Half Century

I’m half a century old today.  How on Earth did that happen? 

In somewhat contrived fashion, this is also the fiftieth post on this blog.  You see, - it’s all carefully thought out.

While I’m at it, - Happy Birthday to Lorel too.  x

Playlist 3

Here's the soundtrack to my last month or so.  I think everyone will know at least a couple of these...

‘Anarchy in the UK’, The Sex Pistols

Johnny Contemplates A Long Tradition Of Dissent

I’ve been reading Greil Marcus’s ‘Lipstick Traces, A Secret History of the Twentieth Century’ that places the Pistols in a long tradition of alienated dissent including the Brethren of the Free Spirit, Dada and the Parisian ‘68ers’.  It’s hard to credit now just what a kick in the teeth Malcolm McClaren’s post-Situationist art experiment seemed in 1976.  Nevertheless, John Lydon/Johnny Rotten’s introductory “Rrrright – noowww” and deranged claims to be “An Antichrist” sound like he really might turn over society this time round.

‘Sandinista’, The Clash

Triple Album Madness At A Great Price

From the Sex Pistols it’s a short step to The Clash.  Despite their initial Punk stance, Joe Strummer’s song writing literacy and Mick Jones’ musicianship meant they’d quickly outgrow the genre’s limitations.  Releasing an experimental triple album covering such wide stylistic terrain was a mad proposition at the time but there’s great stuff on here and the Clash did pull off White Reggae where others failed.

‘Hard Rain’, Bob Dylan

Bob Contemplates Headgear Choices 

Recently we experienced a truly Biblical thunderstorm here - complete with massive hailstones that dented my car.  Old Bob recorded his rawest live album outdoors in heavy weather, in 1976.  Enveloped in a glorious, shambolic racket and looking like a disgraced messiah, Dylan seems battered by psychic as well as metrological elements or like a man who has behaved badly and is reaping the whirlwind.  His bottleneck guitar runs on ‘Shelter From The Storm’ are inept but totally justified.

After all these years and repeated hearings, it’s easy to take Dylan for granted but his delivery of a line like, “I came in from the wilderness, A creature void of form”, proves no one else ever went quite so far lyrically.

‘Das Ist Ein Groovybeat, Ja’, Jake Slazenger

My infatuation with Mike Paradinas’ back catalogue continues.  Jake Slazenger seems to be his pseudonym for stuff that’s a bit less ‘intelligent’ and more straightforwardly funky.  This one gets criticised for being kitsch and over repetitive but I don’t see the problem and hesitate to over-analyse, as it’s mostly just loads of fun.  It’s got some immense beats, terrific cheesy synths and a big fat bottom.  It’s also got a fantastic title and a nice blue Volkswagen on the front.

‘Shangaan Electro - New Wave Music From South Africa’, Various

I have a neighbour who plays African Pop from his upstairs window.  It makes a pleasant change from the usual bass thump of passing cars and sent me to this compilation from last year.  The Shangaan Electro sound combines weirdly speeded up beats with soulful chanted vocals and practically no bottom end.  It’s unmistakably African, absolutely of the Twenty-First Century and very refreshing.

‘The Indestructible Beat of Soweto Volume 1’, Various

The Shangaan Electro album reminded me of an earlier era-defining compilation of South African music.  In the mid 1980s Paul Simon patronised some of these musicians as a backing band but this sounded like the real thing.  It showcases the cream of Zulu/Township Jive and includes some blistering tracks.  I left a vinyl copy in a Bristol pub once and suffered genuine loss.

‘The Sabres Of Paradise Are Sabresonic’, The Sabres Of Paradise

Stick This One In Your Ear

I lamented the unavailability of this for years and nearly bought a tatty CD version from Oxfam a while back until I saw the state of its playing surface.  I’m glad I held back as it’s available now as an official download.  Andrew Weatherall and his colleagues used their rhythmic sense and production know-how to produce a masterpiece of atmospheric techno that’s genuinely sensual and goes way beyond mere enjoyment of structures.

‘Replica’, Oneohtrix Point Never

Daniel Lapotin Contemplates Mortality

Daniel Lapotin’s most recent LP appears to mark a significant departure from his previous O.P.N. releases.  There are plenty of the smeared washes of quasi ambient sound that characterised ‘Returnal’ but also a new reliance on rhythmic patterns and almost-identifiable found sounds apparently constructed from chopped samples of 1980s adverts.  His skill lies in using just enough of each snippet to imply past content without lapsing into the pure abstraction of earlier ‘Clicks & Cuts’ forms.  It appeals to the same part of my brain as Actress.

‘Goats Head Soup’, The Rolling Stones

I haven’t played the Stones for ages but some media activity around their 50^th anniversary coincided with this being on offer locally.  I’ve always enjoyed their stuff from the late 60s and early 70s when they combined the self-parodic decadence of Rock and Roll with real musicianship.  This includes three of my favourite of their songs in ‘A Hundred Years Ago”, ‘Silver Train’ and ‘Hide Your Love’.  If ‘Star, Star’ shows them at their most puerile and sexist, it’s still more life affirming than the cold sexual commodification pushed at teenagers today.

‘Birdsong From The Stroud Valleys’, Various 

A Lovely Little Nuthatch Contemplates...A Nut, ( Probably)

Does birdsong qualify as music?  Can music be made by other species?  Do animal calls become music when processed by the human brain?  Is it even necessary to distinguish between music and sound anymore?  This provided some respite from all the snarling punks, chanting Africans, old rockers and repetitive beats.

Mark Fisher: 'Capitalist Realism - Is There No Alternative?'

Despite my best intentions, it seems I’ve found myself becoming a little more politically conscious again after years of trying to disregard the whole sorry charade.  Recent years have seen such momentous economic upheavals and political dysfunction that it seems impossible to retain that particular intellectual luxury.

In this context, and whilst, still hoping to maintain a position of ideological non-alignment, I’ve just read with interest Mark Fisher’s little book, ‘Capitalist Realism, Is There No Alternative?’ [1.].

The failure of the discredited old Left world-view resulted in the illusion, over recent decades, of the ‘end of history’ [2.] and the ‘triumph’ of liberal market economics.  Yet, daily news reports and the experience of people on the ground bring accumulating evidence of the defects and delusions of that prevailing orthodoxy.  By now, the inherent indifference of Global Capital to the wellbeing of the general populace should be no surprise.  Yet our leaders continue in their desperate attempts to prop up the creaking edifices of nationally based economies, Liberal Democracy and the myth of no imaginable alternative to the status quo.

Over just eighty readable pages, Fisher diagnoses our current situation of ‘Reflexive Impotence’ [3.] incisively.  His genius is to tackle this stuff with genuine intellectual rigour without lapsing into the academic self-regard and impenetrable jargon typical of such discussions and he skilfully links his ideas to cultural references that range from Franz Kafka to ‘Supernanny’.  The scope of his analysis in such a short book is somewhat miraculous and includes ideas about education, mental health and the environment that relate his theories to the real experience of potential readers.

Photo:  Umair Shuaib

Fisher writes from an undeniable left wing position, but his refusal to resort to the old orthodoxies of monolithic state control is admirable.  His analysis of how Capitalism nullifies our lives risks inspiring despair, but the conclusion that there might, after all, be an alternative should at least inspire attempts to look for it.  His own practical suggestions may feel a little thin, but if the book only serves to release readers from their apathy, impotence or hypnotic stasis it will have served a valuable purpose.

Anyone interested in Mark Fisher’s ideas should check out his k-punk blog.  Despite it’s current dormancy, his archives are full of thought provoking stuff.  He is also a teacher and freelance journalist who has written for New Statesman, Frieze, The Wire, Sight & Sound and FACT.

[1.] & [3.]:  ‘Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism – Is There No Alternative?’, Ropley, Hants, UK, 
0 Books, 2009, Chapter 4: ‘Reflexive Impotence, Immobilization and Liberal Communism’.

[2.]:  Francis Fukyama, ‘The End Of History And The Last Man’, New York, Free Press, 1992

More Doors Of Perception

As I trawl my photographic archives I find more and more images of closed doors, gates, shutters and so on.  Here are some more examples.  These were taken over the last three years in Leicester, Nottingham and Grimsby.  There’s somewhat less textual content in some of these but still bags of formal and textural interest.

Clearly, it’s a subject category to which I’ve been drawn for a while without thinking about very consciously.  Maybe, I’ve tended to focus on what’s on the surface within their frames, - regarding them as found images, whilst disregarding the implications of their function as barriers or blocked portals.  I don’t want to go into it all too deeply right now, but there’s a lot that might be explored around themes of privacy, security, exclusion, indifference, lack of engagement and denial of access or opportunity, amongst much else.

It’s a typical example of the coming together of a visual motif with a set of associations that can also relate to a wider external context.  This process often causes me to regard something that’s been in the background for ages with renewed fascination.

Doors Of Perception

My painting activity must undergo a brief hiatus over the next few days while I have the windows in my house replaced then reassemble my little studio room.  It’s frustrating as I normally want to hit the ground running with the next painting at the start of the academic summer break, but the disruption should be over soon.

Since completing ‘Closed 2’ I’ve played around with some smaller scale experiments in preparation for the next piece.  I want to continue with the ‘Closed’ theme and push it forward without slipping into a facile comfort zone.  I’ve also been reviewing my numerous photographs of closed doors, gates, shutters and other barriers.  Some of the recent ones are  here.  All were taken in West Leicester over the last year

These barred entrances constitute a repeating feature of the urban fabric and regularly play the role of un/official notice boards and carriers of all kinds of text.  They also come loaded with associations of security, privacy and exclusion and the obvious question of what lies on the other side.

On a purely visual level, I’m constantly drawn to the artificial colours of painted closures and the range of their substrates and industrial coatings.  Inevitably, this also includes a fascination with how their surfaces weather and degenerate and are punctuated by items of door furniture.  Pictorially, such subjects appeal to my taste for formal, geometric compositions with their frames, planks, panels and visible construction.

That last point reminds me of the exhibition of Gary Hume’s door paintings I saw at Modern Art Oxford in 2008.  Initially, these paintings seem to lack any obvious narrative content and have a slicker glossier aesthetic than mine, but they display a similar enjoyment of synthetic colour and compositional geometry.  Actually, once one knows they're based on real hospital doors numerous possible interpretations begin to cohere. 

Gary Hume, 'Girl Boy, Boy Girl', Gloss on MDF, 1990-91

Gary Hume, 'Four Doors 1', Oil on Canvas, 1989-90

Gary Hume, 'Shine', Gloss On Aluminium, 2001

Gary Hume, Door Paintings At Modern Art Oxford, 2008

Gathered together, Hume's doors display a multiplicity of formal variations on a simple recurring format.  That returns me to consideration of my own ‘Closed’ images and their potential to become a more extended series over the coming months.

Completed Project: 1960 Velocette Viper Motorcycle

This post marks the culmination of an extremely long-term project and is in memory of my Dad, John Marwood who died ten years ago aged 73.

Although he spent his working life in a bank, his real love was mechanics and vehicles of all sorts.  He spent many weekends dismantling and rebuilding a series of Morris Minors and owned numerous other sixth-hand vehicles including a lovely old Rover and an eccentric homemade Ford camper van named 'Flo'.  For many years he was a member of the Lincolnshire Vintage Vehicle Society and plenty of my childhood weekends were spent riding in elderly buses to vehicle rallies where men in beards would discuss coachwork and compression ratios.

Sometime in the mid 1970s he bought the 1960 Velocette Viper motorbike pictured here.  It was tatty but largely complete and the intention was that he and I would restore it together.  The bike was pulled apart and carefully boxed but the momentum was lost as other activities took precedence.  The years went by, I grew up and left home and my parents moved house twice, taking the boxes of ‘Velo’ bits with them each time.

Chris Goldson (R), & Phil Adams (L).  'Thanks Guys'

When he died in 2002 my Mum and I found ourselves staring at the dismembered bike.  We knew it was too interesting to scrap so donated it to ‘The Vintage’ in the hope that someone would restore it in his memory.  More years passed and eventually, sufficient funds were raised and the project handed over to expert local bike restorers Chris Goldson and Phil Adams.  They’ve just completed the job and, as these photos show, have made a beautiful job of it.  The old L.V.V.S depot has expanded to become the Lincolnshire Road Transport Museum and 610 BRM will find a permanent home in the impressive collection there.

Velocette was a classic Birmingham marque from the golden age of British Biking and there are plenty of enthusiasts for their machines.  The sporty 350cc single cylinder Vipers aren’t particularly rare but this one’s a little special due to its two-tone livery and, at the time controversial, engine fairings.  Classic ‘Velos’ always looked stylish in all black with their attractive engine castings and fishtail silencers.  This one demonstrates how the company were trying to bring their established models more up to date cosmetically as they moved into the 1960s and I think it looks the business.  Chris says it displays the typical Velocette reluctance to start first time but then runs nicely.

It’s great to see the bike fully restored so genuine thanks go to the Lincolnshire Vintage Vehicle Society for making it possible and to Chris and Phil for all their hard work and expertise.  I know my Dad would have been chuffed to see it like this.

Merlin Coverley: 'Psychogeography'

I was interested to read a review of Merlin Coverley’s book ‘Psychogeography’ [1.], on the painter Shaun Morris’ blog.  It’s a subject I’ve given much thought to of late and mentioned here several times.  I’ve returned to Coverley’s book several times, as an excellent overview of a tradition that can be tricky to pin down and a great portal for loads of further reading.

In 1955 Guy Debord usefully defined Psychogeography as,

“…the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behaviour of individuals.” [2.]

Guy-Ernest Debord

Debord and his Parisian Lettrist and Situationist comrades were keen to construct a formal theoretical framework for their revolutionary agenda and Debord’s emphasis on “precise laws” and “specific effects” is typical of his post-Marxist approach.  I think I prefer a second description, by Joseph Hart, of,

“…a whole toy box full of playful, inventive strategies for exploring cities…just about anything that takes pedestrians off their predictable paths and jolts them into a new awareness of the urban landscape.” [3.]

Coverley’s book highlights how, beyond any political interpretation, Psychogeography is actually a wider literary tradition.  It finds early expression in the work of Defoe, Poe, Baudelaire and extends through the writings of Walter Benjamin and the Parisians, into the contemporary work of Iain Sinclair, J.G. Ballard, Stewart Home and filmmakers Chris Petit and Patrick Keiller.

J.G Ballard's House, Shepperton 

Iain Sinclair

Still From Chris Petit's English Road Movie - 'Radio On', 1979

Today, it appears the label has achieved mainstream recognition, covering a field that might contain urban exploration, local history, ghost walks, trespassing, rambling, geomancy and everything in between, including the activities of artists in all media.  It extends beyond the purely urban environment and would certainly include the marginal terrain dubbed ‘Edgelands’ by Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts. [4.]  For me, the key points remain the importance of a personal response and a willingness to make simultaneous, invigorating connections between possible biographical, theoretical, sociological or historical interpretations in a location.

What interests me in Shaun Morris’ post is the perspective of the visual artist on all this.  Shaun asserts the primacy for him of a visual response to place over a conscious search for subjects or locations that fit the preconceived Psychogeographical bill.  The tension between the pictorial and the conceptual and one’s position on that spectrum is something all painters must resolve for themselves and was probably at the root of some of the creative confusion I highlighted here a while back.

Shaun Morris, 'Stolen Car 8', Oil on Canvas, 2012

I agree with Shaun’s emphasis on the primacy of a visual stimulus and usually find the best remedy for creative indecision is simply to get back out there and look.  However, I recognise how much I also value the multiple layers of potential meaning that can emerge from a psychogeographical reading of a locale following the initial act of recognition.  This probably connects with my own tendency towards abstraction.  My default process appears to involve distilling the observed world into an abstracted arena for reflection and the decoding of signs and clues found within it.

[1.]:  Merlin Coverley, 'Psychogeography', Harpenden, UK, Pocket Essentials, 2010

[2.]:  Guy Debord, 'Introduction To A Critique Of Urban Geography', Paris, 1955

[3.]:  Joseph Hart, 'A New Way Of Walking', Utne Reader, July/August 2004

[4.]:  Paul Farley & Michael Simmons Roberts, 'Edgelands - Journeys Into England's True Wilderness',    London, Johnathan Cape, 2011