I’m favouring the indigo corduroy version of the Blouson El Americano, the latest triumph from Man Of The World Christophe Loiron’s label Mister Freedom.
//Christophe Loiron road-tests the blouson//
//Left: Catalogue for Circle: Constructive Art In Britain 1934-40, Kettle's Yard Gallery, 1982/Right: 7in sleeve for Danger/Don't Want To Be Your Shadow, The Psychedelic Furs, CBS, 1982//
Find out here.
As a follow-up to yesterday’s Hawkwind post here’s the James Last Orchestra taking on the group’s big hit Silver Machine and segue-ing it into T.Rex’s Children Of The Revolution and Alice Cooper’s School’s Out.
Fun facts: Last’s nickname is “Hansi” (he was born Hans Last). He has sold more than 70 million records in his career.
//Top: Stacia Blake weaving her magic onstage at The Roundhouse in 1975. Photo: Paul Apperley. Above: Peter Lavery's photo of Russell Hunter from the insert in the Pink Fairies' 1973 album Kings Of Oblivion. Posted on the Facebook Portobello Shuffle group by Ian Nottnotw Edmondson//
Sad to witness Hawkwind, the great British musical force which has carved out a unique position outside of the mainstream music business over several decades, dragged into a tawdry row regarding ownership of the group’s name.
The dispute has been sparked by saxophonist/flautist/sometime frontman Nik Turner. It seems he is trademarking the group’s name as a touring entity in the US, even though he hasn’t been a member for a long time.
Turner was in the line-up during Hawkwind’s greatest period, 1970-76, and returned sporadically until a parting of the ways with Dave Brock, generally acknowledged as Hawkwind’s founder and the band’s one constant, at the helm for all 44 years of its existence.
If scans of signed US documents circulated online prove to be authentic, Turner’s registration in the US – where he has just toured under the banner Nik Turner’s Hawkwind – denies the existence of any other entity of that name operating in the field of live performance. This undercuts his claims in the American press that he wants to spread peace and harmony by invoking Hawkwind’s name and has enraged a section of the fan base.
Brock meanwhile has cancelled his Hawkwind’s American tour on the basis that he – at 72, a year younger than Turner – is suffering from a stress-related illness as result of the dispute.
//Barney Bubbles poster for Sunday bill at The Roundhouse, 1975//
//I went with my friend Matthew Cang. He kept his ticket//
This is all a long way from the relative harmony in the ranks when I fell under their spell as a teenager. I saw Hawkwind a few times, at the Edmonton Sundown or the Dagenham Roundhouse in north-east London and at a free festival in Harlow New Town, Essex, but one particular concert in February 1975 when the ensemble played Camden Town’s Roundhouse with the Pink Fairies stays in the memory.
Artist Jeremy Deller was commissioned to make a film by the BBC to coincide with the opening of his exhibition All That Is Solid Melts Into Air, a peroration on the consequences for Britain of the advent and aftermath of the Industrial Revolution.
The film underlines Deller’s deft application of juxtaposition. Eight year old primary school pupils read 19th century transcripts of workhouse children of the same age and former pop stars Jarvis Cocker and Noddy Holder and actress Maxine Peake intone from passages of contemporary Victorian reports on social conditions in their native locales (respectively Sheffield, the Black Country and Manchester).
//Photo: Dylan Vivian//
I’m particularly keen on Jane Horrocks’ recently released version of the Joy Division song Isolation; Horrocks’ vocal talents are widely recognised but I didn’t appreciate her feel for rock and post-punk until I saw her perform a storming Heart Of Glass at a party a couple of years back.
Rat Scabies was drumming that night and is on this Joy Division cover, which also features latterday PiL bassist Scott Firth and producer “Kipper”.
//Front cover of booklet for the Linz show features this 1973 Karl Stoecker portrait of Brian Eno in Roxy Music stage costume designed by Carol McNicholl//
Glam! The Performance Of Style – the exhibition which locates early 70s glam rock in the context of fine art and the interplay between “high” and mass culture – is opening at the Lentos Kunstmuseum in Linz, Austria later this month.
I was a consultant to Glam!’s curator Darren Pih of Tate Liverpool, where the show opened at the beginning of this year before moving on to Frankfurt’s Schirn Kunsthalle for the summer.
//The Let It Rock guitar mirror as exhibited at Glam! in Frankfurt. Photo: Andrei Luca//
//David Bowie As The Elephant Man by Derek Boshier, 1980 © Derek Boshier c/o Flowers Gallery//
Today the National Portrait Gallery unveiled Imaginary Portraits, a selection of works by artist Derek Boshier, who is the subject of a monograph I am editing.
Prominent are two studies of David Bowie; an oil-on-canvas painting executed in New York in 1980 while Bowie was rehearsing for his role in Bernard Pomerance’s play The Elephant Man at the city’s Booth Theatre and a 1981 ink-on-paper drawing which resulted from Boshier’s design for the sleeve for the album Lodger a couple of years earlier.
//Outer gatefold sleeve, Lodger, David Bowie, RCA, 1979. Design Derek Boshier, photography Brian Duffy//
//Top fellas and brushes in the 60s and 70s. Photos courtesy Tadhg Taylor//
For my money, Sharpies beat all other youth cults hands down, so news of the publication of the third edition of Tadhg Taylor’s Top Fellas is cause for celebration.
A few years ago on THE LOOK blog I explored the style and musical tastes of this unique subculture which blossomed among Melbourne teens from the 60s to the early 80s, and never tire of the clips from Greg Mcainsh’s 1974 documentary which captures the top fellas and brushes in the prime.
//Clockwise from top left: Cover, Helen And Desire, 1970; George O'Dowd, photo: Richard Bevan, 2013; Carnaby Street book and Palisades swing tag, 1970 and 1966; front cover, Anarchy In The UK newsprint fanzine, 1976//
I’m involved in a couple of events which open in London this week: artist Lucy Harrison’s multi-layered project Carnaby Echoes in the West End and photographer Nick Knight’s exhibition Punk at his Showstudio space in SW1.
| Paul Gorman is a writer. This is his blog: art, books, conversation, cults, dancing, design, encounters, environments, events, film, galleries, groups, individuals, invitations, magazines, music, opinions, performance, photography, places, press, privacy, spaces, style, thoughts + views. |
© 2009 Paul Gorman is…. All Rights Reserved.
This blog is powered by Wordpress and Magatheme by Bryan Helmig.
Recent Comments