BASTA! - Abortus Vrij, De Vrouw Beslist! 7'' 1977

Rib inflammation and a sore throat, I'm thrilled, all this shit that's extremely annoying and pisses me off. Well, there's time to post if I can crawl out of bed, and it's time again for a little 7 fucking Inch, the only piece by this Belgian combo called Basta! on Agitat and this little dittie was one of the first Belgian Punk releases of any sort. The band consisted of Eric (vocals), Marc (guitars), Luc (bass), Johan (drums) and Peter (sax) and the song refers to the 'national demonstration against the abortion ban' of March 4, 1977 in Ghent, which the Young Socialists (JS) called for with the same slogan. The song posthumously gained international recognition in 2017 when it was included in a list of influential anti-fascist Punk songs by the American music site Pitchfork. The music website mainly praised the saxophone line which is said to be reminiscent of Lora Logic's dissonant contributions to X-Ray Spex and Essential Logic. The flip is a reggae tune which is in my opinion a little bit too long. A short background: "The Radio 1 program Wonderland called a stunned Eric, singer of Basta, last night. "It's unbelievable what is happening now, because there are few people who remember that song from fourty years ago," he says: "Although the fight over abortion is a fight that has not yet been fought in many countries, which makes the song still relevant." The way the song was created appeals to the imagination. "We created abortion free, the woman decides" in response to a similar demonstration under the same name. That demonstration was to take place in Ghent. As occasionalPpunks, we created a soundtrack for it," says Eric. "That all happened in one day: we made a song from scratch in a community center. The lyrics were written there on the spot, the music is pure improvisation. That evening we were already in the studio for the recording. My voice was completely destroyed by then (laughs). Until that day we had never played music together."

here