Between Channels

Old Graffiti

2012-02-17T16:57:00.000-08:00

Evening all. Aside from chanelling the spirit of PC George Dixon, I've been examining illegal daubs and smears throughout the ages. Here's some underneath this very paragraph.

Playgrounds = perfectly fine to hang around in when you should be at school. I love the carefree white fluffy clouds scudding gaily across the sky, whilst some Mad Max-esque poles loom menacingly over the world's ugliest wall. PS - Question: What is pain? Answer: Falling off that cast-iron see-saw.

I'll take mine with a red wedge. Powerful stuff, although it does look like it was sprayed on the door of one of the generators you find round the back of blocks of flats.

How shall we see this? The rise of a new youth culture eclipsing the old? The arrival of a fresh, vibrant youth culture that the previous generation could not possibly own? Or that despite having any number of fresh and vibrant youth cultures, we will always have someone called 'Nidge' writing on walls? Reader, you are the ref.

Try googling 'Techno Force'. You ain't gonna find what they were graffiting about. Or perhaps the artists were a group of young, urban gunslingers who were proper into evaporators and driers? I don't know. Let's all just google 'Nidge'. Be seeing you!

Devon Folklore Tapes

2012-02-07T14:11:00.000-08:00

This is a very interesting project (and if you're reading this then the chances are you will agree) that is well worth a look. A handmade package consisting of Devonian folklore and a cassette of spectral, field recording-style folk, it's just the sort of thing that I would pop on the shelf (much to the distress of Mrs. BC).

I couldn't put it any better than the folks responsible for it all, so here's a link to their site plus another to the soundcloud page where it can be aurally perused. I hope you like it, I certainly do.

Samuel Youd, 1922-2012

2012-02-06T14:06:00.000-08:00

Samuel Youd, better known as the writer John Christopher, passed away on the 3rd. Writer of numerous brit sci-fi classics, I always enjoyed his books and will now hunt down my copy of 'The Death of Grass' by way of tribute. I may also hunt down a copy of the 1970 film adaptation 'No Blade of Grass', starring Nigel Davenport and directed by Cornel Wilde. The main theme is apparently by Roger Whittaker.

Although many of his books are out of print there are plenty to look for; Youd / Christopher wrote prolifically under several aliases including Stanley Winchester, Hilary Ford and Peter Graaf. 'The World in Winter' is great, as are 'The Guardians' and 'The Possessors'. 'The Long Voyage' would have made a great obscure mid-sixties thriller and is very entertaining. But I'm sure you know all this already. Here's to a writer who will be remembered for his very plausible (and peculiarly British) science fiction.

I-Spy People

2012-01-19T15:53:00.000-08:00

Hullo! Hope you all had a nice Christmas. Well forget about it now, back to the brutal misery of January and what better way to ease us into 2012 than a look at The Dickens Press' 'I-Spy' series. I'd like to get a look at some of the others; 'On the Pavement' sounds particularly riveting (or stomach-churning) while 'In Hospital' could be particularly poignant (or stomach-churning). Anyway, you know how it works - see the person (or pavement detritus) and simply add up the points. Let's go!

OK let's see. From the cover I spy Buster Keaton and Peters from Peters & Lee behind the stewardess, and the looming, cloaked figure of death loitering by the aircraft's tail.

Just look at that toff! Look at that swell! Ten points! I like the quote from Pope, and the slightly dispiriting news that you need a grand and a halfs-worth of points to become an 'Anthropologist First Class'. That's like, 150 toffs! It'll take me years!

Where did you see yours? In my dreams, in a deserted seventies shopping arcade underpass, slowly lowering his fiddle as I pass him before starting to walk behind me with a sure-footedness that belies his disability...

"What's the Civil Defence man for, Mummy?"
"Hush now darling, and let me take you to the matinee - you haven't seen 'The War Game' yet have you?"

Yeah, just look at them. Watch them carefully. Just watch them. And when you've seen them, just let me know. Alright? Good lad.

Score for a blind person - nothing. Score for a Morris dancer - forty. That's more than the toff!

I may well have found my new headed notepaper design. Thick as a forest! Fifteen points!

"Um, excuse me mister - are you.."
"Yes my child! Twenty five points!"

That's nice. It's a good message to send to children - the world is better for difference. In fact it should be celebrated, and it's all the better that this message is disseminated to the young. For it is they who hold the key to the future.

Aw. I feel good now. Let's see who else we can spot. Look, there's a Guide with her saxe blue blouse and pleated skirt. And there's a Brownie, with her ni... Jesus.

Well there we are. Who won? All of us, as that word is not used as an adjective anymore. Let me know if you get 1500 points: I'll send you the address to write off to. I'm going onto a popular auction site to look for 'I-Spy On the Pavement'. Be seeing you!

Christmas on Mars

2011-12-19T19:47:00.000-08:00

So here it is - Merry Christmas! Everybody in these pictures is guaranteed to be having fun. But they can't look to the future now. Something something about it's only just begun.

I don't know where these places are. The photographs have no identifying text on the back, and have been sourced from various sets. They do have one thing in common though - they all encapsulate the festive joy that is the Christmas period.

Muffled against the cold and driving rain, she presses gamely on, the pram cutting through the puddles like the bow of a destroyer on the Arctic convoys. Her quilted anorak is soaked through, and her heel is sore after the inattentive gentleman behind her trod on it. The shops don't have what she wants and little Frank is crying somewhere beneath the transparent plastic cover on the pram. If only his father were here. Then again he'd probably be craning round to look at that dolly bird in the black boots' legs. Trollop. The only comfort she has is that this moment of ordinary misery will never be captured for the world to see. That would be awful.

The problem with modern towns is traffic. High streets that were laid out before the age of the motor car just can't cope with modern traffic volumes. That wasn't the case in the old days. Oh no. Take a look at this - all the Tizer lorry has to do to progress up the street is drive round the Mini van, slalom past the Austin 1100 and the other thing, and then pass through the generous gaps left by the three lorries entirely blocking the road. Piece of piss, or indeed, Tizer. They're probably all going to the Town Centre Exhibition. Yay. Two things of note; it's a shame that you don't get shops called 'Hump' anymore and secondly, the photographer took this picture whilst attached to the bonnet of a P6 Rover, having absent mindedly wandered into the road.

The twins liked nothing better than a day out at the precinct. All day they'd just hang about, looking at all the half-masts.

If you want to get your Christmas shopping done, there's always the arcade just down the road. It's nice, honest. You could place a bet for your loved one (William Hill hasn't had to spend its profits re-designing its shop fronts) or go to John Fane and get, well, whatever John Fane sells. John Fane, incidentally, was the tenth earl of Westmoreland so perhaps it sells grouse or ermines or something. The area is also, for the Christmas period only, suffused in a poisonous brown mist.

Terraforming on Mars was not easy.

A lot of the colonists got a bit depressed.

Feel free to print any of these images out to send as Christmas cards. Though only for work colleagues, not friends or family. If I don't post anything before, have a very Merry Christmas and don't go back in time to any of the places shown above.

Creative Masks

2011-12-11T12:27:00.000-08:00

Oh, hello! You know how it is when you compile a load of old photographs and books to put up on your blog and then they just disappear from your house? No? Oh. I do. I just can't find anything. Its all gone. Disappeared. Apart from 'Creative Masks for Stage and School' by Joan Peters and Anna Sutcliffe (pub. Plays Inc, Boston 1976). And something about shopping centres which I'll put up once I've ripped the floorboards from the house in search of my stash. Anyway, lets get on with it.

According to wikijustmakeitupedia masks are worn for 'protection, disguise, performance or entertainment'. I'm wondering which one of those functions this one performs. All four probably.

That's not a mask! It's a sweater and a half though.

All teachers wear glasses do they, Jenny? Well actually I do, but that's not the point. Actresses and spies are fair game though. None of these are masks by the way.

These haven't come up very well, although rest assured she is holding a pair of scissors in front of her face in one picture, and wearing a pair of tights with two chocolate digestives stuffed down them in the other.

Now THEY are masks. A stately home garden setting, although it looks a bit damp underfoot for leotards and bare feet. If you can name the performance these are for, I will give you a biscuit and an M&S Frosty Ball.

(Note - I do not know what performance these masks are for).

Well that has eased me back into the whole posting on my own site thing. If I find the other bits and pieces I'll let you know (I say bits and pieces - two months worth of yellowing instamatics!), in the meantime I'll meet you in the shopping centre for the crippled children's bangers and mash party. And I'm not joking.

David Bedford / Bert Jansch

2011-10-05T17:02:00.000-07:00

The Hanging Gardens of Redditch

2011-10-04T07:34:00.000-07:00

Me - Welcome to the Kingfisher Centre, Redditch. Fancy a look around the shops?

You - Um, no. I'm actually quite thirsty. Is there a pub in the Kingfisher Centre? Why are you walking off towards the shops?

Me - It's hard to imagine shiny tiles and prefabricated pebble-dashed concrete panels as being the materials of the future, but that's what they were once upon a time. What have we got beneath this lovely cladding? There's Martins (THE newsagent). Who's that anxiously stepping out?

You - I suppose you're going to tell me. Fred West?

Me - I thought it was Peter Green with Holger Czukay in the background. But now you mention it ... anyway, my favourite feature is the vacuum tube system for transporting old ladies to the upper levels.

Me - There they are - the Hanging Gardens of Redditch as promised. Pretty impressive actually, with a huge prehistoric fern in the middle of each concrete cylinder, with a spotlight shining down from underneath. It's better than a fountain or a poor likeness of a dead local celebrity (who in this case would be John Bonham, although when Nigel from Dodgy drops from the twig I'm sure they'd form a statuary supergroup). I also like the various yooves 'angin round the benches, with the White Panther guy on the left being by far the best. To balance it out there are five menacing old ladies who resemble the Batley Townswomen's Guild. There'll be no bother today.

You - It's all very good but I bet there isn't a pub here.

Me - There is actually. It's called The Swinging Sporran. I don't have a picture of it.

You - That's disappointing. Did you take these photographs yourself?

Me - Thanks for asking - no I didn't actually. They were taken by Peter Moss Ltd of Halesowen. That should deflect any anonymous cheese-paring in the comments section.

You - I'm off to The Swinging Sporran. Meet you under the giant, swinging concrete flower baskets.

Me - Bye!

Happy Birthday?

2011-10-04T06:33:00.000-07:00

It was my birthday recently, and I thought I would mark the occasion with a celebratory post. Something with a fun birthday flavour eh?

Then my laptop suffered a nervous breakdown, and the new laptop doesn't recognise the scanner and Oh Lord, what a to do. Luckily, being a resilient sort I think I've ironed out the problems and here we are.

Old fun can look pretty creepy, although my favourite detail is the small sausage lying on the tray of my high chair. I'm assured that it is a sausage, by the way, by two very reliable sources. I believe the stardate is 1979 but oddly enough I don't remember being there.

Now that we're back on track I should see a little bit more of you. Right. Where are the rest of those photos?

Intermission

2011-09-13T14:39:00.000-07:00

Hello there. Apologies for the recent inactivity on the site, but my work takes pretty much one hundred per cent of my time at present, and although I am still stockpiling things to post I just never seem to get an evening to do anything productive, let alone compose the sparkling comments to go with the pictures. Ah well. Soon, soon.

As an interim measure I will share some of the top beat sounds currently reverberating throughout the concrete walls of bc towers.

Be seeing you!

Lets Make Puppets!

2011-08-10T09:06:00.000-07:00

Hello. Sorry for the lack of action recently, and thank you for all the marvellous comments from everyone relating to the last post. You're all ace. Back to business. What do we do in the school summer holidays?

We make puppets! This recent find (by A.R. Philpott, pub. Evans Brothers London 1972) shows us how to go about it. But like the hasty child I am, I've ignored the 'Let's Make' parts and skipped to the 'Puppets' bit. The young man on the cover seems to be a little ... apprehensive about the relic on his arm. He doesn't seem to be able to ... stop looking at it. It's all pupaphobia you know (yes there is an official label for fear of puppets, although as my father would probably say "Whats the Latin for 'For God's sake pull yourself together?'")

Maybe for a primary school production of 'The Fog'?

I refer the Right Honourable Readers to my comments on Found Objects.

I remember that glue. It ate into polystyrene and left a wonderful gummy cap over the nozzle when left for a while. It could also cause blindness and hallucinations. Be careful, little girl!

Yeah yeah, nice puppet. It's the background I'm interested in; slatted wooden benches, smooth pebbledashing on concrete surfaces, hardy shrubs in containers, plastic-coated wire fences with gaps just big enough to fit the toe of your Clarks in ... Ladies & Gentlemen I give you the Seventies School Playground!

The title of Janis Joplin's posthumous unreleased live album.

Barely able to function after being parted from his puppet-master, the young boy sits slumped on a bench in the playground. I'd be catatonic as well if I had to untangle the wires of 'the metal tape creature' whilst Miss Goody Two Shoes gets to swoop about with the ace 'Let's Pretend'-style cat. Look at his knees. Pre-five pound jeans, these haven't been patched for the sake of fashion!

'The thing that stuck in young Jenkins' mind was the hands. As the apparition bobbed silently behind the chair towards him, he noticed that the hands, ostensibly shaped rosewood, had a peculiarly sinuous and lifelike quality. Indeed, Jenkins was almost convinced that he could see the tiny veins rising and falling slowly and miniature beads of moisture glistening among the folds of skin. The effect was as if some person unknown had replaced the puppet's hands with those of a large frog.'

'The Imp' by M.R. James from 'Ghost Stories of an Antiquary', 1904.

I don't really fancy making puppets any more. Back soon with more handicraft, markets and shopping centres. And music. Check behind the sofa before you turn the light out tonight.

Struck down by Anonimity, or, Ron Adams' Photographs

2011-07-24T05:28:00.000-07:00

Hello. Sorry I've been away for so long, but work has been a priority over the last few weeks and for various reasons I haven't been able to post anything. Thank you to the people who have kept looking in (albeit in vain).

It was particularly heartening to read the two recent comments posted about the Friars Square shopping precinct in Aylesbury. Before getting to the point, I have to say that many of the pictures taken were by Ron Adams - sorry Ron, I would never have posted any of your pictures had I known you had taken them. They were sent to me, and not nicked off your flickr page. The point of the photographs on this site is that they were taken, and then discarded by, anonymous people. If anyone else sees their stuff in the post, apologies for not crediting you - I didn't know anyone else had ownership of them. I'll edit the posts accordingly.

Which moves me to my point. Hi Anonymous - thanks for the heads up re the photographs. And now for a between channels impertinence. The very nature of the internet means that a lot of people can do things anonymously (or at least under a different handle, as I do!) be it hack into NATO or leave a comment on a web page. Which is fine - free speech and democracy and all that. All I ask for is a little courtesy to go with it - chippiness and / or haughtiness seems to be a default mode for some folks on the web, especially those who don't care to leave their names.

If anyone has a problem with a photo credit or with any comment I make on the site, just PM me (the email address is on there) - don't just leave an anonymous comment on the site which is designed to make me look foolish. I wouldn't do it to you, Anonymous. You have made a very good point but there are better ways to make it.

Friars Square Shopping Precinct, Aylesbury. Part 2

2011-06-15T05:09:00.000-07:00

Welcome back to the between channels Aylesbury extravaganza at Friars Square shopping precinct, courtesy of Sean Hancock. More pics of the place in various states of decay as well as a couple of examples of local colour. Lets press on.

Very nicely composed picture - it almost looks, well, quite nice.

Garments galore at the market, although judging by the heavy attire of the punters I reckon it's a little early for short sleeves (to be fair they are old ladies and as we've seen before on this site, old ladies tend to wear overcoats in all seasons).

Could be a photograph from an old Cabaret Voltaire album cover. Businesses that wouldn't do very well these days Number One: Visionhire.

Peering through the Instamatic murk we have the Friars Square facade. It has some nice municipal sculpture-y bits underneath the lettering, but apart from that it's as cold and unyielding as a former Soviet remand centre. I like old photographs taken on overcast days. They seem to say 'Remember - the past was also this.'

Looks like things are slowing up a little - when the big shops start to shut you know you've got problems. Some japes from the blokes who were whitewashing the windows and also note the large quantity of weeds roosting in the concrete planters. Really sets the place off don't you think?

Cheer up, it could be worse. It might NOT be a unisex hairdressers. Where would you get it cut then, eh?

The strain is etched onto the faces of these people as the siege of Leningrad dragged on for another month. Things are still ticking over, despite the utter devastation that has been wrought in the background. It's interesting to see how the phased demolition has spared some parts (presumably the less sepulchural and profitable ones) and bashed the rest down whilst the shoppers go about their business. Tea, Coffee? No thanks pal, I'll have a drink.

A modern re-imagining of 'Quatermass and the Pit'. The old market square is gone, but at least they've left the Wimpy bar with its bold, raked windows and decorative flanking towers.

Oh.

More mayhem and dismemberment as the demolition teams move in. Not even Granada was saved.

A pigeons-eye view of the redevelopment. Note how Friars Square stands out from the rest of Aylesbury - those rendered and pebble-dashed concrete slabs are in stark contrast to the rest of the town huddled to the right of the picture. The Wimpy and Granada are no more. But I won't leave you with sad memories..

The Olympics have come to town! Well, not your town because they're in Los Angeles but they've sent out an envoy. I've never seen an Olympic mascot sent out as PR before - I wonder what London will be sending for 2012 (insert bit of politics here)? This American Eagle is definitely making himself at home, swaggering round outside Wimpy. I like the synchronicity of the large white patch on the ground behind the 'bird', as if it has just made a man-sized excretion at the feet of the two unimpressed looking young men standing adjacent.

Milton Keynes has its cows ... and that's about it, but Aylesbury had its ducks. I say had, this one seems to have survived destruction, propped up as it is in somebodys garden. What would you do with it when you moved house? And seriously, if Aylesbury had any sort of civic pride, surely it would want to reclaim its concrete duck for a nominal free? As an aside, this picture is a companion to the 'Seventies Recreation' post, featuring as it does one of the most badly sited children's swings in Christendom. Yeah, put it next to the hardcore on the pallet. Next to the duck. On top of the remains of the industrial waste we burned. That's it.

That is also it for Aylesbury. I've enjoyed posting these pictures as they really give a flavour of a long-gone sixties precinct. I may never visit Aylesbury in the future but I can say with certainty that I have visited its past. Until next time...

Friars Square Shopping Precinct, Aylesbury. Part 1.

2011-06-14T03:45:00.000-07:00

Morning! This is quite exciting for me because the pictures posted here have been sent by between channels' first ever contributor. Take a bow Sean Hancock, who sent me this motherlode of pictures depicting the rise and dear decline of the Friar's Square shopping complex in Aylesbury.

An example of early sixties 'brutalist' design, Friars Square was used by Stanley Kubrick for some of the location shooting on 'A Clockwork Orange'. It's not there anymore, at least not in the form shown in the photographs here. There seems to be a peculiar undercurrent of dread running through the place - the local duck breed was originally wiped out by 'duck fever' in the nineteenth century (although it sounds a bit like a David Essex album title) and in the seventies a pamphlet called 'What's Happening to Aylesbury?' was produced, which detailed tales of unemployment and bored youth causing mayhem on the streets and concrete underpasses. I think we'll be right at home here, then...

This ticks all the right boxes for this website, I think.

The biggest Woolies in the country.

How's this for a central feature? A damn great wedgy, glass-fronted cafeteria horned by two retro-futurist Mayan towers. Note how dark and dingy the surrounding area is, even in bright sunlight.

A market AND a sixties brutalist shopping precinct? Marvellous. All told, it looks a bit - well, bleak, bringing to mind post-war Dresden. At least the 'cafeteria' has gone and turned itself into a Wimpy. It'll be a burger eaten with a knife and fork first, and then down to the square where a young John Peel will sell you a wicker shopping basket on wheels from the shadows.

Pretty impressive, nice and clean - nothing can make this square look cluttered and untidy.

Ah. Looking a little more weathered a few years down the line, the market is in full swing. Lots of sprouts on offer - quite a few market stalls mark their prices up in that font even now. Any idea what it's called? I'll start us off with 'Brussels New'.

The Wimpey bar has been condemned and moved to redevelop are afoot. The spiral fire escape is rather lovely, like the inside of a whelk shell. There's a similar one atop Sheffield's Castle Market, next to the winding gear for the lift. I tried to go up it and then had to retreat quickly. God knows what the vertigo-suffering office workers of Aylesbury would have done in a fire.

Zodiac Toys in the background, when there were still toy shops in shopping precincts. Note the street furniture; prismic advertising posts and those deep concrete planters, nominally flower beds but actually a handy place to store soaked cigarette ends and crushed cans of lager.

Our Price, a chain much derided in its declining years, but try finding a record shop nowadays (HMV aside). To be fair most of the chain record shops all sold the same stuff, and when you did find that Jesus Lizard cassette you really wanted, it was £18.99. The only exception I found was the HMV down The Moor in Sheffield, which stocked an incredibly large amount of krautrock. You'd see people's mums flicking through the racks and looking at albums by Grobschnitt and Embryo in bewildement. So to conclude, Our Price was rubbish, good riddance.

Jesus.

More Aylesbury images to come. Don't have nightmares.

Covered Markets of Olde England - Rotherham!

2011-06-02T08:28:00.000-07:00

I know what you're thinking. Ok, I don't - but I think people are thinking 'why so many covered markets and shopping centres?' Well a) I like them, and b) by taking a microcosmic look at unfashionable and neglected parts of a societies popular culture and infrastructure, I think you can learn a bit about them and 'enter the time machine' more easily than, say, looking at the same images of swinging london or that eighties clip of a yuppie in a bar thumbing loads of fivers. And c) I've got a lot of photos of covered markets and shopping centres.

But I digress. Here we are in Rotherham, and this is a covered market in the literal sense - a load of market stalls in a vast hangar. It looks quite futuristic - like the alien virus from The Andromeda Strain multiplying in your local town centre. Attractive too, with muted tangerine and mustard (did I say attractive?) pyramids topping each stall. And they're good stalls - Lees of Leeds (a jewellers that is still going strong), a toy shop, book shop, tree overall shop. Tree overalls? Must be a word that has been obscured, although it is a gap in the market.

I would describe this gentleman as 'solid'. More old ladies, one of whom has a jellyfish-skin cap.

The view from the walkway. Is it just me or can I smell damp cement dust when I look at this? Main thing of note is the yellow cabinet on the far wall - I have a distant folk memory of something like this being a children's ride, where you sat in it and lights went off and it rose up and down on a hydraulic arm. Is it a Yellow Submarine? Is it a children's ride at all? This seems to have contradicted my earlier statement about learning things from the past - perhaps I'll amend it to 'you can observe things from a distance and try to join up the dots'. If anyone can assist re this tantalising image, please let me know. We shall take our leave from Rotherham. Until next time ...

Mansfield

2011-06-02T07:48:00.000-07:00

Welcome to Mansfield! I don't know why we're here, or when (though there is a sixties feel to things, I think you'll agree).

A trip to the Nat West first - same font and logo and everything, although what we're all looking at is the old lady in the foreground hanging a gold lame-suited Elvis pose in the middle of the road. Two of her colleagues trek back and forth across the junction a little further up like baddies in an old computer game: traffic calming measures, sixties style. To the right of the picture a woman seems to have perched her white-breeched infant on one of those trolleys that grocers use at the market. As an aside, I think this picture has the most old ladies in it than anything else ever posted here - a between channels record!

This is Mansfield Market, with the Bentinck Memorial in the background. Looks imposing, with lots of neo-Gothic fronds and frills but it looks like it's missing something. Well you'd be right to think that - as a memorial to Lord George Bentinck, fourth son of the Duke of Portland, you'd expect there to be a statue of him in the middle wouldn't you? Fortunately the burghers of Manfield saw sense and didn't stump up enough money for the statue (probably thinking, quite reasonably) that the Duke of Portland's son's estate should have possessed the means to whittle one themselves.

Anyway, he isn't there, although mum and daughter are. She gazes wistfully at the Agfhan coat and the tightly be-jeaned arse of the clothes stall proprietor. On the cusp of womanhood she is symbolically turning away from twin-set mum, as if to say 'Yes I am here, I am young and this whole status quo has to change'. Mum has seen some pegs on the next store along. Come along Cecilia, she seems to be saying, look at the pegs. There will be a swift backward glance, and then back to the Hillman Imp. What could have been, if only I were younger ...

That's what I think anyway. Best thing in this photograph? Well, it could be the lonely, kerb-poking Asian gentleman, keenly missing the country of his birth and yet determined that Mansfield, his new home, will be the making of himself and his family - a man apart, but not out of place. Or it could be the Michael Kitchen / Tom Jones crossover stood next to the old boy with the flat hat. Long leather coat, wide leg trousers and shell-toe trainers! The merry-go-round is sadly not in colour but it seems to have attracted a fair crowd of female spectators, despite being situated next to the bins.

That's enough sociological discourse in Mansfield. Time to press on with the rest of the backlog...

The Ridings Centre, Wakefield

2011-05-26T06:59:00.000-07:00

If the Waverley Centre was 'a bit much', lets visit the whitewashed chill-out room that is Wakefield's Ridings Centre.

A nice view this, giving us the full vista of 'The Garden', a central snacky-communal-mingling area. Quite a bit to look at here - most notable is the streamlined and illuminated 'Metropolis' style lift, which takes you from outside Miss Selfridge (pink neon sign = ace) and sets you gently down amid bubbling mini-waterfalls and garlands of flowers. A good place to relax before you go to ...

Britain's premier door fittings and domestic fixtures outlet! Don't worry if you haven't seen a branch for a while, they still have a reassuring presence on the internet. Speaking of reassuring presences, the chap with the khaki bodywarmer seems to radiate good vibes - people pass him in the arcade and can't help but be drawn to him. As he descends the stairs to browse for a clock in 'Knobs and Knockers', an old couple bow and curtsey to him as they pass. You don't get deferential old people like that anymore. I like the style of the young chap with the green cardigan, looking a bit Miami Vice as he strides past the lamps and brass fireguards in Ks & Ks window. No accessorising necessary for him.

As for the decor, we've got it all really; mirrored panels, mock street lights, little coloured in-fills on the railings and that honeycomb roof-material that looks like it's made of balsa wood. This riot of colour and artifice has all been a bit much for me so next time we're going back to the sixties. Until then ...

The Waverley Shopping Centre, Edinburgh

2011-05-24T13:09:00.000-07:00

Yeah, Fine Fare can sod right off when you can go and visit the city where the Tripods lived. Forget trying to make your shopping centre a tasteful, neo-classical, 'up-market' experience, you should instead fill it with mirrored panels, tinsel, spotlights and a glowing hive mind that levitates in a pool of water.

I don't remember places actually looking like this, but I'm sure my nine year old self would have been in seventh heaven. I love the lack of delineation between steps and water - you could just take your Spud-U-Like and groove on in there. Try and imagine the results of a potato-related slip: a cross between Don't Look Now and the beginning of Scanners.

Here's a better view of the paddling p...er, water feature, with various punters making themselves comfortable (or as comfortable as you can get on potato-flecked toilet floor tiles). Points of interest - the two identically dressed men hustling a youth out of his place on the step. What's in the bag? Also note the hold that the glowing sphere has over the boy in the blue jacket. They'll find him, last man standing with just a small white plastic knife and fork in his hand, still staring, oblivious to the sirens.

Well, it's not all snacks and fountains. There are shops too - here's the mini-market. You know the story. You go to Edinburgh for the weekend and want a souvenir for your other half. What, this? Yeah, I got it from Little Haiti. You know, the one in Edinburgh. The older lady in the doorway is tempted, but not sufficiently so to cross the threshold.

It's time to leave Edinburgh, but I'll be making a stop at another palace of shopping delights. I'll wager it will be understated, uncluttered and timeless. See you shortly.

My Fare Lady

2011-05-24T12:01:00.000-07:00

Hello! After a short (long) hiatus, we're back with more eighties life, although this time we're taking a step back from your grandparents' sitting room and having a look outside. This picture was amongst a batch taken in Edinburgh, so I presume that this branch of Fine Fare is in the Athens of the North. As for the year, Fine Fares were re-branded as Gateways from 1986, so maybe just before that. OK, I haven't a clue.

Lets have a look then. Ever get the feeling someone's following you? Keep walking girls, Mummy's just taking you for a nice walk. Yes, keep a tight hold of Teddy. No, I don't care that Coca Cola is only 63p. It's a brisk march past for this lady and her kin, although I don't blame her as she seems to have attracted the attention of Molly Weir off of SuperGran and her beige husband, who are left spinning in their wake.

As for the prices, we have Red Salmon at £1.29, and Stewing Beef at an outrageous £1.34. The rest is sadly pixellated beyond my ken, although I would love to know what only cost 29p. Having seen the other pictures in the set, I think I have a rough idea where mother and daughters were heading, and it certainly ain't Fine Fare...

Covered Markets of Olde England - Huddersfield Queensgate!

2011-05-08T08:41:00.000-07:00

Hello! Huddersfield Queensgate Market is one of yer actual bona-fide buildings of architectural merit, with a roof made of 21 distinct hyperbolic paraboloid parts, and a series of relief panels outside designed by artist Fritz Steller. Overall it's a pretty impressive place, and given that the photographs aren't exactly of the first order, there isn't much scope for the usual facetious comments. I'll try my best with the slim pickings at hand.

Here are the relief panels and a nice bit of landscape gardening. I particularly like the rustic looking man trotting by like a frisky Lippizaner stallion - there's none of that in Castle Market. Place like this make people happy!

After World War Two ended, Robert Capa spent a lot of time in Yorkshire, taking action pictures of covered markets. Here he is accompanying a crack couple of middle aged people past the fruit and veg store. You really get a feel of what it was like there - the smell of concrete and cabbages, the chirp of sparrows that have got trapped inside. On a serious note, just look at that roof. Bluewater doesn't have anything as bold or well-designed.

Sadly, due to an error in the processing lab, Capa lost most of his Queensgate pictures and so we have to end with this tantalising view of John Lewis's Bookstall. THE John Lewis's? I'm not sure but it looks ace, although I will forever be tantalised by the Wiltex sign. The suffix '-ex' suggests a modern and durable man-made fibre: the prefix 'Wilt' suggests the smell that will arise from your armpits after a hot days shopping in late sixties Huddersfield.

If you want to know more about Queensgate, and see what it's like now, go to Huddersfield Gem.

If you want to look round a mind-melting eighties shopping centre or go for a black and white ramble through a provincial English town of the sixties, come back here in a bit. And an additional thanks for the response to the Eighties Grandparents - I think the hauntological community has adopted Grandad Le Mesurier as something of an icon. It's all been rather lovely. Mind how you go!

Grandparents of the Eighties Part Two

2011-05-03T08:26:00.000-07:00

We've been to one set of grandparents, now lets visit the others. If they offer you any sweets, don't eat them. I'm not cleaning the car up for your sakes. But we'll talk about cars later.

And here we are! Grandad, and he's a hard character to pin down, what with the twinkly smile and old-Ted hairstyle. Part of me pictures a career in the Merchant Marine and a whole afternoon of risque stories about Sierra Leone and posh officers, but I'm also getting a double dose of John le Mesurier a bit down on his luck, holding court in the front room of his new council bungalow. Anyway, things aren't so bad - there's always Sherry, sat there faithfully, and a footrest to take the weight off while reading the papers.

But let's look around again. You're not telling me there isn't a Grandma right? This isn't one of those aesthetic Grandads with a Daschund and a lavender scent packet on the radiator. Plus, he's sat in Grandma's chair (check out the Grandad-proofing on the cushion and the antimacassar.) But what sort of Grandad sits on the settee? Agh! This is proving to be a stressful visit.

What's the reason behind this picture? Perhaps they were trying to capture the rather globular daschund doing a trick, although it could be one of those photographs people used to take in case they were burgled, to show the insurance man they had a telly. Anyway, here we are and I'm liking the brass hood over the fire and the turtles underneath. The decor is quite larky at first glance; lethally spiky conch on the telly, a little brass beer bump handle, a brass counter bell that goes DING when you strike it - but then have another look around. Anything missing? What have Granny and Grandpa Le Mes done with all those school portraits you sent them? Yes that's it, they must be in the other room. The one we're not allowed in.

Time to go home, and it shouldn't take too long because isn't that a Fiesta XR2 parked outside? You're the greatest, Dad, although it isn't too far beyond the imagination to picture Grandad Le Mesurier screeching up to Fine Fare to get some evening drinkies. Anyway, it's been really rather lovely to see you, thanks for dropping by.

Grandparents of the Eighties

2011-05-03T07:42:00.000-07:00

Hello! Aren't you growing up fast? Make yourself comfy. Is he allowed a drink, Keith? Today we're visiting our grandparents at between channels. These pictures were in a hoard I recently purchased. The others in the series were of various non-descript garden scenes, but these two caught my attention straight away because this is an actual view of a real grandma's house in the eighties. Take your shoes off when you get into the kitchen.

Dad and lad have sat down to read The Sun. The haircuts match, but that's where it ends - whereas Dad has cunningly angled the paper to hide what he is looking at, son is checking out an Annabelle Croft-alike on the facing page. There isn't a hint of sideburn between them, as befits the decade. Although there's no sign of a dog, we do have a tank of those swollen-eyed goldfish that fascinate grandchildren so much. Don't bang on the glass.

Other things to note; the phone with one of those little phone number holder things next to it (from the days when we wrote down a phone number ONCE, and then that was it), a letter rack nailed to the wall, a sizeable antimacassar on the velour sofa and the obligatory grandparent accessory, an ashtray.

Here she is! And I have to say that the photographer has crept up on their subjects twice, because Gran isn't aware of the presence of the camera - she's more intent on watching Spurs on the telly! This Maysles Brothers-like unobtrusiveness lets us have a good look around. Brass things on the wall, and what looks like a video with a wig on. This is some serious kit - my parents didn't have a video for years and when we did get one I'd get told off for rewinding for too long 'Because it will wear out'. There's either a packet of cards or a packet of cigs on the gas fire, although looking directly down from there gives us a clue as to what's in the box.

One last thing before I give you a mason's handshake that conceals a pound coin - look at the photographs. On the windowsill, above and beneath the telly ... that's real love that is. There are more covered markets, shopping centres and bits and bobs to come, but I have to confess that there wasn't just one set of grandparent photographs ...

Covered Markets of Olde England - Coventry!

2011-04-18T07:37:00.000-07:00

Ever wanted to go to a covered market in 1973? Um, well you can, even if you don't want to because this is the subject of my latest batch of photographs. Upon acquiring them I thought 'Why would anyone actually take these?', but after my recent holiday to Valencia I found myself photographing all sorts of shops and new buildings so I answered my own question : a 1973 version of myself.

But enough. These two had 'Coventry' written on the back of them so I'll start here.

It's warm enough to leave your coat at home, but the gentleman in the foreground has decided to go fully buttoned up - matching suit and tie, even when buying the groceries. No sign of standards slipping there, although I wonder what's on the mind of the be-dungaree'd chap on the right? Robin Askwith or Robin Nedwell? I'll leave that to you. The rotunda caught my eye first, but then I was drawn to the various pieces of British cast-iron peeping through the railings on the roof. I can indentify a TR6, P6 Rover and some sort of Ford estate, lest we forget that once we made and designed things. Any idea about the rest?

The camera is not a passive observer here - it has startled the middle-aged couple in the centre and caused the centre-parted young lady on the right to pretend to look at the fruit and veg stall in order to capture her best side. Things I like; the terracotta ceiling, the uniformity of hanging signage and the presence of the young lady in the blue velour jacket. She's in the first picture too -

Is the photographer's girlfriend tagging along, checking out the bargains whilst he pursues his obsessions with covered markets, or is he doing something else - maybe following someone? I leave you to decide. There will be more Covered Markets of Olde England later. Be seeing you!

Seventies Recreation

2011-04-10T05:01:00.000-07:00

These undated photographs show us the range of free time activities available to seventies youngsters - hanging about on the rec, graffiti, go-karts and, er, shopping trolley jousts.

No-one on the swings and no sign of those roundabouts that were banned by councils across the country, but some proto-This is England grafitti on the slide. Nice. Like a crime-scene photograph.

Great care went into siting this playground - on the wasteland behind the estate, near the garages. Note the slide, which appears to utilise the ladder used to climb into a Vulcan bomber.

Nothing really - just hanging around. I do wonder why the photographer took this picture. Is this 'Blow Up'?

Trolley jousting. God help the Bowie fan who walks along here.

Marc Bolen.

Arsenal shit bast. Pre-graffiti culture graffiti is interesting in its banality. There are no 'street names' for Eddie Kelly. Some of it looks as if it were written in blood (that or Cresta).

This is the most fun, and the photograph that conforms most to the nostalgic view of pre-computer childhood. I've no doubt that modern parents would have something to say about go-karting down the middle of the road, especially with pre-crumple zone Austin landcrabs lumbering in the opposite direction.

More slices of pre-digital life to come soon, along with some full-colour covered markets. Get your bargains here, although probably after I come back from holidays. Be seeing you!

1982

2011-04-08T04:10:00.000-07:00

More Sheffield, and this time we have materialised in 1982. Tumultuous times for Britain but not reflected here on the streets of Steel City, where shoppers rest on uncomfortable benches, old men huddle in the stygian gloom of the Hole in the Road, Reliant Robins wobble through city traffic and guitar-'n-violin buskers entertain Chinese tourists. And I'd fortgotten that WH Smiths' old corporate colours were brown and orange. The one jarring note is the grafitti in the Hole in the Road, something reflected in other grafitti photos I have recently acquired.

Sex Sells ...

2011-04-05T06:37:00.000-07:00

... nozzles, tubes and outdoor safety showers.

All of the ads are taken from trade magazines from 1974-5. Women are still used in advertising in much the same way, so not much has changed since these were published, although I doubt you would see smoking now.

The Tram That Never Was

2011-03-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

Proposals, montages and diagrams from 1975.

Eddie O'Keefe - The Ghosts

2011-03-26T17:05:00.000-07:00

I recently came across American film maker Eddie O'Keefe's new short 'The Ghosts'. A tale of a girl in a small town, the film has a hypnagogic, lucid dreaming quality - did this happen? Is it a projection of the hopes and dreams of the main character? Decide for yourself. As well as being beautifully photographed, it has a wonderfully atmospheric soundtrack.

'The Ghosts' features two of my favourite things - fairground architecture and 'Sleep Walk' by Santo & Johnny. Watch!

The GHOSTS from Eddie O'KEEFE on Vimeo.

Spacemen

2011-03-26T15:12:00.000-07:00

We're back after an interminable wait to fix the scanner, and here is the magazine 'Spacemen' as promised. This copy was bought in Oxfam for 50p, which must be an Oxfam record as most of it's books are somewhat on the pricey side. Rather charmingly the cover bears the date March 1964, which has then been blacked out and replaced by 'June'. It's billed as 'The World's Only Space Movie Magazine' and was a precursor of the various cult TV / SFX type publications. The chief interest in 'Spacemen' is that it must have provided the only source of information on SF and fantasy films for many fans in the early sixties, and probably the only source of images. The pages of the magazine are full of adverts for 8mm prints of films, spoken word LPs and film-related books and comics. You can also buy Venus fly traps and parachutes, but that's another story.

The 'Orbituary Department' section is the one that really catches the attention of the modern reader. Fans write in and request a still from a film that has caught their eye or stuck in their memory - so we get a printed image that confirms a fleeting impression from a film seen in the recent past. What we don't know is whether, for example, Fran Keylark thought that the Martians from 'The Three Stooges in Orbit' were worth the price of a stamp (I for one think they do). For all the technology and fantastical happenings that these sci-fi films portray, the society that produced them was unable to produce a way of capturing them and allowing their fans to watch them or look at still images 'on demand'. The fact that I can now, with a few keystrokes watch the 1958 clinker 'Queen of Outer Space' for free says a lot about the strides made in digital technology in recent years. It's poignant to think that we now have vastly more technology in our homes than is portrayed in these uber-futurist fantasies of the late fifties and early sixties, and probably more poignant that people cared deeply enough to write a request to see a single picture.

As well as the requests service, 'Spacemen' also played a practical role by informing readers of new sci-fi and fantasy releases. Stills accompany the listings and some of them look great. I really want to see German film 'Sonny's Flight to the Moon', if only to confirm that it really does have six women in bowler hats and snorkels patrolling the lunar surface with umbrellas. Anyone heard of it?

Then there's 'Planet of the Storms', the 1962 Russian film that was later chopped up and used as the basis for Curtis Harrington's 'Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet' and the Peter Bogdanovich / Mamie van Doren barrel scrape-athon 'Voyage to the Planet of Prehistoric Women'. Interestingly (to me) the black and white pictures I scanned from 'Spacemen' look much more like images from Mars or Venus than the crisp, full-colour cinematography of the actual film.

Inevitably there will be more from 'Spacemen' later. And if anyone really has seen 'Sonny's Flight to the Moon', I'll send you a letter requesting a synopsis and photograph.

Curses!

2011-03-17T13:31:00.001-07:00

It's typical. Just when I'd got a load of old sexist adverts from seventies trade magazines as well as esoteric early seventies avant-garde architecture and a weird sixties American sci-fi fan magazine (which has a page where readers request a still from a particular film to be printed because they remembered it was a good scene) my bloody scanner breaks. As we are on a tight budget at between channels there may well be a short hiatus whilst I search eBay for a new thermionic valve (or go to Staples). To tide you on here's an old back issue of 'Processing' magazine, featuring a bloke and a big bank of controls. Until later ...

Haunted Landscapes

2011-03-14T09:36:00.001-07:00

Aktion! or, C.E. Fudge unmasked.

2011-03-07T09:10:00.000-08:00

I don't know, nothing for ages and then two posts in a day. This is advertising H.A. Schult's 1970 performance piece 'Aktion 20.000km'. Schult travelled across Germany in a Citroen Diane, recording his thoughts and experiences on tape, and photographing people and things he saw on the way. At each stop he sold his photographs, used maps, tapes and spare bits of car. In Schult's own words; "A whole land as an environment ... For twenty days people have reacted who have never heard about art."

As a postscript to my adventures with C.E. Fudge, I can now reveal the great man's identity. Professor Colin Fudge is Pro-Vice Chancellor & Vice-President of Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology and I have contacted him with regard to returning his portfolio of pictures. No answer as of yet but I wait with bated breath. Many large thank-yous to Chris Marsden of Huddersfield gem and Manchester Modernists, who provided this (and much more) information on Professor Fudge. Please check out the links as Huddersfield's Queensgate Market is definitely of interest to readers of both this blog and Found Objects.

It feels strange knowing the identity of C.E. Fudge. The young man who boldly travelled to the farthest corners of modernist Britain, from Cumbernauld to the Chelsea Drug Store, is now revealed as a Professor and an expert in his field. I wonder if he had any inkling he would end up in Australia, or as a senior figure in an educational establishment. Probably - people like that are both talented and driven, with a will to succeed in their chosen field and a willingness to take risks that can offer them professional and personal fulfillment. However, if it wasn't for people like me - beetling around charity shops and second hand book dealers when they could be writing that CV - nobody would have seen Professor Fudge's wonderful photographs in the first place. I do have some work-related things to do tonight, but might just do a bit of scanning first...

Spring Reading

2011-03-07T08:13:00.001-08:00

Like a squirrel burying its nuts in winter, I have recently stockpiled a few paperbacks for reading in more clement times. These are they ...

It all starts with the CND, and ends with the Reds marching down Whitehall (according to the blurb). Tantalisingly there was a TV adaptation filmed by Associated Rediffusion in 1962 featuring Peter Vaughn and Denholm Elliott. By the same author (full name Robert Louis Constantine Lee-Dillon Fitzgibbon) - ahem - 'Adultery Under Arms'.

A collection of John Wyndham science fiction and horror stories, the titular name is short for 'Giselle', before I get any smutty comments (although you're welcome to comment on the word 'titular'). This is the 1978 edition, with uncredited ace title artwork.

Random sample - Page 219. 'Retribution - 'Baptize with dirt.' 'Throw stones at his feet to make him dance.' 'Take off his shoes and put water, grass and earth down his neck.' 'Spit in his face.' 'Make him cut his finger.' 'Put itching powder down his neck.'

I like Stapledon, one of the more agreeably bonkers classic British sci-fi writers. I have misplaced my copy of 'Odd John' (which, according to the rear cover 'explores the concept of man-love') but am looking forward to 'Sirius', where a puppy is born with the mind of a man following a series of experiments. Seeing as I also like Bulgakov's 'Heart of a Dog' there is a great sense of expectation. The cover is Paul Klee's 'In the Land of Precious Stone'.

Sample chapters; 'Abodes of Horror', 'Messages from the Grave' and 'Beware of the Sheep'. I'm sure Acid Mist released a concept album about this...

Featuring some great photographs that, weak spine permitting (the book's not mine) I will scan at a later date. There is mention of Tom Ventress and the near-two-ounce gooseberry he entered in the Egton Bridge Old Gooseberry Show in 1952, but sadly no photograph.

Plus about five people cornered me for World Book Day, so I also have lots of bestsellers to read and pass on. Perhaps Found Objects could do something similar - I'd be willing to swap some old copies of 'Practical Wireless' for a salacious primer on witchcraft. Anyone? Anyone?

Groovy Pads

2011-03-01T13:29:00.001-08:00

After a recent hiatus I will quickly post some groovy pad designs, and there are some at Found Objects too. I think we're safe to assume these designs are from the late sixties / turn of the seventies.

'Centering Environment' by Ted Hallman Jr. I'd get pretty centered in there, I can tell you.

'Moon Man Fountain' by Neke Carson, Museum of Contemporary Crafts, New York.

'Reclining Space for one' by Wendell Castle.

'The Sitting Room' designed by Elizabeth Harrison, ICA.

I'll be back on track with a little C.E. Fudgery later in the week.

Acid Mist

2011-02-18T07:24:00.001-08:00

One of my favourite record labels, 'Acid Mist', was often advertised in the most unusual places. I found these tantalising snippets in the back of some old issues of an industrial trade magazine called 'Processing'. They date from 1971-73.

'Technology & Technicians' was a library record recorded in Cathedral Studios, Lincoln in 1971. Sounds and textures for the laboratory.

'Versatile Pot Recorders'. Folk quartet from Grantham who pioneered use of the the 'synthaesia' device, pictured above. A small modular instrument that induced trance-like sensations and bizarre hallucinations amongst players and listeners alike.

Eponymous debut EP of Keep It Dry, funk quartet from Biggin Hill. Design by Peter Saville's brother James.

Acid Mist's biggest selling group in 1972 was 'Let's Get Together', a proto-industrial easy listening trio of arrangers and singers from Leicester. The album they're promoting here ('The Full Force in Filtration') was released on spin-off label 'Separation'.

Acid Mist dabbled in electronics, launching the Tricon synthaesia range. They were banned on the continent following a festival in Rotterdam.

Poster advertising Dusseldorf-based krautfolk group 'Particle Free'.

Another spin-off label, launched in 1975 was 'Joy' - it used the Acid Mist in-house session musicians to record dance music for the newly nationalised Locarno dancehall chain.

A promotional poster for failed teen idol Robbie Pursey. Unsure how to promote him, Pursey's Acid Mist singles flopped. Pursey left the music industry in 1976 to form a commune in Hull.

Water was a Christian bass-drums-synth/flute trio who recorded 'Electric Drilling' at Cathedral Studios in late 1975. Founder member Davey Twilley (pictured on the album cover) composed the original music for 'Play it Safe' and the alternative faiths programme 'Kandlemas'.

All of these items are extremely valuable but very scarce. Many are not even listed in buyers guides.

Concrete

2011-02-18T05:50:00.000-08:00

More post-war housing from Sheffield. Taken on an instamatic in what I think is the early eighties, they are very sharp images, slowly fading to amber and orange.

Carnaby Street 68

2011-02-07T05:32:00.001-08:00

Most people will know that the media image of what '1968' looks like bears little resemblance to the real thing. On history programmes you tend to see that shot of a young man trying on a guardsman's jacket in 'I Was Lord Kitchener's Valet' and then maybe John Lennon's psychedelic Rolls Royce followed by the Post Office Tower sprouting up through some bomb sites. All cobblers of course - in many areas the visual cues that we associate with the sixties only started appearing in the seventies, with long hair and bright bri-nylon clothes. Most of the people in C.E Fudge's photographs have a timeless, crisply preppy look with the shops and architecture taking the lead in appearing to be futuristic. Of course, these precincts and developments were new, many of them under 10 years old but it doesn't always yell '1968' when you look at them.

To remedy this, the next set of pics were taken when C.E. travelled to the nexus of swinging London to photograph some of the boutique shop fronts on Carnaby Street. The architecture isn't new, but the design aesthetic is. Let's have a look.

Here's Pop, already showing signs of self-parody judging by the display in the window.

His 'N' Hers is notable for being orange and looking a bit like a psychedelic Greek restaraunt. The flags are good though, as is the 'Detroit Cleaners Ltd' next door and the old Pepsi sign on the other side.

A little research tells us that this is the painted brickwork above 'Lord John' on the corner of Carnaby and Ganton Streets. Shades of the Apple Boutique, although I imagine that mural wasn't up for very long before it was whitewashed.

A quick look at Habitat, although C.E. tells us that this was on Tottenham Court Road. I like the jar in the window that says 'Beans' on it. Lessons in design no.1 - how to design a timeless shop brand.

Sacha was a shoe shop and looks a bit gloomy to be honest, like an old seaside aquarium. Of more interest is the cinema next door - apparently the Academy 1-2-3, quite an important picture house that had an art-house reputation (although they are showing Yellow Submarine by the looks of things). And I'd bet a guinea that that's a Wimpy Bar next door. There are still two in Doncaster!

Here's the one that really grabbed me - the Chelsea Drug Store. Now an icon for fans of sixties culture and design, it housed bars, shops and a chemist and is shown in its glory in 'A Clockwork Orange'. In this picture it looks a little like the foyet of a provincial leisure centre. Come on C.E.! Go inside!

Bugger. Looking more futuristic than before, C.E. apparently went inside the Drugstore and didn't take any photos, although it is recommended for 'the audio-visual experience and the powerful air-conditioning'. If you've seen the interior in 'A Clockwork Orange' you will know how startling and exciting it was, and it tells us everything and nothing about the nature of modern London and modern culture that the building is now a MacDonalds.

That's it for specific site visits, although C.E. did take some photographs of markets, which I will share with you next time. And as a stop press, top BC reader Christopher Marsden has contacted me with some information re the identity of C.E. Fudge. But that's for next time..

Sheffield Castle Market 1968

2011-02-03T06:19:00.000-08:00

The 1968 tour of British new-build shopping precincts continues, and today we pitch up in Sheffield. I've already explored the modern-day Castle Market in a previous post, and Unmann-Wittering took some great pictures of the covered market and signage on Found Objects. C.E. Fudge paid the place a flying visit and I like seeing it when it was less neglected.

Approaching from Castle Street, the market looms up out of the road like the island of an aircraft carrier.

Some good swastikas in the upper windows.

Ena Sharples fingers a blouse in the foreground.

Taken from the upper walkway and looking out toward Hyde Park flats - they built a lot of social housing in Sheffield after the war. Even in 1968 the walkway looks empty though. And concrete's propensity to age prematurely (a la Cumbernauld)is shown up again.

Max Wall passes up the chance to buy some fish.

So far, 1968 hasn't been particularly swinging, but C.E. Fudge and I will remedy that with the next set of pictures, in London's epicentre of cool (or just shopping).

Coventry 1968 and 2011

2011-02-01T12:16:00.000-08:00

There has been a lot of interest in C.E. Fudge's photographs, especially with regard to the sets taken in Coventry and Cumbernauld. Many people have recognised modern features and picked out places from their youth, but Paul & Elizabeth at Inversion Layer have made a direct photographical 'Now and then' comparison for Coventry city centre.

You can view it here and the rest of the site is well worth a look too. Further updates are in the pipeline but work (and a slow build-up of new photographs) mean I'm snowed under at the moment. Soon, soon ...

Elephant and Castle 68

2011-01-27T05:22:00.001-08:00

A brief stopover with C.E. Fudge at the new shopping centre in London's mysteriously named district, and first impressions are not good. Still unfinished when these two pics were taken, C.E. reckons it's the most unsuccessful precinct s/he has visited. The rememedy? "..coloured handrails as in Milan's underground station." I think it would take a bit more than that, though the place seems to have a bit of attitude about it, more Burgess than Ballard.

Dingy, hard-edged and roughly-finished, it makes me pine for Stevenage and Wembley - you can just picture the youths craning over the balconies and delivering long silkworm trails of spit onto the shoulders of innocent shoppers below.

Who is this droog clowning for the camera? One-legged dervish aside, this is pretty bleak stuff again : the E&C looks more like a converted multi-storey carpark than a shopping precinct. It is definitely more 'outside' than 'inside', and you can imagine some of the old ultraviolence taking place behind the photo-me booth. Look at the hospital ceiling-style striplights, and remember that this edifice was still under construction!

We'll be going somewhere a little closer to (my) home next time. See you there...

Sheffield 1960

2011-01-27T04:40:00.001-08:00

A brief interruption to the 1968 series of pictures comes in the form of these two lovely colour snaps of Sheffield city centre from 1960, and in glorious Kodak colour too.

The first picture is taken from the top of the pre-pedestrianised Fargate, looking up towards Barker's Pool.

This picture is looking back towards the point of view of the first photograph, from outside City Hall. On the right is the lovely old (and not so long demolished) Gaumont cinema. You can smell the pre-Clean Air Act atmosphere, ripe with factory smoke, Players cigarettes, Boots perfume and mentholated lozenges. We must fast forward in time for the next post though...

Ivey Balderson

2011-01-23T16:22:00.001-08:00

I recently happened upon the work of New York artist and sculptor Ivey Balderson. Check out the website here - there's a mixture of hermetic imagery, industrial construction and a bio-organic feel that brings David Cronenberg to my mind. The drawings have a Ballard meets Bacon look that particularly intrigues me.

Cumbernauld 68

2011-01-21T05:37:00.000-08:00

For our latest installment of the round-Britain 68 tour with C.E. Fudge, we head up to Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire's new town and home of Cumbernauld Shopping Centre. I must warn you now, the first couple of photographs are a little ... bleak.

For a long time I wondered what this picture reminded me of. Now I have it - it's like the colony where Ripley discovers the little girl in Aliens. A bizarre mix of hospital crematoria and the Royal Festival Hall on stilts, bear in mind that this building was under 10 years old when this photograph was taken.

C.E. describes this as 'a sombre scene'. Locals shelter from the rain while the children stand outside and challenge it. Note the cavalcade of prams parked outside, pre-stranger danger era.

Nicely framed by C.E. and I think it has stopped raining. Look at the bleak, block-house type dwellings lurking in the background.

More elevated walkways and flyovers.

Look once and then look again. The shoes, the brooding boy up on the walkway above Galbraiths and a middle-aged Michael Caine peering through the smeary windows.

Meet me outside the fish and chicken bar at two. Rain settles in the sagging floor, and even the barbershop's pole has stopped turning.

Scan books. "It is the oasis in a desert of concrete." (C.E. Fudge).

As a couple is wed in the background, three wee boys mug for the camera. When did children stop looking like this? Black shorts, wrinkled socks and woollies. They could have stepped from the Blitz, into this concrete playground.

The main hall captures some weak sunlight as the jazz band play. Previously unknown cigarette brands No.1 : Kensitas.

A jolly illustration by the talented C.E. - note the little Alan Bennett inserted shiftily at the front. Cumbernauld - modern, complex, damp and unprepossessing, but extremely interesting nonetheless. A brief flit down south next, before heading back up north to a place I have visited in a previous post. Be seeing you...

Stevenage and Wembley 68

2011-01-16T16:16:00.001-08:00

When C.E. Fudge arrived in Stevenage it was raining. Still, he / she rather liked the place, although we only get a few quick pics of the town centre.

A man and a van. Austin A30 / 35 based? Wish I knew what those posters were advertising. Probably wrestling.

A bit wayward from Fudge - perhaps he / she was distracted by the noise of that person buffing the paving slabs in front of Woolies.

There are some amazing posters in the window of Fine Fare - if only C.E. had got in a bit closer ...

That's it for Stevenage. It's now off to -

Jesus. There are so many vertical and horizontal axes going off in this picture I don't know what to do. At least there's Richard Shops to calm us all down.

Beautifully composed. Just enjoy 1968, and how town centres used to number shop units on the signs overhanging the front.

Hmm. A bit Clockwork Orange. C.E. agrees and wonders whether the little vandal-tempting display booths couldn't have more brightly coloured roofs 'like in Paris'.

Lovely. Note the 25 year wedding anniversary horseshoe in the window of the card shop. That would be for a 1943 wedding.

I wonder what caught the girl in the stripy top's attention? Those children on the right? I wonder where she went afterwards? Leslie Davis'? Home? Is she still alive? These pictures pose so many questions - I think I may go out and photograph my own city centre, just to leave a record. And where are we going next? Ah, just have a look in a couple of days...

Trish Keenan

2011-01-14T15:01:00.000-08:00

At an age when I have less time for music than I used to, I've started to cherish those bands that really capture my attention, or at least continue to follow the ones that I was absolutely crazy about when I was younger. I was absolutely crazy about Broadcast, and still am : their sound, their influences, their aesthetic - it was and is all a big YES. To hear the news of Trish Keenan's passing is so sad. All fans of her music (and of good music) will keep her, and her family and friends, in their thoughts tonight.

Birmingham 1968

2011-01-13T05:00:00.001-08:00

We're staying in the Midlands for the second part of our trip back to 1968, this time going to Birmingham. Or rather, a particular part of Birmingham city centre.

C.E. Fudge found this part of town to be 'cluttered', which is something of an understatement. The air seems to hang heavy as the pensioners trek up and down the concrete stairs. I like the rococo roundabout in the background though.

It had to be here, really.

The jogged, blurry style is great on the escalator here. Check out how little Mothercare have changed their branding since 1968, although the ceiling is a little too 'Summerland leisure resort fire' for my liking. This picture actually puts me in mind of the start of 'Scanners', if it had been filmed by Michael Reeves in 1968.

Taken on the hoof in the middle of the thoroughfare, this picture gives us a type of fast food outlet that has now died out. Again slightly Michael Reeves-y, only this time it could be a still from that one where Boris Karloff and his wife take over Ian Ogilvie's mind.

Everyone on the go here except for the gentleman in the brown suit on the left, an oasis of calm in a bustling neon arcade. C.E. Fudge doesn't like the Bull Ring all that much and you can tell by his / her photos - taken quickly with little care for composition or detail. We're going down south next time. See you there!

Coventry 1968

2011-01-11T07:56:00.001-08:00

These photographs are taken from 'Colour in Shopping', a portfolio entered for the British Paint Prize in 1968 by one C.E. Fudge. I found this and a 1970 entry in a Sheffield charity shop and they are full of Instamatic photos of British town centres, inadvertantly documenting the fashions, designs and general meander of city life. Nobody notices Fudge as he / she strolls around, snapping the Locarno dancehall and the GPO phone booth / stamp machine kiosk. It's an odd feeling to see these cityscapes, clean and ordinary, and completely stripped of their context. This is just everyday life as it once was, and never will be again. There are quite a few of these, so I'll start off with the first in the book, Coventry.

A dapper gent and his good lady having a rest by the roses in front of Marks and Sparks.

Is this lady wearing a surgical collar? The woman on the far left seems to think so.

A rotunda cafe for ice cream and hot dogs; it could be the Korova Milk Bar. Is any of this still in existence?

The Locarno 'entertainment suite' is situated next to a Police information box. The font is surely more appropriate for a perfume or sunglasses shop?

What I would term as 'futuristic shit' - this is the GPO centre with telephone boxes and stamp machines. Street furniture at its best, although a point is deducted for not having a street map featuring a 'You Are Here' point that lights up when a small metal button is pressed.

A businessman is snapped unawares as he strolls through the dappled sunlight to his Ford Consul in the short stay car park. This picture shows the potential for dinginess in all these new concrete developments.

The Three Tuns' wall looks as if it is alive, or studded with the fossils of rare and unlikely sea anemones. This was probably demolished years ago.

Clean, bright, no empty shops ...

You could actually be there, in that shopping arcade with all those sixties people. Next stop, Birmingham.

Interplanetary Revolution

2011-01-10T15:25:00.000-08:00

A bit of Soviet stop-motion animation from 1924, 'Interplanetary Revolution' was written and directed by Zenon Komisarenko, Youri Merkulov and Nikolai Khodataev and tells the story of Comrade Cominternov, who smashes capitalism and fascism on Mars. It reminds me (in a non-literal way) of 'We' by Zamyatin and various bits of Mikhail Bulgakov. Music is by Pan Sonic. I find it all a bit frightening.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-23T13:48:00.000-08:00

I'm going to wassail with kith and kin in rural Lincolnshire and Edinburgh for the festive period and as a result will be shutting down for a while. This blog will be up and running again (and a bit more active) from January 4th. Have a very Merry Christmas and a less than usually disappointing New Year. And save me a bit of the Pyramint.

Her Eyes Are A Blue Million Miles

2010-12-18T16:07:00.000-08:00

I never thought Captain Beefheart would outlive John Peel - I don't know why, maybe because the former's voice sounded so old and gnarly, and because the former was always on the radio by my bed. I have dozens of old teenage notebooks that have covers filled with slanted written-in-the-dark handwriting, courtesy of listening to Peel in bed with the lamp off, and then having to note down the title or creator of a particularly startling piece of music. I don't do that anymore -partly because I've got older, and music no longer plays such a central and impulsive part of my life as it did before, and partly because the one true easily accessible conduit for 'my' music (Peel) has gone. However, I've got into more contemporary music (Demdike Stare, Forest Swords, Hardy Tree, Mordant Music, Pye Corner Audio, D D Denham etc etc) in the last year due to the blogs and sites mentioned in my links list. By digging around a bit I feel like I've got a bit of my old enthusiasm back. Thanks everyone.

I miss Peel's Festive Fifty, but don't really miss Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band because they retired years ago and I've got most of their music. The song below is one of my favourites - Don Van Vliet was married for 40 years, which I didn't know.

Captain Beefheart R.I.P.

2010-12-17T20:00:00.000-08:00

Computer Magazine #2

2010-12-07T02:50:00.000-08:00

More vintage covers from 'Computer', and all designed by Frank Yanai.

Computer Magazine

2010-12-06T15:16:00.000-08:00

These covers for 'Computer' Magazine date from 1975 - 1976 and were designed by Frank Yanai.

Wooden Sputnik

2010-12-03T06:36:00.001-08:00

From 'Wildlife and the Countryside' November 1967, illustration by Denys Ovenden.

Under the Ground

2010-12-03T06:08:00.000-08:00

These images are taken from 'Under the Ground' by Peter Usborne, published by Macdonald Educational books. The illustrations are by Derek Collard and Pace Studios. I like the overlays (ink and paint on real textured backgrounds)and the general flair with which the various roots, burrows and even worms have been drawn. The cover was probably great too, but sadly it's missing from my copy.

Sound Mirrors

2010-12-02T13:31:00.000-08:00

Hemmed in by a dozen inches of powdery snow and thick ropes of ice, my thoughts have turned to winters past, and in particular the wild and windy walks I used to embark on with my parents as a child. One trip in particular has stuck in my mind, as I came face to face with a piece of early twentieth century aircraft detection apparatus, abandoned and mottled with lichen in a field at Kilnsea, on the Holderness coast. The sound mirror was a pre-radar device that was used to pick up the soundwaves produced by enemy aeroplanes as they droned towards the coast, with the concrete dish directing the sound to a microphone set in the base of the mirror. I would go about their usage and history at length but there's no need because this site has everything you need to know about them.

Part of my fascination with sound mirrors comes from the fact that as well as being a technological dead end (detecting something by listening for it and waiting for it to arrive was bound to be superceded sooner rather than later)they are also situated in some of the less well-known areas of the British coastline. The names are not overly familiar; Kilnsea, Boulby, Denge, Seaham, Joss Gap and Warden Point - but they are definitely names to conjure with. Edwardian gentlemen, muffled against the cold, are sat in the shelter of their giant concrete discs grimly waiting for the whisper of Zeppelins or Gothas which will bring down destruction on Holderness or Hythe. It's the idea of science fiction before it became a stereotyped genre - as intoxicating an idea to us 21st century folk as the Royal Artillery and Royal Yeomanry battling with Martians in Surrey. Thinking about it, a stone saucer is a very good emblem for all early science fiction (or all science fiction): new thoughts tethered by old ways.

In addition they look pretty impressive as well, almost attractive with their purposeful curves and bulwark solidity. They are a good example of the utilitarian design becoming romantic and mysterious.

Drew Mulholland knew where it was at when he put one on the cover of the original release of 'Seance at Hobs Lane'. Time and obscurity have granted these graceful objects an aura of mystery. Defunct technology will always interest us, especially when its primary function is no longer viable. Like a bank of televisions that can no longer transmit a picture, a treeless coast of sound mirrors, a fossilised Jodderel bank, will always arouse the hauntological curiousity in me. New signals may still be detected on wintry days like these...

like a fossilised Jodderel Bank

Pye Corner Audio

2010-11-28T06:34:00.000-08:00

I've been inundated with work recently so haven't had time to do much in the way of hunting for images or scanning, but have been able to listen to more music than usual. As well as Demdike Stare, I've been very partial to Pye Corner Audio - lots of excellent drones, screes of decayed tape sound and Derbyshire-esque Radiophonic experiments. There are melodies too, something I'm rather partial to. Listen here and enjoy. You can buy their album to download too.

I don't know if it's just the artwork, but this music puts me in mind of Nigel Kneale's folklore-versus-the-rational TV play 'Murrain'.

It has a nicely bleak Yorkshire farming setting and coves some of the bases I touch on here - the past impacting on the present, folklore and tradition and old TV. Credit should go to John Broadley, who wrote about Murrain on his fine blog here, and from whom I nicked the above screenshot. To end on a cheerful note, 'Murrain' apparently means death. Mind how you go!

Demdike Stare

2010-11-24T03:33:00.001-08:00

Whilst compiling the next batch of posts, I have recently been listening to Demdike Stare. It's all pretty menacing stuff, condensing Eurohorror-artiness with the more abstract end of library music and electronica. I heartily recommend them, and all who sail with them.

Junior School Happening

2010-11-19T05:27:00.001-08:00

Film in Teaching - The Bird King

2010-11-19T05:09:00.000-08:00

A class of children devised a story about an unhappy man who is 'summoned to the kingdom of birds'. The collaged pictures telling the story were photographed with a 35mm camera using Kodachrome II slide film. 'Again, a soundtrack can be prepared and the projector operated according to pre-determined cues from the tape recorder'.

Film in Teaching - The Gun Pit

2010-11-19T04:45:00.001-08:00

More images from 'Film and Teaching' - three fourteen year olds (though I think they look younger) 'exercise the consequences of a direct hit by a bomb' using a Kodak box camera. Although the images look very depressing (partly due to subject matter and partly due to the grainy nature of the film) this was probably the best day these three boys ever had in school. Again, very Peter Watkins-esque, this time tilting more toward 'The War Game'.

Comus - The Herald

2010-11-15T14:11:00.000-08:00

All sixteen-odd minutes of acid folk's finest moment, 'The Herald' is actually pretty unrepresentative of the group's oeuvre, which can be probably summed up as 'forest death music'. There aren't many groups who can claim to have a completely unique sound but this is one of them; Roger Wootton's death-rattle vocals and a mix of rangy acoustic guitars and hand drums are offset by slide bass, reeds and violins. Where Comus really stand out from other late sixties / early seventies folk-inspired groups is the malevolent streak throughout the music. Rather than a bucolic place to relax or the setting for a familiar folk ballad, the forest here is a real place of fear and bewilderment. The lyrics range from gothic lust to madness and fear of imprisonment, all examined with a forensic eye for detail that makes it sound as if the singer is actually enjoying the vista of fear and decay that he is describing. In addition, the cover artwork is truly awful - not as in bad, but awful as in 'it's a cover showing a malnourished, twisted grey creature in agony'. A two CD retrospective was issued a few years ago, with the essential (and very difficult) 1971 debut 'First Utterance' on one disc and the 1974 'To Keep From Crying' album on the other. The second effort is by no means a disaster, but is a bland and smoothed-out shadow of 'First Utterance', as if the band had been lobotomised following the bacchanal and frenzy of 1971. Enjoy the oddly uneasy lullaby that is 'The Herald' and then delve deeper into the undergrowth with the rest of 'First Utterance'. You won't have heard anything like it.

How Babies Are Made

2010-11-08T13:43:00.000-08:00

This is 'How Babies Are Made', published by Time Life books in 1969. Blake Hampton is responsible for the wonderful illustrations. I haven't included the text (I hope everyone is clear on that sort of thing, and it isn't my place to tell you if not) but I will say that it is admirably forthright, combining the biological side of things with the emotional as well. I have included the perky little dog because I think it's rather amusing, and certainly unique as far as illustrations that I've seen. Although the overall effect is rather heartwarming, I do think that the children and babies look a little bit like Autons, which adds a tang of edginess to proceedings in general.

Seventies Graphic Design 3

2010-11-08T07:11:00.000-08:00

Here are some more images from the Sheffield Yearbook. This time 1973, as promised;

Seventies Graphic Design 2

2010-11-08T06:44:00.001-08:00

The images below were scanned from the Sheffield Year Book 1971. They were part of adverts, some of them the 70s equivalent of clip art, some of them designed specially for the company concerned. Taken in isolation and magnified considerably, they seem to develop new meanings; the grainy, ink-wet close up of an eye has become quite threatening, whilst the spindly-limbed telephone looks witchy, almost like a twentieth century familiar. There are more in the 1973 Year Book, which will follow shortly.

Film in Teaching - Interviews

2010-11-05T15:44:00.000-07:00

Stills and quotes from a series of interviews with locals in South East London. Removed from their context, the quotes have a strange power and poignance.

Film in Teaching - Barabbas

2010-11-05T07:00:00.001-07:00

I've recently come across two books published by B T Batsford about the use of film making in education. The first (and the origin of the following scans) is called 'Film in Teaching' by Keith Kennedy (Batsford, London 1972) and details how to use film and videotaping as a way of teaching primary and secondary school children. It is full of wonderful black and white stills and photographs from student films and I've been scanning like mad over the last couple of days. The first series, reproduced below, is from a play called 'Barabbas' written by 13 year olds. They look like stills from a Bugsy Malone-esque biblical epic as filmed by Peter Watkins.

The Tape Recorder in the Classroom

2010-11-05T06:18:00.001-07:00

I love this book cover. The sheer delight of these boys is tangible as they crowd around the school's new Revox. There's something a bit 2001 about their exploration of this strange machine, as if it will pass on strange and magical new skills without their fully comprehending them, assisted by the op-art background and the sci-fi novel title font (John Weston sounds like a science fiction novelist doesn't he?)

In reality, it will just have a man saying "Allo Christophe. Bonjour Jean-Claude." in a decidedly non-schoolboyish voice, whilst everyone giggles at the word 'piscine'. But that's technology for you; it can only deliver so much. It may, however, be good for this:

Sheffield Castle Market

2010-11-03T06:54:00.000-07:00

I'm kind of obsessed by this place. Here are some photographs taken in Sheffield Castle Market, a modernist shopping centre built to replace the old 'rag and tag' open market from 1960 to 65. Owen Hatherley has written about it far more eloquently than I can, but I will say that although Sheffield Council has tried its best to get the place dynamited over the last 10 years, it is far more used and useful to the ordinary people than the dull, middlebrow (and mostly empty) new developments that have sprung up in the last few years. Apparently one of the inspirations for Cumbernauld, Castle Market is now chipped and unkempt but always busy, serving the people of Sheffield who have neither the money or inclination to visit Meadowhall.

There are three floors of stalls including a fresh food market and various cafes (including the Rooftop, which has wonderful sixties furniture and more importantly, very good bacon sandwiches). The whole place is built on the site of Sheffield Castle, which exists in stump form somewhere in the basement. Before you form any Stone Tape-y ideas about the powerful influence of old ruins on the present, you should know that access to the castle comes via a peeling wooden door round the back of the loading bay with a large sign that reads 'Sheffield Castle Ruins' pinned above it.

The view from the upper gallery. The gallery on the other side is now permanently sealed off, although the old shop fronts are still visible.

The cheerful original detailing on the bannisters only remains on the uppermost floor leading down from the upper gallery.

Lew Burgin's is actually still open, though they seem to have forgotten to take their old shop signs with them, and no-one has bothered to remove them.

All the old fixtures and fittings remain upstairs, although some of them weren't installed particularly well in the first place.

Near this sign is the old mini-market, now known as the 'Collectors Fair', which is a glass-walled room of old varnished wood booths containing only one trader; Roy Jenkinson's Stamp Shop. Roy knows pretty much everything about Sheffield and sells old postcards of the area as well; his stuff seems to have organically spread throughout one half of the room. I asked him what happened to the other traders. "They left a couple of years ago. A woman from downstairs came and told them that the rent was going up so they all cleared off at once." He scratched his head. "That was in 1985." Time seems to have stood still for Roy in that room. I would have taken a couple of pictures but I think that might have been a bit rude. Maybe next time.

These tiles can be found at the end of the arcade behind the still-functioning hairdressers.

This is the Fresh Food Market. The Lucifer lens on the Hipstamatic doesn't capture the clean, eighties feel of the place, so I think I may return for another try.

This gives you an idea of the multi-levelled, labyrinthine nature of the market. Although it's most certainly a modernist building, it has been made with a feel for community and closeness - it lets people mill about, browse and stumble on things that they may want to buy. In other words, it's a space that is made for ordinary people.

Castle Woolcraft just sits open and empty, its counter gathering dust. I think it's just for people to lean on if the cafe opposite gets full. It reminds me of the shop from an old cinema foyet, although Poppets were not in evidence.

This is the Market Guide outside the old lift. An man from the building contractor working in another part of the market told me I was looking at the wrong sign. "The new ones are through there. We need to get rid of this old one because everybody still looks at it." I can't think of a worse reason for getting rid of an old sign (although moving it to the working lift would be a good idea).

The view from the Upper Gallery when the Market first opened in the sixties.

The view now, post-steel industry and post-Meadowhall.

This turret was added after the through road was pedestrianised. Bottles and cans huddle for warmth at the top.

It's easy to be sentimental about things in decline. Castle Market is not glamorous and by no means perfect - mention the name and many locals' faces will give a little involuntary grimace - but it isn't the building's fault. The whole area has been allowed to run down with the expectation that it would be replaced by a new 'Financial District', but the recession has put paid to that. Post-Meadowhall, Sheffield city centre will never be the same again, but if the Castle Market area goes, we will have lost another modernist building, planned and built in an age when councils employed architects to build things for the good of the community. I intend to keep going, and you are all welcome to join me for a pot of tea and a bacon sarnie in the Rooftop Cafe.

The Speaking and Sneezing Clock

2010-11-02T08:06:00.000-07:00

Can you imagine doing this for a living? The sheer serendipity of an early home-taper catching the live speaking clock lady sneezing has made my afternoon. She sounds like Betty Boop and is probably doing her nails as she reads out the time, for hours and hours each day before clocking off and going for cocktails. Now somebody sample this.

Comet in Moominland plus last Words

2010-11-01T07:17:00.001-07:00

It's nice to be back after a brief holiday in Venice. I took my camera and expected a haunted medieval archipelago, wreathed in fog and full of medieval-faced extras from a Fellini film. As it turned out (thankfully for Mrs. BC) it was really sunny and so all the pictures I took were ones of duomos and gondolas and things, and so of absolutely no interest to anyone who regularly reads this blog. I did however, find this:

Hmm. Sort of a Dali-meets-Quatermass feel to it, although the Moomins were always one of the most matter of factly odd creations in children's fiction so I wasn't entirely surprised to see a science fiction style cover.

In addition, I found a few more pictures from 'Words', although they aren't as spine-chilling as previous examples.

A prescient look at the effects of coalition cuts in the elderly care budget.

A Langley Schools Project-type benefit is arranged.

The late Brian Jones hands over the proceedings and a hazardous oil stove will soon be bubbling away in the corner of the parlour.

Abbeydale Road, Sheffield

2010-10-17T12:42:00.000-07:00

Some murky pictures of Abbeydale Road, Sheffield, taken on a murky day last week.

Abbeydale Picture House has somehow managed to survive and is now a cinema and venue again.

I don't know if John Carr & Co. is still open for business. It wasn't when I passed by.

Words

2010-10-14T12:53:00.001-07:00

Just a nice, easy-going book to help us learn to read. OK.

Is that television terrors up there?

Just chilling out. Nothing wrong with that. Maybe take those boots off, eh?

I love Raumpatrouille Orion. And now I know how to spell 'weird animal-men'.

Hmm.

Er...

Look at the hand. The hand. Behind you. Still, it's OK though.

Right?

Jesus.

'He was shaking all over as their feelers touched his skin' has to be the best line in a kids reading book ever. This perfectly captures the genuine terror that children sometimes feel when watching science fiction on television. My parents used to let me watch 'The World at War' but when I first saw an episode of 'Quatermass and the Pit' when it was repeated on BBC2 in the eighties I almost shot through the serving hatch without opening the doors. I expect there'll be more from 'Words' later.

Good Night! Sleep Well!

2010-10-14T12:16:00.000-07:00

I've never understood the concept behind 'tonic wine'. It sounds like a hangover (heh!) from the Victorian period, like buying heroin from the chemists and prussic acid from the corner shop (Prussic Acid being my main choice of name if I ever recorded any Aphex Twin-style electronica). A little alcohol a week is said to be beneficial for your health, but I'm not sure I'd fancy a few gulps of Buckfast before trying to settle down.

Then I realised where I found the image, and things started to become a little clearer. I discovered this in a 1940 copy of People's Friend magazine. What other period of British history would require you to take a pretty strong drink before going to bed? If I'd have lived through the Blitz I think I would have been permanently pickled (although you do wonder how many people missed the air raid siren and had to be dug out of the wreckage of their bedrooms after a Phosferine or three). As an aside,I really like the name of the product - somehow redolent of phosgene gas and phosphorus, those well-known putter-to-beds. It smacks of an era before large marketing departments and focus groups, although I'd take a focus group over being bombed any day.

Good night! Sleep well!

Adam Curtis - The Strange Death of Political England

2010-10-13T08:27:00.000-07:00

Many people will be familiar with Adam Curtis' work on the BBC, and his particular M.O. when it comes to documentary making, i.e. the use of carefully sourced original film and video, sometimes in context and sometimes juxtaposed with music and effects to create an atmospheric and darkly humorous feel.

More recently he has started a project on his BBC blog called 'The Strange Death of Political England', an 'emotional history' of Britain from 1970. I imagine that this will take some time to complete, but 1970 is already finished - take a look at it here. The clips are taken from news and current affairs programmes (amongst other sources) and are backed with the music of that particular year. There is something rather poignant watching the ordinary people from 1970 on the screen - taken out of their context as observers of great events or eyewitnesses to history, we actually get to see little shards of ordinary life from the past. The whole thing is a bit like wandering into a photograph, and taking a look at the straggly haircuts, British Leyland cars and pre-decimal adverts.

Anyway, it's great if you love archive film - it shows just how much has been stored away and remains, unseen - and I eagerly await the next year to be completed. Watch out for the report from Cairo after Nasser's death, with the unflappable chap from the BBC being slowly beseiged by members of teh public without once missing a beat, and also a quick look at a booze-puffy Gene Vincent touring around London and talking about conspiracy theories.

Finally, here's the first part of a Curtis series that I haven't seen for years;

Pleased

2010-10-12T14:04:00.000-07:00

I found this in either 'Traffic Engineering and Control' or 'Civil Engineering (Monthly)' and is part of an advertisement for a road sign manufacturing company. Anyway, I like it - it's as if the men from the 'Keep Britain Tidy' signs got dressed up for their Christmas party.

Faces of Old England

2010-10-11T06:53:00.000-07:00

I found this terrifying photograph here. Taken circa 1863, it belongs to a photo album that was about to be thrown away for recycling.

The site has some wonderful found photographs (discovered in second hand books) and is highly recommended.

Seventies Storage

2010-10-11T04:45:00.001-07:00

Storage solutions from the Design Council, seventies-style. I haven't included this in a kitsch, look-at-that-white-television kind of way, I love the ornaments and little details that give these interiors a sense of time and place. They in no way remind me of my own seventies childhood kitchen, which owed more to the Victoriansd and the local branch of Leo's than the Design Council.

Albania! China! Workers Notebook

2010-10-10T13:07:00.000-07:00

Looking Around

2010-10-04T06:40:00.001-07:00

These primary school geography textbooks were published by the University of London Press in 1960. They are written with a very clipped, precise but entirely uncondescending voice. Pupils are asked to 'Cut out a paper spiral thus:'

The second book has a very urbane title:

The number of primary school children familiar with legs of mutton in 2010 = zero.

Three herrings on a dish. Paint pictures of a drifter at sea. Drifter at Sea sounds like a beatnik Dirk Bogarde film.

Peak National Park Information Pack

2010-10-01T17:00:00.000-07:00

Discovered in a dusty vault and full of interesting leaflets. How to wander the dark peak, discover love feasts and dressed wells, and who to contact if the worst comes to the worst;

Richard Manuel takes a group of young pioneers out into the peaks. I like her t-shirt.

The treasures contained within the folder;

There's a touch of the old weird albion about the next three. The faceless woman on the cart, the pensioner 'petalling in the smithy', not to mention the love feast of alport castle.

Finally, if you get into trouble;

Bee hive cover - depression in hillock. Phone Ripley 3551. That'll be all.

Watches

2010-10-01T15:12:00.000-07:00

From Practical Wireless ...

Seventies Graphic Design

2010-09-29T14:19:00.000-07:00

The following are some little title headers and pieces of artwork from one of my favourite publications, mid-seventies era Practical Wireless ...

Fire and Flame

2010-09-28T07:11:00.001-07:00

This is from another of the Evans Brothers series of integrated studies books. More chapter title pages, and some useful information on famous british beacons (definitely a band name).

Olde Shop Fronts of Berwick-on-Tweed

2010-09-27T05:47:00.000-07:00

At the weekend I braved the gales and fine mist of sea-rain to head to the borders, spending Saturday afternoon in Berwick-on-Tweed. As well as possessing some fine old fortifications, it also possesses some of the oldest-looking shop signs and frontages in the Kingdom. By 'old' I don't mean Victorian pawn-brokers balls and the sort of antique carpentry you see in that James Mason exploitumentary about London, I mean 'old' as in seventies plastic lettering, timber-fronts and coloured glass. The sort of thing you saw on every high street about twenty years ago but rarely do now. Here is a very fine camera shop illustrating my point:

Everything about the shop is modern apart from the sign. Why? I don't know actually. Berwick town centre has a homogeneity about its architecture, with lots of imposing, steep-fronted stone buildings and very little sixties / seventies Arndale-type intrusion. Across the road from the Three Barrels pub (recommended) there is this venerable institution:

It was still up and running when I last visited two months ago but seems to have closed for good now. It was unheated, and run by two old gentlemen wearing various scarves and layers of damp tweed. Stock consisted of a few sweets, cigarettes and a few pots of cockles. Unheated, dark and fitted out with wonderful old wall-to-wall shelving, it wasn't like a time warp, more like a scene entirely out of time. The owners also ran a newsagent across the road, which was even more spartan than their main shop. This too has closed;

Check out the waffle-type wall cladding, where the shopkeeper could attach hooks and hang things at whim. I would love to know what all that parapehanlia on the shelves at the back is; old account books? Unsold copies of The Eagle? I never went into the newsagents while it was open for business, but was able to get that last glimpse of the past through the window. A visit to Berwick-on-Tweed for its old shop fronts (including a spectacularly eighties cafe) is highly recommended.

Townlook 2

2010-09-27T05:25:00.001-07:00

The rest of the selection from 1969 junior school geography book 'Townlook';

French Actors With One Name! #2

2010-09-27T05:23:00.000-07:00

Moustache!

Townlook 1

2010-09-23T05:43:00.000-07:00

From a secondary school textbook of the very early seventies. Note the absolute bleakness of some of these photographs.

To be continued.

French Actors With One Name! #1

2010-09-23T04:20:00.000-07:00

Fernandel!

Secret Ceremony (1968)

2010-09-22T06:15:00.000-07:00

We're into our obscure films this week - this is one of Joseph Losey's more obscure works, starring Elizabeth Taylor, Robert Mitchum and Mia Farrow. Ostensibly a psychological thriller about a prostitute (Taylor) who becomes embroiled in a series of mind games when she 'adopts' Farrow's character, the film has a darker, sicker feel to it. This is partly down to Mitchum's character, who is absolutely vile, and partly because of the theme of assumed identities; Farrow latches onto Taylor because she reminds her of her dead mother and Taylor accepts her because Farrow resembles her dead daughter. My copy (on VHS) has long given up the ghost but there are a couple of clips on the elektroweb. Check out this fragment, complete with a bit of Richard Rodney Bennett's eerie soundtrack:

It's on DVD but only Region 2. I'd class this one as 'Acquired Taste Psychodrama'.

Tam Lin (1969)

2010-09-21T09:14:00.000-07:00

Title song by Pentangle. Starring Ava Gardner, Ian McShane, Cyril Cusack, er, Richard Wattis, Stephanie Beacham, Madeline Smith, Jenny Hanley AND Joanna Lumley. Plus Withnail's Bruce Robinson. Miss Gardner's gowns are executed by Belmain apparently, which sounds like a Celtic sacrifice. More here:

Roddy McDowall's only stab at directing - from the glimpses here maybe it should be filed under 'dated but intriguing'?

Folklore-wise, Tam Lin was kidnapped by the Queen of the Fairies and can only be rescued by a virgin. Roses are plucked in forests, transmogrification occurs and I would love to see how this is applied to the screenplay (Gardner = Fair Queen, McShane = Tam Lin I'd imagine). It's also filmed in Edinburgh. Anyone seen it?

That's probably the Queen of the Fairies and Tam Lin right there.

Time and Change

2010-09-20T02:49:00.000-07:00

Time and Change was written by Oliver Aston in 1973 as part of Evans Brothers series of 'integrated theme' books for junior schools. The 'integrated' part makes them discursive and they have beautifully designed chapter title pages.

The idea of not merely dealing with time as a mathematical or scientific subject is interesting, and the book's gentle explanation of the nature of passing time and how it affects the child is both intelligent and sensitive.

Although older does not necessarily mean better (especially when dealing with education), 'Time and Change' has a gentle, ruminative quality that is almost entirely absent from culture and media aimed at modern children. The muted browns, ambers and sepias remind me of childhood autumns and murky instamatic photographs. It isn't all backward-looking though; the range of 'integrated' references in here make Time and Change look like a lost work by Dr. John Dee or Robert Burton in comparison to the things I had to work with when I was a teacher. We have Aristotle on dreams, circadian rhythms, derelict land, family trees, homes of the future and a photo of John P'twee in full velvets and ruff stepping out of the Tardis. Pretty esoteric for junior school children.

Some of the imagery is quite melancholy. The one below could be a still from the shop in Bagpuss:

The last page contains this quote which I'm pretty damn sure wouldn't crop up in a modern text book:

'Benjamin Franklin once said: Remember, that time is money.
Could this be the reason it has become so important?'

Skywonky

2010-09-19T15:45:00.000-07:00

J.G. Ballard and the JAE

2010-09-18T17:59:00.000-07:00

The covers of the Journal of Automotive Engineering were meant to be perfunctory - broadly illustrating the thrust of the main story. Here we are though, nearly forty years later, and they have acquired a whole new potency and meaning, creating a new series of associations that transcend their original utilitarian intentions. I look at the first three and think J.G. Ballard;

Cars scream into view and crash: no doubt there's an injured doctor involved somewhere. The next one shows us what could be a strange landscape, teleprinted out and ready to be examined. Not by machines though, by a man using one of those folding portable magnifiers, the old and new rubbing along together:

The last one, shown below, could be the cover of a cheap Sci-Fi magazine - 'Weird Tales of Finchley'? - and looks inexplicable. Maybe it's a screenshot from a long-wiped ATV telefantasy series.

Numbers floating in an open road - a compass reference? A hallucination caused by road vibrations (that could be Ballard again)? When an image loses its context it loses its meaning - the numbers are meant to be a new kind of speedometer that is projected by laser onto the windscreen, but it's impossible to tell just by looking. As an aside, I'm glad it didn't catch on. You can imagine all those pre-crumple zone Ford Corsairs and Farinas slewing all over the road as their drivers squint at the revolving numbers in front of them.

The covers of the JAE were meant to have a small amount of decorative value by way of introducing the text within. Now I think they have gained something over time as their original purpose has become obsolescent and the technology they were promoting long gone.

Demon Seed

2010-09-15T05:32:00.000-07:00

Whatever you do, do not allow this computer to look out for itself. Next thing you know, that optical digitizer will pan across the room as your girlfriend makes her breakfast wrapped only in a towel. Then you won't be able to open the door when you come home from work...

Practical Wireless

2010-09-15T05:17:00.001-07:00

Not just any tank battle game - this is the official tank museum-endorsed version. Please note - the instructions are for creating the game, wiring it up and MAKING THE BOX THE CIRCUITRY GOES IN.

Make your own music system ... physically make it. It has a Reader's Wives-y feel, somewhat diluted by the promise of an 'electronic fish feeder' within. For readers born between 1970 and 1980, look at the carpet and armchair and slowly start to regress.

Municipal Library: The Joy of Panthers

2010-09-14T07:25:00.000-07:00

The Merrion Centre - Exit to the Future

2010-09-14T06:10:00.001-07:00

The Merrion Centre in Leeds opened in 1964 and has long been a place of hauntological interest to me. It contains the sine qua non for hauntological retail areas, the abandoned cinema. The first floor doors opposite Morrisons are still there and some kind soul has cleared a space in the whitewash so you can see in. All the seats and equipment have been removed but the paintwork and fittings still remain. There are some pictures of the Odeon in its current state here but what is so intriguing about an old cinema in a shopping centre? There's the faded glamour - childhood memories of Saturday matinees now locked up behind plywood walls and cashpoints, and also the very feeling of decline that pervades the Merrion. I worked for the Citizens Advice Bureau in Merrion House for a while and it was one of the oddest locations for an office ever. A trip down the lift would deposit you in the upper shopping area, clad with mirrors, white tiles and reflective metal. This was in the pre-smoking ban days so people would wander up the stairs and sit near the empty shop fronts and smoke vacantly whilst security guards patrolled the walkways sniffing for cannabis. The guards are a little more proactive now. After taking this picture:

a guard requested that I curtail my amateur photography, as it wasn't allowed. There isn't really anything there anymore - perhaps they thought I was peddling illicit and unofficial advice to distressed citizens. I withdrew down the stairs to where the supermarket was. The area near the Morrisons supermarket was great, with some of Bruce Lacey's very 60s automatons in a big display case and lots of red and yellow glass above the shop front. This kind person recorded it one Christmas here. Sadly this exuberant decoration has gone, replaced by the standard industrial-looking facade. Why bother? It was old and weird and cheerful - the whole centres aging design makes it stand out from the Saint John's Centre and The Light. This constant updating, upgrading and blanding out is making our shopping streets dull and identical. I'm not saying that we should put up with broken windows and rust weeping from concrete walls. But we do need variety, and a few reminders of our recent past as an everyday marker, otherwise we will just continue to erase all the charm and distinct detail from our environment. I guess that's where the hauntological references come in - the Merrion Centre is a faint reminder of our everyday past, which is slowly but surely disappearing.

On a less anguished note, I found the following video on youtube, and aside from the music it really nails the feeling of oddness and timewarping that you got from the old Merrion, and also shows early 60s planners' fondness for rats nest stairways and sunken outside areas.

What else? There were the two outdoor escalators at the rear of the centre that began to slowly decay in a carpet of dead leaves and plastic bags. There's the sloped entrance on Merrion Street which is as treacherous as the North face of the Eiger when so much as a teardrop falls on it. There was the Georgian Arcade, which resembled the temporary bierkeller at a city-centre German Christmas market. And the cinema. Still intact, with its velour drapery and memories of Lyons maid and usherette trays, it can't be long before the space is gutted and transformed into something less magical, less abandoned. Take the chance to have a look and when you're withdrawing money from the cashpoints inside the centre, just remember that behind them is a set of glass doors and a dark, abandoned ticket office; other people's happy memories just lurking at the periphery of the present.

The Exhaustive Guide to the BBC Handbook #3

2010-09-13T06:58:00.000-07:00

I say exhaustive - maybe 'quick scan' is more apt. What about 1965 then?

A little Telstar-like polygon comes hurtling through space towards us out of the darkness, twinkling little points of writing as it flies. There we go - education (still important), drama, current affairs, sport, religion, news, entertainment and music. Everything billed equally in the same sized font. There's no massive picture of 'Christmas Night With The Stars' here. No credit though. Six out of ten.

Now here we have a lovely set of vintage screen-shaped panels with a child of the sixties peeping through. The geometric arrangement is very good so I'll bet a professional did that. And they did - Alex Kroll, art director and editor who worked with Lee Miller at Vogue. Best one yet for me, really representative of its era so a big eight out of ten.

A bit of a retrograde step design-wise, but we do get an explanation:

'The colours of the strips on the cover represent the primaries used in colour television and their complementaries.' Five out of ten. Will things get any better?

This wandering psychedelic minstrel will tell you his ten tales and then go on his way, and the presence of his monochromatic brother will additionally tell you that colour TV has been inaugrated by the BBC. Sadly, no designer attributed. I think it looks like one of the 'King Midas In Reverse'-era Hollies and while the hipsters down at UFO might have sneered at the clothes, it at least shows the BBC tuning into popular culture for the cover of their handbooks. A mighty seven out of ten. As psychedelia turns to hard rock, what will we have on the cover of the 1969 handbook? John Bonham setting up his Ludwigs with a brown ale in his hand?

It's not. It's an unattributed snap of an early colour camera (type, anyone?) filming something in the studio. And it looks exciting - that little atomium badge and the odd planes and panelling. Could it be a lost snap from the set of 'Year of the Sex Olympics'?. Maybe not, but just as the filigree of psychedelia hardened into rock and roll, so the paisley-wearing troubador has been replaced by a 'behind the scenes' cover picture. I really would like to know what set that is, though (although it'll probably be something by Charlie Drake). Marks out of ten? Seven! That's it for the sixties, I'll bet the seventies has something amazing waiting for us...

Images - too cool for school

2010-09-11T19:43:00.000-07:00

These images are taken from the Gladys Buxton School magazine, erm, 'Images', produced yearly throughout the 1970s. The primitive montages and typewriter font look brilliant - stark with plastered-down hair and that terminal scruffiness of the early seventies schoolkid. They radiate a 'Come and Praise' / Ghost Box feel and you can't help but feel a little sad that these budding young graphic designers put their best work out there for an audience of precisely 100 proud Mums and Dads. Gladys Buxton School (now a college) is in Dronfield, South Yorks.