Penny Capitalists

"Support School" poster, 1976

Lyrics

The careless purveyors of high culture are presented with clear alternatives. One of them is finally to be fixed as the harmless class, the dangerous harmless class, the social and historical scum; for the most part, the bribed flunkey (tool) of reactionary intrigue, the worst of all possible allies, absolutely venal and absolutely cunning, a wholly indefinite disintegrated mass thrown here and there, rich and poor, offal, organ-grinders, rag-pickers, mountebanks… The helpless dregs who turn in circles between suicide and a tedious madness, incapable of the uncritical violence which is their true heritage, a plague zone which can’t be cleansed by the plague.

Or they can realise that they are incapable of 'governing' themselves, struggle to reach, and restore to themselves a social and historical base, recognise that they can seldom find their way about the countryside, recognise that they are a non-working, not-working class — penny capitalists — and ask themselves what that means: become people in process.

Chronology

• Corrected Slogans
  • Mel Ramsden - vocals
  • Mayo Thompson - piano
  • Jesse Chamberlain - drums
• The backing track became the song "Letter-Bomb" on Soldier-Talk

Retrospectives

Mel Ramsden, 2019

I'd heard some of the [Corrected Slogans] tracks [before writing the lyrics to Nine Gross and Conspicuous Errors]. In fact I performed one of the tracks on Corrected Slogans—Brilliantly, I must say.

Interpretations

• Art & Language International: "The lyrics to “Penny Capitalists” are excerpted from a small, square, staple-bound pamphlet titled “The Intellectual Life of the Ruling Class Gets Its Apotheosis in a World of Doris Days” authored by Baldwin that, across six pages, excoriates the Venice Biennale as “a necrotic extremity” of the ruling classes"
• The text was also used on a poster for Philip Pilkington and David Rushton's School magazine project in 1976
• Mel Ramsden's vocal track was the only contribution to Corrected Slogans from the New York branch of Art & Language