Here’s an old and new Christmas favourite; hope they spread holiday cheer.

Feliz Navidad’s blending of the Mexican Christmas carol as popularised by José Feliciano with PiL’s Public Image never fails to please, bringing back happy memories of the UK leg of the Merry Mex-Mas dates in 2000 I helped organise for my dear friend Robert Lopez, aka El Vez, who wowed audiences with his Elvettes and the Memphis Mariachis. This footage is from that tour.

Alan McGee’s Poptones released the accompanying album and the song on a limited edition 7in.

Meanwhile I’m adding Nick Lowe’s Christmas At The Airport to my list of hardy perennials; the video’s great and it was fabulous to see Nick at our Christmas drinks a couple of weeks back, fresh from yet another hit American tour.

It’s from his new album Quality Street which is as off-the-wall as you like.

Hope you enjoy both songs. Thanks for following my blog and Happy Holidays to you.

PG

Tags: Alan McGee, Christmas At The Airport, Elvettes, Feliz Navidad, José Feliciano, Memphis Mariachis, Nick Lowe, Poptones, Robert Lopez

“There is a moment when ‘good taste’ becomes dead; what has been considered ‘bad’ is suddenly found to be invigorating. Fashion today has little to do with la mode and the tacky is often accepted as an essential part of the necessary ‘total’ look. It can be fun.”

Cecil Beaton, introduction to the catalogue for the 1971 V&A exhibition Fashion: An Anthology

Recent visits to the V&A’s Archive of Art & Design have proved fruitful, particularly a viewing earlier this week of the collection of  Pop Art clothing sold through London boutique Mr Freedom in the late 60s and early 70s.

//Design: Diana Crawshaw, 1971//

//Kiss Off t-shirt, Jim O’Connor, 1971//

//Design Christopher Snow/Trevor Myles, body design: Diana Crawshaw, 1971//

//Design: Pamla Motown, 1971//

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Tags: Christopher Snow, Diana Crawshaw, Dinah Adams, Elton John, Fashion An Anthology, Felix Dennis, Jim O'Connor, Michael Regan, Oz, Pamla Motown, Royal College Of Art, Sir Cecil Beaton, The Fabric Of Pop, Trevor myles, V&A

//Vivienne Westwood in felt Inside Out Jacket with assistants Debbie Wilson and Michael Collins in Seditionaries, 1977//

While updating his rich and varied archive, photographer Homer Sykes came across these superb photographs taken inside Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood’s boutique Seditionaries at 430 King’s Road in the spring of 1977.

The images capture the air of raw uncertainty surrounding the shop and the McLaren/Westwood coterie in this period. McLaren’s charges the Sex Pistols had recently been signed to their third record company in six months – Virgin Records – after being publicly excoriated for their behaviour and bounced out of EMI and A&M. The national media had seized upon punk as a source of sensationalism and the release of the Pistols’ explosive God Save The Queen was a matter of weeks away.

//Debbie Wilson (aka Debbie Juvenile) sports Hangman Jumper, Seditionaries, 1977. Note the studded Venus Top and leather jacket on the wall behind the counter//

//Westwood expounding against the photographic mural of Dresden after WW2 air-raids, Seditionaries, 1977. Note Collins’ Cambridge Rapist design produced by Westwood’s partner Malcolm McLaren a couple of years earlier//

//Behind the customer in black bondage jacket is the wall-size inverted photographic mural of Piccadilly Circus, Seditionaries, 1977//

On Saturday August 20 1977 Sykes again took to the King’s Road to document the atmosphere of unrest embodied by the outbreaks of violence caused by marauding Teddy Boys targeting punks and such boutiques as Seditionaries and Boy.

//Young Ted bops while another’s jacket mourns Elvis Presley’s recent death, King’s Road, 1977//

//Musician/actor Gary Holton and girlfriend Tracy Boyle lead a demonstration against violence between Teds and Punks along the King’s Road. Far left is punk Mick Bladder//

Some of his photographs feature the punk Mick Bladder, whose arrest on that day in August 1977 was featured in Wolfgang Büld’s Punk In London. This documentary  shows how the movement’s initial creative burst swiftly dissipated, while Sykes’ images capture the ways in which a cult movement had entered the mainstream, infiltrating the media, music, fashion and the wider culture.

Sykes’ archive covers the waterfront, from social unrest including the Notting Hill Carnival riot of 1976 and the riots in Toxteth and Brixton in the early 80s, to the on-the-road antics of Paul McCartney & Wings and Sigue Sigue Sputnik, the New Romantic haven the Blitz club, Andrew Logan’s Alternative Miss World and Quentin Crisp . Visit www.homersykes.com.

Tags: A&M, Andrew Logan's Alternative Miss World, Boy, Cambridge Rapist, Debbie Juvenile, Debbie Wilson, Elvis Presley, EMI, God Save The Queen, Hangman Jumper, Homer Sykes, Michael Collins, Paul McCartney, Quentin Crisp, Seditionaries, Sex Pistols, Sigue Sigue Sputnik, Virgin Records, Vivienne Westwood, Wings

//Le Gun’s Planet Frottage, one of the group works featured in Space Is Deep//

Tomorrow sees the opening of Space Is Deep, the latest exhibition from art collective Le Gun.

The show, at London’s Daniel Blau gallery and featuring contributions from fellow travellers such as Wildcat Will Blanchard, Andrzej Klimowski and Will Sweeney, marks a departure for the group; for the first time work in colour is included alongside Le Gun’s trademark monochrome representations.

“We felt the time was right to introduce some colour and started off by making two technicolour free-form ‘nightmare paintings’, says Robert Rubbish, who founded Le Gun in 2004 with fellow artist/illustrators Bill Bragg, Chris Bianchi, Neal Fox and Stephanie von Reiswitz and designers Alex Wright and Matt Appleton.

“Then we reassessed our approach, fine-tuned our colour pallet and made three space-inspired paintings, taking references from the likes of (horror/scifi comic artist) LB Cole and  Tintin’s adventure Explorers On The Moon.”

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Tags: Alex Wright, Andrzej Klimowski, Bill Bragg, Chris Bianchi, Daniel Blau, Doremi Fasol Latido, Explorers On The Moon, Hawkwind, In Search Of Space, LB Cole, Le Gun, Matt Appleton, Neal Fox, Space Is Deep, Space Ritual, Steph von Reiswitz, Tintin, Wildcat Will Blanchard, Will Sweeney

Here’s a cure for year-end cookie-cutter rock-doc fatigue.

Basically Johnny Moped, Fred Burns’ exemplary documentary about Paul Halford (aka punk rocker Johnny Moped), has been selected for a week of screenings at London’s ICA.

The mini-season kicks off next Tuesday night with a post-film chat and q&a with Moped conducted by Burns.

Tickets available here.

Find out more about the film here.

Tags: Basically Johnny Moped, Fred Burns, ICA, Johnny Moped, Paul Halford

//Tommy Roberts, 1987. Photo: Christopher Clunn//

Sad to note the anniversary today of the death of Tommy Roberts, flamboyant design entrepreneur and subject of my book Mr Freedom.

//Dedication (right) with (left on cover-flap) list of abiding interests (courtesy Eve Ferret + Mark Summerfield) and Brian Aris portrait//

//Roberts opened Kleptomania with Charlie Simpson in Kingly Street, central London, in 1966//

//Neon arch sales counter display designed by Jeffrey Pine for Mr Freedom, opened with partner Trevor Myles at 430 King’s Road in September 1969//

Here – with a selection of images from Mr Freedom – is an extract from an essay I have written about Roberts’ role in the development of design in Britain for Chris Breward and Ghislaine Wood’s book British Design: Tradition & Modernity, which will be published by Bloomsbury next year.

It is arguable that wider recognition for Tommy Roberts’ audacious innovations in the promotion of street style, furniture, gastronomy, home-wares, interiors and collectables was undercut by his refusal to observe the sensitivities of England’s post-war design world.

Roberts adopted an ebullient public persona to match his stout physique and broad Cockney accent. “I’m the most vulgar man in fashion, darlin’!” Roberts proclaimed to the no-less outrageous Sunday Times fashion editor Molly Parkin in the heyday of his Pop Art fashion and objects emporium Mr Freedom.

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Tags: Chris Breward, City Lights Studio, Eve Ferret, Ghislaine Wood, Jeffrey Pine, Keith Roberts, Kilburn & The High Roads, Mark Summerfield, Molly Parkin, Mr Feed'Em, Paul Conroy, Practical Styling, Sunday Times, TomTom, Two Columbia Road

//Susie Bubble pays tribute to Shop, The World According To…, Shop At Maison Bertaux, Posh, Shopgirl//

Rifling through her memories of Pippa Brooks and Max Karie’s Soho boutique Shop (which later mutated into The World According To… and then shifted base to Shop At Maison Bertaux), fashion blogger Susie Bubble has nice things to say about me and my work and includes in her selection of images the cover of the first edition of The Look.

This featured Libby Peder’s photograph of Pippa and James Dearlove, her musical collaborator in Posh, All About Eve Babitz and Shopgirl.

It was as Shopgirl that Pippa and James played the launch party, which was held across the road from Shop  at the club Astral and featured DJ sets by others in the book, including Jeff Dexter, Count Indigo, Dan Donovan + Don Letts and Jay Strongman.

//2001 invite to the party launching the first edition of The Look//

Read about that eventful night on THE LOOK blog.

Read Susie Bubble’s post Shopped-Out here.

I got to know Pippa through Shop and Posh, who I saw live a few times in the 90s. Sadly I missed this performance at Wembley Stadium on the same bill as Bon Jovi (is it me or is Pippa absolutely bricking it when she leans down to take a slug of water?):

Tags: All About Eve Babitz, Count Indigo, Dan Donovan, Don Letts, James Dearlove, Jay Strongman, Jeff Dexter, Libby Pedder, Max Karie, Pippa Brooks, Shop, Shopgirl, Susie Bubble

//Courtney Love, backstage, Reading Festival, 1994. © Tom Sheehan//

Tom Sheehan may be known as a “rock photographer” – a déclassé term for any old snapper with access – but is really an exacting and highly adept portraitist who chooses musicians as his subjects because, put simply, music is his abiding passion.

I write as someone with the inside, having first encountered Sheehan in the late 70s glory days of one of the finest London pubs of our individually but carefully compiled experience, the eccentric Wickwood Tavern, situated in Camberwell’s Loughborough Junction, hosted by the glorious Syd and his pot boy Roy and populated by a wild and wonderful set of attendees from Mad Pat Collins to No Neck Neenan to George O’Dowd.

Right back then, when Sheehan was making his bones as a freelancer for Melody Maker and various record companies, his love for, and knowledge of, music knew no bounds. Consequently, as I devoured everything I could get my hands on at that age, I gained an education in the distaff likes of, say, John Cooper Clark or Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks.

We reconnected a couple of years ago; following Tom’s Instagram adventures is but one of the pleasures of falling back into Sheehan’s circle.

His current exhibition Analogue has been rightly acclaimed a success, and the run justifiably extended until December 17. If you’re in town do yourselves a favour and grab the chance to take in Sheehan’s cool, calm and collected body of work.

Analogue is at Lomography in Spitalfields – see here.

Visit tomsheehan.co.uk

Tags: Analogue, Courtney Love, Dan Hicks & His Hot Licks, George O'Dowd, John Cooper Clark, Lomography, Mad Pat Collins, No Neck Neenan, Radiohead, Tom Sheehan, Wickwood Tavern

//My copy of the Tedious/Memories 12in//

Junior Murvin – who has died aged 67 – will forever be associated with the rebel cool of his 1976 Lee Perry-produced single Police & Thieves. Yesterday morning’s BBC Radio 4’s Today news programme displayed it’s trademark ham-fisted approach to pop culture when eagerly proclaiming the song his shining achievement by managing to misname Paul Simonon “Mick Jones” in an interview introduction and rushing to gush unconvincingly over an excerpt of The Clash’s version.

Personally, I favour another Lee Perry collaboration from the same period, the epic single B-side Memories.

I bought the UK 12inch mix on a shopping spree in a record shop tucked away in an Earl’s Court side street one late afternoon in 1977 on the recommendation of the shop assistant.

At 8mins 45secs, Memories is not only a sonic adventure to match the very best of 70s dub, but also a sweet, romantic song, the yearning, regretful theme over Perry’s bubbling cauldron of rhythms perfectly matched to Murvin’s falsetto whoop (I found Police & Thieves too preaching, which I guess is why it made sense for The Clash – always complaining about being told what to do, they tended towards dictating to their audience).

The flip, Tedious, is pretty good, as were other Black Ark explorations such as Closer Together, but nothing in my view in Murvin’s body of work touches the tenderness of Memories.

Remember him this way:

Tags: Black Ark, Closer Together, Earl's Court, Junior Murvin, Lee Perry, Memories, Mick Jones, Paul Simonon, Tedious, The Clash