Feeling The Spaces – Asylum Kids
Fight It With Your Mind – Asylum Kids
It was UK punk band Sham ’69 who sang, ‘If the kids are united, then we’ll never be divided’. Well back in the 80s in South Africa the kids known as Robbi Robb, Steve Howells and Dino Archon were united for a little while under the banner of the Asylum Kids and produced a couple of great punk albums, but then they divided and went on to Tribe After Tribe and The Dynamics, but while they were united, there was little division among punk fans that they were the best band in the country (fans of Sonja Herholdt and the like would probably have disagreed).
‘Feeling The Spaces’ appeared on their debut album ‘Fight It With Your Mind’ and does not have spaces, but definitely has feeling. The song is a controlled barrage of thrashy punk. I say controlled as there is a tune in there – it’s not just a noise – which doesn’t relent as it rattles through the 3 minutes 43 seconds at pace with angry drums clashing with heated guitars and underpinned by a pulsing bass.
The feeling comes to the fore in Robbi’s voice as he injects venom into lyrics like ‘and everyone seems to doubt the leaders’ and ‘coldness is spreading/out here it’s lonely’. This is South African punk at its best, and it sounds as fresh and invigorating now as it did back then.
Where to find it:
Fight it with Your Mind/Solid (Aka The Complete Asylum Kids) – Asylum Kids (2005) Fresh Music, FRESHCD 147
Video:
1001 South African Songs You Must Hear Before You Go Deaf 
Sounds pretty relevant even today. Dino Archon was the vocals on that one.