Living your life completely and utterly for music

Louder Than War review ‘An Anarchy of Demons’

The life and times of Charlie Harper, punk rock legend and frontman of UK Subs, is written in his own voice. Charlie’s story provides an insider’s eye witness account of punk rock and earlier pop cultures over the last 7 decades. A great read, says Nathan Brown.

Charlie Harper: An Anarchy of Demons – Book Review by Nathan Brown.

Earth Island has struck gold with this book. Charlie Harper is a living legend in the worldwide punk community, having led the UK Subs since 1977 and constantly gigged ever since. As he says in his dedication, they played the Americas for 33 years consecutively without a break. Charlie has always remained a man of the people, chatting at the bar with fans rather than hiding in the dressing room, and attending other people’s gigs, so there is a lot of love for him. That and the fact that the early albums and singles by the UK Subs were essential listening. This volume takes its name from a line in the song Anti-Warfare that appeared on the anarcho-punk compilation LP We Don’t Want Your Fucking War! in 1985.

Charlie’s voice is evident, with the writing carrying the cadence of his speech. He is a natural storyteller, so it is pretty much like you are sat at the bar with him reminiscing. The conversational style means that inevitably the narrative can go astray or occasionally repeat itself, but this doesn’t hamper the story. If anything, it adds to it and makes this all the more like you’re chatting over a couple of pints. Charlie’s generosity of spirit comes across in his encounters, which make for an interesting life before you even get to him helping to found one of the longest continuously running punk bands of all time.

The chapters are short, making this easy to dip into and read as a series of short episodes if you’re pushed for time. However, the brevity of the chapters also helps to create its own momentum, making it a page turner, although you are unlikely to make it through all 136 chapters in one sitting.

Charlie, real name David Charles Perez, was born in 1944 and very nearly the victim of not one, but two, Warheads that blew apart two different homes before he was even one year old. His recollections of a childhood playing in Hackney bombsites and being educated “Down On The Farm” and at special boarding schools for miscreants demonstrate that while life had simpler pleasures, it wasn’t always a bed of roses. Being taught how to box got Charlie out of a few dodgy situations.

An Anarchy Of Demons is something of a journey through pop culture and counter culture, almost since the advent of the teenager up until the coming of punk rock. He’s still singing “I wanna be Teenage” at 80. The first third of the book, covering the years before the UK Subs, is fascinating stuff. The man has lived a life! It’s social history told through his experiences. Charlie did the beatnik thing, busking around Europe. He was involved with the folk and blues scenes. Harper became a mean blues harp player.

He was on first name terms with the Rolling Stones when they were still playing small pubs around London. He witnessed Soho in its swinging 60s heyday and the London music scene of the 70s. Kensington High Street, Notting Hill, The King’s Road, The Marquee and The Rainbow all get a mention. Before punk, he was immersed in Bowie mania, pub rock and his own R’n’B band The Marauders – then everything changed. In 1977 he was a regular at The Roxy (the UK Subs Live At The Roxy album was a favourite of mine as a youngster) and the book name checks Ramones, Sex Pistols, The Clash, Lemmy and more “big names” before you get to his appearances on that most celebrated icon of pop culture, Top Of The Pops.

Of course, two thirds of An Anarchy Of Demons is about Charlie’s time in the UK Subs. He conveys the relentless nature of touring. The festivals, theatres, dive bars, squats and sheds. The riots. The after parties and long distance relationships. In doing so, he charts the rise, fall and resurrection of punk rock’s popularity. Unlike so many bands who split and then reformed once big festivals started to splash the cash, the UK Subs never gave in. They never stopped playing. When the punk spirit was being kept alive by a small hardcore scene, Charlie was there. Born a rocker, die a rocker.

The cast of characters in this book is vast, with the UK Subs having had over eighty members and played gigs on so many bills since 1977. As you would expect, there has been plenty of rock’n’roll excess in all those years on the road. Somehow, Charlie’s staying power, perhaps his philosophical view of life (“I’m the guy whose beer is half-full”), got him through where so many crashed and burned. The number of times he was left alone at the helm of an empty UK Subs before a gig, but never gave up, is testament to his dogged determination to keep doing what he loves.

Trivia fans will get to find out how he got the Charlie Harper moniker, how the UK Subs got their name and the writing background to some of their songs.

You don’t have to be a die-hard UK Subs fan for this to be worth a read. Even if you have only seen them a couple of times or remember very little after Another Kind of Blues or Stranglehold, this book is fascinating. Aside from Charlie’s early years providing a grounded view of what went on in London in the swinging sixties and into the seventies, this book lays out what it’s like to achieve the goal of living your life completely and utterly for music.

Last words go to the man himself: “For me it’s all about the journey rather than the destination…to tour is to go on holiday and get paid for it”.

https://louderthanwar.com/charlie-harper-an-anarchy-of-demons-book-review/

Charlie Harper will be at Rebellion Festival signing copies of his new autobiography later this week and you can still pick up a pre-order copy of 'An Anarchy of Demons' with all the extra goodies from Earth Island Books if you are quick. The official publishing date in 5th September 2025 but the first print books are shipping now.