How the Troubles in Belfast gave rise to punk’s greatest love song
London was always at the heart of the UK’s blossoming punk scene back in the mid-1970s, with its various squats and dingy, damp-walled venues becoming inundated with spiky-haired youths preaching a rejection of the political establishment.
Inevitably, though, the greatest punk anthems came from areas with a lot more need for resistance than the bright lights of the capital.
Forged by an unsuspecting group of teenagers during the height of the Troubles in Belfast, Stiff Little Fingers have always stood in a league of their own as far as punk rock is concerned. Not only did the band create some of the most enduring masterpieces of the genre, with tracks like ‘Suspect Device’ still being a touchstone for multiple generations of punk devotees, but the group were also adept at capturing the fractured spirit of their surroundings in the six counties that, since the 1920s, have been identified as Northern Ireland.
Division was rife throughout Belfast during the 1970s, torn by sectarian conflict which persisted for many more years, but Stiff Little Fingers aimed to bridge that division. Their music reflected their upbringing surrounded by sectarian conflict, but the band themselves were made up of both protestant and catholic members, preferring to focus on the effects of the Troubles on ordinary, working-class people on both sides, rather than picking their allegiances with one side of the conflict or the other.
Particularly during their early days, on masterpiece albums like Inflammable Material, the influence of the Troubles is utterly unavoidable, manifesting itself in virtually every track. During a time in which the only voices being heard in Belfast – at least as far as global audiences were concerned – were those of politicians and paramilitary leaders, the very fact that a group of young people were channelling the conflict within their music was revolutionary in and of itself.
One of the stand-outs of that album is ‘Barbed Wire Love’, which goes down among the greatest punk rock love songs ever to be recorded. A satirical take on the classic Romeo and Juliet storyline of a romance between two sides of a conflict, vocalist Jake Burns croons of bombsites, blown kneecaps, and, of course, barbed wire, none of which were in short supply in 1970s Belfast.
In addition to exemplifying the incredible songwriting talent within the young band, ‘Barbed Wire Love’ is also perhaps the greatest satire of the Troubles ever written. Setting a classic romance and an old-school style love song befitting of Elvis Presley, within the surroundings of sectarian conflict, perfectly captured the surreal futility of the conflict.
While other writers of love songs might focus on bouquets of flowers, chocolates, and the glimmer of their one true love’s pulchritudinous eyes, Stiff Little Fingers focused instead on what they knew: a war-torn city flanked by barbed wire and with No Man’s Land borders occurring between neighbourhoods and, in many cases, in the middle of streets.
Art school students in London certainly had their own sense of rebellion, with the likes of the Sex Pistols aiming their disdain at the Royal Family, or The Clash discussing police brutality and the Americanised gentrification of the English capital, but it all paled in comparison to the essential impact of Stiff Little Fingers on 1970s Belfast.
It might not be overtly confrontational within its lyrics, but ‘Barbed Wire Love’ still remains one of the greatest anti-war anthems and love songs ever to arise from the punk realm.
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