Subway Sect

Samer, Southampton, 2014

You can take it or leave it as far as we're concerned

Because we're not concerned with you

 tribute to King Robbo, Crem, Southampton, 2014

What you want is buried in the present tense

Blind alleyways allay the jewels

. 

Bees not Babylon, Yaritza Burgos, Southampton, 2014

I am a dried-up seed can't be restored

Lark rise, Lark 37, Southampton, 2014

 I hope no-one notices the sleep on me.

 I've been walking along down this shallow slope

Looking for nothing particularly.

 Jip 2 Crem, Southampton, 2014

Am I guided or is this life for free

Because nothing ever seems to happen to me.

 Ebz, Southampton, 2014

The Secret Society of Super Villain Artists

And I won't be tempted by vile evils

Because vile evils are vile evils..........

Ambition, Vic Godard, Subway Sect

1965 - there are places I remember

Still only four years since Yuri Gagarin became the first Man in Space, Bob Dylan had come a long way with Like a Rolling Stone, the Kinks were in the charts, the Stones, the Who, the Animals Gotta Get Outta This Place, Yardbirds with their Hearts full of soul, Manfred Mann, Them - golden year, golden year, good times, good times.  The Beatles had carried on being Beatlish, getting into the movies before their bubble burst.  By 1965 it was impossible not to notice what was going on in the outide world, unless like me you were only four. In 1965 the Beatles were still playing it pretty damn straight. Oh Macca, all you did was yesterday.

the Story of Them, Them

Now people say, who are, or what are Them?  That little one sings and that big one plays the guitar with a thimble on his finger runs it up and down the strings.  The bass player don’t shave much, I think they're all a little bit touched.  But the people came and thats how we made our name, too much it was.  Yeah, good times.  Wild, sweaty, crude, ugly and mad and sometimes just a little bit sad.  Yeah, they sneered and all but up there, we just havin a ball. It was a gas, you know, some good times...

and the biggest hit of 1965? Tears by Ken Dodd.  I saw Ken Dodd and the Diddymen, Doddy's diddy Diddymen at the Liverpool Empire in the 60s.  Probably not in 1965 but Doddy and the jam butty mines undoubtedly meant more to me than Like a Rolling Stone or Here Comes the Night. 

A year for movies too.  Surprising how many of these became Christmas televsion staples.  Or at least inspired song titles.

The Sound of Music, Doctor Zhivago, Thunderball , For a Few Dollars More, The Loved One, She,  The  Heroes of Telemark, Battle of the Bulge, The Great Race, The Greatest Story Ever Told, Repulsion, Faster Pussycat... Kill! Kill!, Son of a Gunfighter, Beach Blanket Bingo, Help!, The Sons of Katie Elder,  What's New Pussycat, Dr. Who and the Daleks,  In Harm's Way,  The Spy Who Came in from the Cold,  Cat Ballou, Von Ryan's Express, The Ipcress File, How to Stuff a Wild Bikini, Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines or How I Flew from London to Paris in 25 hours 11 minutes, Ship of Fools, That Darn Cat!, Shenandoah,  Ten Little Indians, The Agony and the Ecstasy, A Patch of Blue, 36 Hours, Bunny Lake Is Missing, Alphaville, une étrange aventure de Lemmy Caution, Inside Daisy Clover, Lord Jim, Fantômas se déchaîne.

Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines is probably the only one of these that I remember watching as a child, probably not in 1965, but not that much later.  And The Sound of Music. But I still try to blot that out.

1964 - history is bunk

Munchkins, I, II, & III, Idelle Weber, 1964

History has a way of being written not by who is right but by who is left.  Watching Punk Britannia you could be fooled into believing that Punk was all about the Sex Pistols and Clash.  There's no question that they were two of the first and two of the most important but Punk was about so much more. From the Drones, Buzzcocks, Slaughter & the Dogs, Eater, the Adverts, Wire, the Plague, Sham 69, Johnny Moped, X-Ray Spex, UK Subs, Ed Banger & the Nosebleeds the story was much more about those halcyon days when bands leapt on stage, though they couldn't play (furthermore they had nothing to say). 

You might also get the idea that the whole country was swamped by punk rockers.  It isn't true.  Most people didn't even notice punk in 1976. Through 1977 there was plenty of press coverage and the NME was filled with news of punk but sales were minimal and the biggest punk bands were playing to an audience of hundreds while Pink Floyd, Genesis and Yes were playing to tens of thousands.  By 1978 punk was dead on the vine.

What does this have to with 1964? Well, revisionist history would have us believe that in 1964 everyone fell in love with Beatles.  And if they didn't love the Beatles it was because they had plumped for the Stones.  I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that although the Beatles were massive in terms of pop group popularity, that popularity was limited to a narrow band in terms of age and class.  A million sales in a country of 50 million (UK) or 200 million (US) is relatively small.  Even 73 million watching the Ed Sullivan Show does not translate as 73 million fans - at least half of those watching were parents suggesting that those longhairs cleaned themselves up, got a haircut and a proper job.

The Civil Rights Act, Vietnam, Liverpool winning the league, Beatles, Dylan, Kinks, Beach Boys, Warhol, Idelle Weber, the British Invasion, Louie Louie.  Something was happening (wasn't it Mr Jones) and the world did change eventually, but in 1964 the old world prevailed.

High Ceiling—You Won’t Get This, Idelle Weber, 1964 (Photos: Courtesy the Chrysler Museum)

1963 - take a trip around the world (dedicated to Brandan)

It is no accident that the first couple of posts in this series were headed up by pictures of astronauts.  The first was Yuri Gagarin, first man in space: he did it, he actually sat in that tincan, floating in a most peculiar way, planet earth being blue and there being nothing he could do (nothing that Laika couldn't have done presumably).  The second (from 1962) was an artist's impression of men on the moon - then still a few years away but within reach.

My paternal grandfather was born in 1895.  In the late 60s he told me that he remembered the first airplanes and now look, in his lifetime, Man was walking on the moon.  Where, we wondered, would Man be walking when I was his age?  In my first decade we'd gone from the first man in space to landing on the moon - and. perhaps even more impressively, returning safely to earth.  The concept of progress was just there, in the air.  Well, it was if you were a nine year old boy.

Progress went a different way though.  Once there was a Stars & Stripes planted on the moon space travel got knocked on the head.  But the development of computers (and associated technologies) has been staggering.  In 1978 (or thereabouts) the tech college I went to got a computer.  So we were told.  Never saw it or knew anyone who did.  Apparently it took up up a whole floor.  And was probably as powerful as a pocket calculator.  And nowadays . . . Last week we were talking about an event in my grandfather's life back in 1919.  He'd fought with the Liverpool Scottish at the Somme and Paschendale during the Great War and was still Over There in 1919.  He was part of the guard of honour at the memorial for Captain Fryatt at Antwerp. I googled Fryatt Antwerp on my phone and a few moments later we were watching this video.

The opening pictures of the Liverpool Scottish in their kilts coming down the steps carrying the coffin caused a collective gasp.  We're still not sure which one is grandad but these men are his comrades, his brothers in arms.  Until now all we've known about this event is a single still photograph.  And by the wonders of a technology unimaginable a couple of deacdes ago we are watching a film of this on a mobile phone.

The development of music during the 60s was similarly startling, exemplified by those lovable moptops, let's hear it again for John, Paul, George and Pete Ringo.   Following the abortive Decca audition they'd been signed by EMI, released a single and in February 1963 recorded their first album, Please Please Me.  One day in February.  February 11th 1963.  The same day Sylvia Plath commited suicide.  Patti Smith once said something to the effect that as a teenager she had sometimes felt suicidal but didn't want to miss the next Rolling Stones record. While I've never looked forward to hearing the Stones I understand what she meant.  Everyone needs landmark events to look forward to, whether it is Xmas, a new car or a new One Direction cd.

Please Please Me, it goes without saying, is a lot better than the Decca audition.  There's no Sheik of Araby or Besame Mucho for a start.  But it is still rooted in what went down well in Hamburg and the Cavern.  It still isn't miles away from what other beat groups were doing.  But just wait. 

There were a whole bunch of Lennon/MacCartney instant classics - eight of the fourteen tracks were Beatles originals, the others were covers. Amongst them was Anna.

Anna, Arthur Alexander, 1962

Anna, Beatles, 1963

Anna, Humble Pie, 1971

What else happened in 1963?  Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech, Kennedy's assasination, Moors Murders, Profumo, a brand new baby brother.  And a move to a brand new house.  In a brand new housing development.  We recently helped my oldest daughter move into her first brand new house.  In a brand new housing development.  As I was carrying a box of stuff into the house I looked along the road and saw the same scene repeated time and again all the way along the road.   Everyone had got their keys the same week.  This Saturday morning there was a flotilla of white hire vans, peopled with young couples, dragooned parents and friends, helping a new generation take flight.  Same as it ever was, same as it ever was.

1962 - When you're a Jet

from Dreams of Space

Picture this: New Year's day 1962, four Scouse chancers, John, Paul, George and Pete turned up at Decca studios in north London to impress the southerners.  Unfortunately they sounded like this: 

Till there was you, Beatles, Decca audition, 1962

That isn't the worst song (Sheik of Araby probably is) but it is pretty representative.  Decca didn't make a mistake in rejecting the Beatles on the basis of this audition tape.  They went back to Liverpool, knocked 'em dead at Litherland Town Hall and New Brighton Tower ballroom.  At New Brighton there was said to be an audience of over four thousand.  That sounds pretty impressive but I remember going to New Brighton Baths in the '60s and there being at least that many people there every weekend.  There wasn't room to actually swim. New Brighton Baths wasn't even the only pool around - there was the Derby Pool at the other end of Mockbeggar Wharf and the Guinea Gap in Seacombe.  Guinea Gap was where we went with school to learn to swim.  But that was a bit later in the '60s.

New Brighton baths, Wallasey

It is said that one of the drivers of Merseybeat was the fact that Liverpool was a seaport and everyone's big brother was forever going across to the States and coming back with a duffel bag full of records by Little Richard, the Isley Brothers and Chuck Berry. My dad was in the merch and he brought back a few records. Unfortunately he was terminally unhip. Have a conversation with him about modern popular music and he'll probably say something like "you don't hear much from that Sarah Brightman these days",

What he did bring home included a trio of classical albums (the 1812 Overture, a family favourite; Holst's Planets; Dvorak's New World Symphony) presumably from a 99 cent bin and a copy of West Side Story.   West Side Story was the most popular album of 1962, spending 54 weeks on the chart (some in 1963 obviously).  With a limited number of records the same ones got played repeatedly so we got to know When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way from your first cigarette to your last dyin' day pretty well.  While this early introduction to gang culture could have led to a life of delinquency I was somewhat put off by the dancing.

When You're a Jet, West Side Story, 1962

There was one record that the Old Grey Feller brought back that had some cred.  It was a 10" extended extended play: eight rock 'n' roll songs, two by the Everly Brothers.  This is one of them:



 Bird Dog, Everly Brothers, 1958

In the outside world the Americans were carrying out nuclear tests, the Russians were carrying out nuclear tests, the Americans carried out more nuclear tests, the Russians carried out more nuclear tests, even the British carried out nuclear tests.  There was the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Americans flew the X-15 ever higher, a Russian spent four days in space, the Canadians launched a sattelite called Allouette, eh.  The British contribution to the Space Race was Telstar by the Tornados.

Telstar, Tornados, 1962

Throughout 1962 the Tornados were Billy Fury's backing band.  Billy Fury had worked on the Mersey ferries and for some reason had incurred the wrath of my old Nan, who would always refer to him as "that Ronald Wycherley with the tight trousers". 

Last Night was Made for Love, Billy Fury, 1962

By the end of 1962 the writing was on the wall . . . in September the Beatles recorded Love Me Do.  With three different drummers - first with Pete Best, then with Ringo and third time with Andy White.  Released in October in climbed to a heady Number 17 in the charts - most copies reputedly bought by Brian Epstein.

Love Me Do, Beatles, 1962

1961 - Red Star, Blue Moon

Second week of April 1961 was a busy one.

Tenderness, Sam Cooke

• Sam Cooke went into a studio and recorded Cupid and Tenderness (unreleased version).
• Bob Dylan got his NYC Big Break when he started a two week residency at Gerde's Folk City in New York, opening for John Lee Hooker.
• Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space (possibly the second, but the first to survive, if the rumour about Vladimir Ilyushin is true)
• It all kicked off in the Bay of Pigs
• I was born.

Seminal week. 

A song or more from each subsequent year will appear each day between now and <undefined future date> .  From around 1973 the songs will be the ones I claim for my own, songs that meant something to me at the time.  Before that music was background.  I don't honestly remember listening to music in 1961. For some people that never changes: they don't get music.  They are happy to listen to Coldplay, James Blunt or Adele.  For some of us that isn't an option.  Music is not background, music is the answer.

I don't know what the first song I heard was.  It was a long time ago.  I didn't want my youngest daughter to not know the first song she heard so I engineered it so that Black Cat Blues by Lightnin' Hopkins was playing in the car as she left the maternity hospital. 

 Black Cat Blues, Lightnin' Hopkins

Maybe the first song I heard was the song that was Number 1 (in the hit parade) all through April 1961 - from the film GI Blues, Elvis and his Wooden Heart.  Seems reasonable.  If I'd been a parent then I probably would have lullabyed my children to it. 

Wooden Heart, Elvis

Although possibly more likely I would have sung Johnny Kidd & the Pirates Shakin' all over.  A 1960 release but too good to miss out on.

Shakin' All Over, Johnny Kidd & the Pirates

When it did come to lullabies many years later the Residents came up trumps.  I would sing mein kinder to sleep with Bach is Dead or (fittingly, I now see) Elvis and his Boss. 

Bach is Dead, Residents

Elvis and his Boss, Residents

Wooden Heart was replaced at the toppermost of the poppermost by the Marcels' Blue Moon, another stone cold classic and a song that Elvis recorded for his first album.  Elvis' version sounds like it was recorded on the moon, sounds like nothing before or since. 

Blue Moon, Marcels, 1961

Blue Moon, Elvis (1954)

In July 1961 Yura Gagarin visited Manchester 

Note the movie playing at the cinema in the background - Beat Girl with Adam Faith.  Here's the opening credits (Beat Girl was renamed Wild for Kicks for the US market)



Not a bad start.  Some good listening in there.  I haven't fully thought this through.  I mean, five of the songs on this first post aren't even from the year in question.  But, hey, I was only a baby with no concept of time.  We'll see what 1962 brings.

Flora Borsi

 

Elvis, Time Travel, Flora Borsi

The first I saw of Flora Borsi's work was a series of photographs of 20th century icons like Elvis, Warhol and the Beatles which Flora had photoshopped herself into.  They were fun, they were funny, they were clever without being groundbreaking.  I've done it myself.  Not so well, but I've done it.  Ok, nowhere near so well, but I understand the principle, if I was a bit more patient . . .

Woman with Green Hat, Picasso, Real Life Model, Flora Borsi

Then I saw another series of pictures: The Real Life Models.  These posited the idea that Modigliani and Picasso painted people who actually looked like that.  One picture in particular stopped me in my tracks.  The Corn Poppy by Kees van Dongen re-imagined by Flora Borsi.

The Corn Poppy, Kees van Dongen, Real Life Model, Flora Borsi

I don't know what it is about the picture.  The starting point is van Dongen's portrait.  This in itself is a wonderful painting.  It is thoroughly modern (in a 1919 sort of way), thoroughly ancient (I can imagine it as a cave painting), totally timeless: it sparkles.  And then Flora superimposes herself upon it. Gilding the lily. The cherry on top.

The Time Travel series was a funny, punny commentary on modern media and the nature of instafame but The Real Life Models took things a stage further.  Putting herself in the picture, Flora Borsi claims this art for herself, she's not the onlooker, the voyeur from Time Travel, she is the subject.  But in disguise.

For me, The Corn Poppy suddenly made art interesting again.  So much so that I started a blog, called it TheCornPoppy and began my search to find an answer to a question which I haven't quite formed yet (the question, not the answer).  Something about when is art art and when is it not art. Or what is original thinking in art. Is it ever worth taking a photo (or painting a picture) of something that someone else has already taken a photograph of (or painted).  I even started painting pictures.  I even painted The Corn Poppy, multiple times.

Smudge tool, Photoshop in Real Life, Flora Borsi

Flora Borsi, born in 1993 in Budapest, was still a teenager when many/most of these images were created.   These earlier works are about identity but they're also very much about the process.  We know it is about clever photo manipulation.  We're in on the joke when we see the Real Photoshop series.

Identity, Flora Borsi

Watching each successive series of works shows her development.    Each new series of images shows a growing maturity, a development.  It has stopped being about the technique.  The images are more abstract, more fluid, more fluent, more eloquent. And although Flora is often the subject matter her identity is hidden or disguised.  She's got her johari window open (but the curtains are drawn). Look at these.

Recent Artwork II, Flora Borsi

Recent Artwork 1, Flora Borsi

 

Des Monstres, Flora Borsi

Did I mention the Beatles?  One of the astonishing things about the Beatles 1963 to 1967 is the incredible journey they made in a very short space of time, from Love Me Do to A Day in the Life, for example.  When, in 1962, Lennon & Macca sat down in the McCartney's front parlour with a couple of guitars and a piano and wrote I Saw Her Standing There they were trying to emulate their heroes, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Elvis.  And why shouldn't they be able to?  Berry, Holly and Presley were barely out of their teens themselves, kids from from St Louis, Lubbock and Tupelo.  By Revolver and Rubber Soul they weren't trying to be anyone other than John, Paul, George and Ringo.  

Time Travel is Flora Borsi's I Saw Her Standing There.  It's a statement, a first assault. Since then she has rattled off a couple of solid albums.  But I think now is where the fun begins.  Flora is moving at a rate of knots towards something that is genuinely new, exciting and, yay, groundbreaking.

iReel, Flora Borsi

Coffee Universe

The Coffee Universe images are striking but reminded me of a 1970s album cover (Rick Wakeman's Journey to the Centre of the Earth where, if you look closely you will notice that the ocean is actually beer).

Flora Borsi will be in London this week for a gallery show at Leontia Gallery (Thursday 18th September 6-8pm).  You should go.  See what the fuss is going to be all about.

All of these images are copyright Flora Borsi.  Most have been borrowed from www.floraborsi.com. I hope she doesn't mind me using them.  I'll put them back when we've finished.