critical, Hidden History" is a living, breathing account of a brief moment in time, when the light got through the cracks in the wall, and a new world felt possible. As we career into the 21st century, with Capitalism apparently in semi-permanent crisis and new (often transient) zones of opposition appearing by the month, the relevance of the playful, life affirming, non-hierarchical, anti-capitalists King Mob seems as great today as it ever did."
The psycho-mythological legacy left behind by King Mob, nowadays often tied up with its assumed influence on Malcolm McLaren/the Pistols and Punk Rock (and via it's wider Situationist context, Factory Records and the Hacienda) far outweighs the physical imprint they left behind in the form of six glued together copies of it's often wildly and deliberately provocative publication, and the iconic graffiti left up around West London and beyond.
From a radical working class perspective, Dave Wise (helped by brother Stuart and longtime collaborator Nick Brandt) gives a first hand account of the (loose) formation of King Mob after their core members were excluded from the Situationist International by the schism-happy Debord in 1967. (Not, unfortunately, as the story used to go, after Debord came to London looking for the crack squad of pro-situ streetfighters he'd heard about, and found Dave and Stuart W. sat in front of Match of the Day getting on the lager- it never happened). "A Critical History ." celebrates their attempt to move "from the Situationist salon to the street," whilst not shying away from identifying tactical, strategic and theoretical holes in the groups day to day actions, as seen by brothers Dave and Stuart.
Plans to blow up waterfalls, getting arrested on demos dressed as pantomine horses (the back end got off in court, on the grounds he didn't know what the front end was doing seriously), sharing oversized baked bean costumes with ultra-Maoists on Vietnam marches.
Getting high and hungrily devouring Coleridge, De Quincey, Rimbaud, Marx, De Sade, Breton, Joyce and Hegel. Pissing over the lectern whilst declaring the death of art at the 1968 English Surrealist convention, being (falsely) put in the frame for the 1969 Newcastle School of Art firebombing; perhaps most infamously dressing up as Santa Claus in Selfridges toy dept, Xmas 1969, and watching the chaos of consumerism unfold before them as crying children had the King Mob freely-gifted toys wrenched from their arms by confused and desperate employees.
There was never any danger of King Mob withering quietly on the vine of ritualised opposition, but the downturn of the early 1970's and the apparent end of any hope for imminent social revolution as the "forthcoming horror of a totalitarian free market society of pseudo-individualism" hoved into view, hit some of them harder than they could have imagined.
As more financially independent King Mob individuals drifted off into the warm embrace of various strands of bourgeois counterculture, others faced up to the harsher realities of the "capsized utopia." Some didn't make it through, as an at times unintentionally moving epilogue here recalls.
Dave Wise spent the next thirty five years combining casual work on the buildings with travel and immersive writing on everything from the Portugese Revolution to Punk, from deep-ecology to the Inner City Riots of 1984. As he continues with this "maimed praxis" into his seventies, "A Critical, Hidden History" is a living, breathing account of a brief moment in time, when the light got through the cracks in the wall, and a new world felt possible. As we career into the 21st century, with Capitalism apparently in semi-permanent crisis and new (often transient) zones of opposition appearing by the month, the relevance of the playful, life affirming, non-hierarchical, anti-capitalists King Mob seems as great today as it ever did."
- GenresHistory
238 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 2014
1 person is currently reading
34 people want to read
About the author
David Wise
151 books57 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.
From Wikipedia:
«David Wise (May 10, 1930 – October 8, 2018) was an American journalist and author who worked for the New York Herald-Tribune in the 1950s and 1960s, and published a series of non-fiction books on espionage and US politics as well as several spy novels. His book The Politics of Lying: Government Deception, Secrecy, and Power (1973) won the George Polk Award (Book category, 1973), and the George Orwell Award (1975).»
Most of his books were non-fiction examinations of espionage and U.S. politics. According to his obituary in the New York Times, “He also wrote three spy novels, which were praised for their insight and authority.” Those novels include:
• Spectrum, 1981
• The Children's Game , 1983
• Samarkand Dimension , 1987
From Wikipedia:
«David Wise (May 10, 1930 – October 8, 2018) was an American journalist and author who worked for the New York Herald-Tribune in the 1950s and 1960s, and published a series of non-fiction books on espionage and US politics as well as several spy novels. His book The Politics of Lying: Government Deception, Secrecy, and Power (1973) won the George Polk Award (Book category, 1973), and the George Orwell Award (1975).»
Most of his books were non-fiction examinations of espionage and U.S. politics. According to his obituary in the New York Times, “He also wrote three spy novels, which were praised for their insight and authority.” Those novels include:
• Spectrum, 1981
• The Children's Game , 1983
• Samarkand Dimension , 1987
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January 10, 2024
King Mob was initially a coming together in London of members of the English section of the Situationist InternationaI and like-minded individuals from Newcastle associated with the anti-art magazine, Icteric, and the Black Hand Gang.
Following Guy Debord’s expulsion of the English members of the SI in December 1967, the King Mob Echo was co-founded in April 1968 by former SI member, Chris Gray and ‘friends from the north’, Dave and Stuart Wise.
The material in this collection by King Mob writers and their associates still has a power to provocatively invigorate and open up new directions of thought and action emanating from a subversive critique of culture. For the most part, these documents have been forgotten and therefore never archived in the libraries of art history and the ‘popsicle academy’ of media/music studies. Indeed, they had to be rescued from what Marx called “the gnawing criticism of the mice”.
Contents
Dave Wise and Stuart Wise (King Mob), Introduction: By way of an explanation,,;
Ronald Hunt (Newcastle-based art historian), The Arts in Our Time: A Working Definition; The Great Communications Breakdown, (1968)
Dave Wise and Stuart Wise, Culture and Revolution (1968)
John Barker (Angry Brigade) Art+Politics = Revolution (1968)
Fred Vermorel, (music writer who collaborated with Malcolm McClaren in formulating Punk Rock), The Rewards of Punishment; On Whom Can the Workers Count? (1970)
Chris Gray (Situationist) and Dave Wise, Balls! (1970);
Phil Meyler (Dublin associate of King Mob), The Gurriers (1968) and Notes from the Survivors of the Late King Red (1972)
The book is dedicated to Stuart Wise, 1943-2021.
Following Guy Debord’s expulsion of the English members of the SI in December 1967, the King Mob Echo was co-founded in April 1968 by former SI member, Chris Gray and ‘friends from the north’, Dave and Stuart Wise.
The material in this collection by King Mob writers and their associates still has a power to provocatively invigorate and open up new directions of thought and action emanating from a subversive critique of culture. For the most part, these documents have been forgotten and therefore never archived in the libraries of art history and the ‘popsicle academy’ of media/music studies. Indeed, they had to be rescued from what Marx called “the gnawing criticism of the mice”.
Contents
Dave Wise and Stuart Wise (King Mob), Introduction: By way of an explanation,,;
Ronald Hunt (Newcastle-based art historian), The Arts in Our Time: A Working Definition; The Great Communications Breakdown, (1968)
Dave Wise and Stuart Wise, Culture and Revolution (1968)
John Barker (Angry Brigade) Art+Politics = Revolution (1968)
Fred Vermorel, (music writer who collaborated with Malcolm McClaren in formulating Punk Rock), The Rewards of Punishment; On Whom Can the Workers Count? (1970)
Chris Gray (Situationist) and Dave Wise, Balls! (1970);
Phil Meyler (Dublin associate of King Mob), The Gurriers (1968) and Notes from the Survivors of the Late King Red (1972)
The book is dedicated to Stuart Wise, 1943-2021.
Displaying 1 of 1 review