I was heavily involved in the free party rave movement from 1993
until 2003. The majority of my mates at the time lived in squats and
we were all into an alternative life style. I was only 15 when I started
attending these parties in London. I regularly attended a club on
Old Street called Whirl-y-gig. The night would finish at midnight,
so a group of us would go to raves afterwards. I remember the first
one, I danced non-stop all night and interacted with everyone in
the room. We all felt connected somehow through the energy of the
dance floor.
When I started attending these parties it was the year after the iconic
Castlemorton week-long free festival, which took place in the British
countryside. Before the days of mobile phones, 20,000 to 50,000
people attended the party via word of mouth. Spiral tribe was the main
system that got penalised as they were the last sound system to keep
the music playing when the authorities arrived. After violent attacks by
the police at raves to follow, a two year court case, and the enactment
of the draconian Criminal Justice Act in the UK, the collective decided
to head to France to continue their mission of putting on free Tecknivals
(techno festivals). Numerous sound systems stemmed from this
subculture including Bedlam, DIY, Hekate and Desert Storm, who
continued to put on illegal raves in warehouses, derelict factories and
post offices across London and in fields and quarries beyond the city.
These groups also joined the Spirals further afield across Europe.
