This is the little-seen promo video for Brian Eno’s song China, My China (from 1974’s Taking Tiger Mountain [By Strategy]).

Eno appears with Polly Eltes and Judy Nylon.

Eltes is a former model turned actress and singer; she contributed vocals to the same album’s Mother Whale Eyeless and has collaborated with Michael Karoli and Jah Wobble. She is also a photographer.

Judy Nylon is the American-born performer, writer and artist who took 70s London by storm – I wrote about her a couple of years back here.

Nylon was often in cahoots with her partner in Snatch, Patti Palladin. Here they are performing at Hurrah! in 1979. I think this was shot by the estimable Paul Tickell:

Tags: 1974, 1979, Brian Eno, Jah Wobble, Judy Nylon, Michael Karoli, Patti Palladin, Paul Tickell, Polly Eltes, Snatch, Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)

Can of Biba own-brand baked beans. Packaging design: Whitmore-Thomas Partnership, 1973.

Chelsea Space director Donald Smith has invited me to contribute items from my design collection to his forthcoming show Ideal Home, which features the work of more than 50 artists and designers spanning 1913 to 2011.

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Tags: Biba, Chelsea Space, Damien Hirst, David Bowie, Do It Yourself, Donald Smith, Ian Dury, Ideal Home, Jane Ashley, laura Ashley, London Design Festival, Lucian Freud, Mark Titchner, Patrick Caulfield, Richard Wentworth, Roy Lichtenstein, Steve Howard, Tim Whitmore

For a fabulous interviewer, Tom Hibbert – who has died aged 59 – was a fabulous interview.

Nary a word needed to be edited, or a phrase untangled, from the thoroughly enjoyable conversation I had with him in 2000 for In Their Own Write.

For obvious reasons, interviewing journalists can be tricky. This was not my experience with Hibbert. Probably because he didn’t care, lacking the vanity which characterises this profession (or craft, or whatever it is that we do). Talking to Hibbert was akin to reading one of his rightly celebrated Who The Hell pieces: he was trenchant, highly entertaining and occasionally and surprisingly enlightening.

Here’s a selection from that chat:

“I had my first letter published in Melody Maker in 1970. It was about Crosby, Stills & Nash and how crap Graham Nash was, which I think still stands up today.”

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Tags: Arthur lee, Cliff Richard, David Crosby, Johnny Rotten, Lynn Barber, Neil Young, Nik Kershaw, Q, Robson & jerome, Roger McGuinn, Smash Hits, Tom Hibbert, Who The Hell

Palais de Tokio, Paris Feb 2006. Suit in cavalry twill by Muller Wipperfurth.

I am proud to count Bruce Marcus, the man who is Count Indigo, as a firm friend. We have known each other for many years but familiarity has not blunted my admiration for his singular style one whit.

A keen sports participant and observer, one of the first pieces of information Bruce imparted to me was that he always wore a suit to watch football (I can’t remember his team, but sure he continues to strike an imposing figure on the terraces whatever their fortunes).

Bruce also confided that one of his peccadilloes is to shave en route when taking a journey by train (in homage to Cary Grant in North By Northwest). Naturally.

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Tags: Boris Conte, Bunny Roger, Cary Grant, Count Indigo, Dhobi, Eve's, Madame JoJo's, Mark Powell, Muller Wipperfurth, Nik Cohn, North By Northwest, Philip Boucas, Sammy Davis Jr, Stephane Manel, Today There Are No Gentlemen, Yves St Laurent

/From Twen, September 1970//

The recent FT piece about the value of Disney to high-end brands (Fashion Takes The Mickey) caught up with those which have engineered hook-ups with the House Of The Mouse in recent years: Dolce & Gabanna, Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, Iceberg, Neil Barrett, Manish Arora, Hayden-Harnett, Capellini, Cory Grosser, Chopard, Tommy Hilfiger…

A Disney apparatchik is quoted: “We would never work with a designer that was too edgy or irreverent.”

Once upon a time they weren’t so purse-lipped.

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Tags: 1970, Disney, Financial Times, Mickey Mouse, OZ Schoolkids Issue, Stern, Trevor myles

Grace Jones maternity dress 1979 © Jean-Paul Goude.

Here is a selection of images from the V&A’s forthcoming exhibition Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990. In pursuit of this slippery-to-define movement, curators Glenn Adamson and Jane Pavitt have settled on the defining principles of quotation and bricolage (assemblage from diverse elements).

As a result they have mixed and matched disciplines, categories and scale in their line-up of 250 exhibits, ranging from a reconstruction of Hans Hollein’s 1980 Venice Biennale facade The Presence Of The Past to graphics for record sleeves by Barney Bubbles, Neville Brody and Peter Saville.

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Tags: Andy Warhol, Charles Jencks, Cindy Sherman, Derek Jarman, Glenn Adamson, Grace Jones, Hans Hollein, Helmut Newton, Jane Pavitt, Jeff Koons, Jenny Holzer, Laurie Anderson, neville Brody, New Order, Peter Saville, Philip Johnson, Ray Petri, Richard Prince, Robert Rauschenberg, Ron Arad, s David Byrne, Talking Heads, The Face, V&A

NAME: Christophe Loiron

RESIDES: Los Angeles

OCCUPATION: Mister Freedom

Christophe Loiron is the perfect person to kick off the Men Of The World section, the new counterpoint to Blokes Of Britain and a chance for outernationalists of every stripe to talk about their style.

Schooled in Zaire, the Frenchman has long been a resident of Los Angeles, where he opened his label and store Mister Freedom in the early 00s.

Loiron, ID photograph, 1984.

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Tags: Beverly Blvd, Casque d’Or, Christophe Loiron, coutil, Django Reinhardt, Eddie Cochran, Hud, Kinshasa, LA, Marien Nationale, Mister Freedom, Nudie The Rodeo Tailor, paletot, Paul newman, Pépé le Moko, Phantom 309, Salaire de la Peur, Treasure Of Sierra Madre, Zaire

I’m agnostic about Steve Nicks (though I have been to The Night Of 1,0000 Stevies), but this is mesmerising.

Mrs G turned me onto this. It seems Nicks was listening to a backing track of then-new composition Wild Heart as she was being made-up for a Rolling Stone photoshoot.

The title song of her first solo album, it was hit in 1983. Don’t bother with that version – it’s buffed and polished into formulaic AoR.

This is something else; Nicks and a backing singer/friend launch into the chorus again and again like there’s no tomorrow. The make-up artist eventually gives up her job and looks on in awe. As do we decades later.

Tags: Fleetwood Mac, Night Of 1000 Stevies, Rolling Stone, Stevie Nicks, Wild heart

This postcard’s over-amped application of colour (despite the “natural” tag on the back) contrasts deeply with the dowdiness of the buildings and the appearances of the inhabitants of the Swinging London über strasse on a summer’s day in 1966.

The disconnect – between projected lifestyle and everyday reality – sums up the 60s.

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Tags: 1966, Carnaby Street, CE Fudge, David Vaughan, Douglas Binder, Dudley Edwards, Lord John, Warren Gold

Promo News is a favourite site, and not just because it is run by pal o’mine Dave Knight; day-in, day-out he delivers the full span of fresh work in the field of music promos, and occasionally one tickles my fancy.

Like this. Directed by Vidya Sharma & Rajesh Thomas, this animated clip is for Non-Stop Radio, the Cornershop track featuring Celeste.

Cornershop featuring Celeste – Non-Stop Radio from rocketscience on Vimeo.

Read all about it here. And subscribe to Promo’s daily bulletins here.

Tags: Celeste, Cornershop, David Knight, Non-Stop Radio, Promo news, Rajesh Thomas, Vidya Sharma