Paul Gorman

The Life & Times Of Malcolm McLaren

Virtual Malcolm McLaren biography signing available here: Send me your address and I’ll send you a personalised or random signed bookplate

In response to inquiries about signed copies of The Life & Times Of Malcolm McLaren, I’m offering the socially distanced solution: I’m happy to send signed adhesive bookplates (personalised if you like) gratis anywhere in the world.

Send your postal address to my contact address stating whether you want a random or personalised message, and I’ll send you your very own bookplate.

The photo at the top of this post shows variants I have already signed for the virtual event being staged by Atlanta’s A Capella Books next month. I’ll post about that and other US activities coinciding with the book’s American release on September 22 in the coming weeks.

When David Bowie + Malcolm McLaren simultaneously seeded the 70s by appearing in the same issue of underground paper IT

//Box advert for the Beckenham Arts Lab run by David Bowie and Mary Finnigan in IT #59, July 1969//
//News story about the Goldsmiths Arts Festival organised by Malcolm Edwards and his fellow student Niall Martin in IT #59//

Researching my archive during lockdown for a project has given me the opportunity to thoroughly assess individual publications, none more so than the 59th issue of underground paper IT, which hit the streets in early July 1969.

This particular edition features a couple of small items which provide clues as to the countercultural activities at the time of two Londoners who would go on to define pop culture in the 1970s: David Bowie and Malcolm McLaren.

Continue reading When David Bowie + Malcolm McLaren simultaneously seeded the 70s by appearing in the same issue of underground paper IT

Fashion Beast: Arena Homme + pays tribute to Malcolm McLaren’s collaboration with Alan Moore

//Introductory spread from the Fashion Beast feature in Arena Homme + 53, Summer/Autumn 2020//

//Above: Fashion Beast story, AH+ 53. Photography Drew Vickers; fashion Tom Guinness//

The new issue of Arena Homme + – which is available to read through Exact Editions here for those who can’t obtain physical copies – includes a 28-page extravaganza on Malcolm McLaren’s activities across cinema, fashion and music during the mid-80s.

With an extract from my new biography of McLaren, the feature homes in on Fashion Beast, the unrealised film collaboration with Britain’s dark magus of comic book writing Alan Moore. It also includes my interview with Moore as well as an ingenious fashion story photographed by Drew Vickers and styled by Tom Guinness.

Continue reading Fashion Beast: Arena Homme + pays tribute to Malcolm McLaren’s collaboration with Alan Moore

Rock’s Back Pages x 3: Guest on the podcast, McLaren bio extract about David Harrison’s tryout as Sex Pistols frontman and archival pieces by me on the Spice Girls (1996) and US alternative zines (1994)

//In conversation with (from top left) RBP’s Mark Pringle, Jasper Murison-Bowie and Barney Hoskyns//

I’m the featured guest on this week’s podcast from the world’s premier music journalism site rocksbackpages.com.

I go way back with RBP founder and author Barney Hoskyns; he commissioned pieces from me when he was Mojo editor in the early 90s and we launched my music press book In Their Own Write, RBP and photographer Jill Furmanovsky’s rockarchive.com on the same night at a Shoreditch gallery nearly 20 years ago.

I had fun talking to Barney and his confreres Mark Pringle and Jasper Murison-Bowie. The chat ranged from my background in trade journalism to, of course, the new Malcolm McLaren biography. Listen to the podcast here.

//David Harrison in customised Sex t-shirt, 1975//

Continue reading Rock’s Back Pages x 3: Guest on the podcast, McLaren bio extract about David Harrison’s tryout as Sex Pistols frontman and archival pieces by me on the Spice Girls (1996) and US alternative zines (1994)

We dressed up to mess up: Virtual book launch of the Malcolm McLaren biography

//Clockwise from top left: @vieux.wave, @pippabrooks, @luxoramor, Nick Vivian, @ladyacss, @chrissalewicz//
//Clockwise from top left: @belmaczmayfair, mr + mrs @adamskiofficial, @joebrookks, @pippabrooks, @ourmanincairo, @mrsgorman//

We have to take our pleasures where we can during these grim times, and last night’s virtual book launch of my Malcolm McLaren biography provided a much-needed tonic.

The plan was to celebrate the publication with a party at the library bar of London’s hotel The Standard, with a relaxed congregation of friends and contributors and DJ sets by Pippa Brooks and Pam Hogg.

Continue reading We dressed up to mess up: Virtual book launch of the Malcolm McLaren biography

‘Masterful and painstaking’: The Life & Times of Malcolm McLaren will be published on April 9

“Within the slippery divides between disciplines and media – fashion, art, music, interiors, commerce – one finds Malcolm McLaren, roaming and creating.”
Lou Stoppard in her essay in The Life & Times Of Malcolm McLaren

Disruption to the publication of a book is extremely small beer at a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has set the world in disarray, so I’m sanguine about the postponement of several events and signings which were due to occur around the publication of my biography The Life & Times Of Malcolm McLaren.

//The back of the book jacket features this 1976 portrait by photographer Joe Stevens//

Continue reading ‘Masterful and painstaking’: The Life & Times of Malcolm McLaren will be published on April 9

Extremely rare Sex Pistols/Smoking Boy shirt up for sale

//T-shirt from the first run produced by Malcolm McLaren in March 1976. Photo courtesy Bonhams//

“This was my first attempt at making a Sex Pistols T-shirt. I wanted to create something of a stir”
Malcolm McLaren, 2005

An extremely rare and controversial T-shirt from the first run produced by Malcolm McLaren in the early spring of 1976 for the new group he managed, the Sex Pistols, is up for sale tomorrow at London auctioneers Bonhams.

Continue reading Extremely rare Sex Pistols/Smoking Boy shirt up for sale