This Antrim Anarcho band formed in mid 1982 during the height of the Falklands war. The band consisted of Trevor Dawson “Leafy” vocals, Steve Peden on bass, Jeff Elder on guitar and Brian Peden “Wire” on drums. Steve came up with the band’s name and wrote all of their songs “I was sitting one day, trying to think of a name and there staring at me was the cover of Feeding Of The 5,000 by Crass, with the words Sterile Vision stenciled on it. It’s easy to see if you’re looking for it”.

Inspired by the images of the Falklands war on T.V. and the purchase of a P.A. the band started practicing in the music rooms of Antrim High School before relocating to St. Comgall’s hall where they built a set around their first original material, “Crazy Falklands”. Steve Peden “Sixty hard earned quid was handed over in a music store in Belfast to secure a cheap p-bass imitation. I was playing in another rock band to learn a little more on the bass. However, hang-on-snoopy and the wankers at the Railway drove me to despair, so I focused on our fledging archo-punk band. The first practices had the bass plugged into the PA until the beauty of Marshall Valve amps was learned. (At 14 years old the PA purchase was only allowed by Leafy’s mother if it was stored under Leafy’s bed. Reportedly it is still there today)”. Leafy “I couldn’t sing a note but it wasn’t so much singing as pure punk venom. We were all sort of 2nd generation punks (with the exception of possibly Wire). We were still at primary school when the Pistols came along and we’d grown up on a diet of Crass, Conflict, Dead Kennedy’s, etc. I suppose we started off with more of an anarchist edge, had a message to put out there with all the anger that we felt”.

The band began to build up a following from the young kids who attended the youth club at St Camgall’s and who regularly watched them practice. Soon they made their live debut at the very same hall. Steve Peden “St Comghall’s was a hive of revolt and yet brought together punks from across the religious divide. Flare up’s were more a concern of the Pennies’ clockwork braces than ever was religion. Various bands were just a thin wall from each other and a strong community formed”. Leafy has fond memories of St Comgall’s hall too “They used to run an annual battle of the bands there consisting of all the bands that practiced there. They occasionally had a gig in the main hall and I remember one year we were on stage first and the rockers started fighting amongst themselves, the peelers were called and they closed the place down, I remember shouting over the mike, “ If you want to fight, go join the fucking army”, not that it did any good”.

Various lineup changes ensured after their debut performance. Wire was replaced at the drum stool by Glen Moffet, who was subsequently replaced on a more permanent basis by Jarlath McCooke “Cookie” from the Dublin Road area of Antrim.

Jeff eventually left too to be replaced by Adrian Scott (Scottie) ex Dirty Noise. Scottie “Sterile Vision were a much more politically motivated band than Dirty Noise ever were which fitted much better with me at that point in time. A few years ago I went into a local pub in Antrim and this bloke came up to me. He started spouting these lyrics at me and I was WTF? You're Scottie he said, you used to play with Sterile Vision! He was one of the young lads who’d watched us rehearse and came to our gigs. We'd obviously made quite a lasting impression on him!”

The band had assembled a set of original compositions consisting of titles such as “Act Of Anarchy”, God Says”, “Little Revolutionist” and “Are You Prepared To Die?” They also incorporated the old Dirty Noise song “Sunset On The City Of War” into their set. They played a number of gigs at schools in the Antrim area and they also played a number of times at both the Labour Club in Belfast and Spuds in Portstewart. Highlights included supporting the Subhumans at Spuds in Portstewart on 10th October 1984. They also played the Remembrance Day For The Living concert at the Mandella hall on 24th November 1984. Here they shared the stage with bands such as Uproar, the Iconoclasts, The Icons, Political Asylum and Stalag 17. They also played Rock The Radar, a demo in support of the Bishopscourt Peace Camp outside Bishopscourt RAF base in County Down on 21st to 23rd June 1985, where they shared the stage with bands such as Paranoid Visions from Dublin. By this time Steve Peden had droped out when a girlfriend became pregnant and Jarlath had split too. The band was now Leafy on drums, Stephen Porter on vocals, Scottie on guitar and Warlicks on bass. The band split shortly after this gig. Stephen Porter recalls his brief stint in the band ““Yeah I was drafted in when they all went awol! I can remember yelling loudly and hearing nothing but the shouts of spides at Rock the Radar and having a microphone malfunction at the Labour Club in Belfast. We were never going to match the dizzy heights of Toxic Waste, Stalag 17 et al but it’s the taking part that counts. I think that Bishopscourt was the final gig”. Leafy “I remember that gig too. On the Saturday a load of squaddies marched down the road dressed as punks, those were the days”.

Steven Peden has the final word “ In 1996, after 16 years of travels between Belfast, Dublin, London and Berlin, my trusty P-Bass was donated to future musicians in the closet of the King’s Cross Hotel on the Strand. Upon arriving in Boston, an original Fender Precision was purchased. In quiet nights across South Boston, faint sounds inspired by the Falklands War can still be heard over the Boston Harbor.”