//From Frendz, June 24, 1971//

I’m a fiend for line ads in print media; all human life is contained in the few words demanding the casual reader’s attention.

Leafing through a 1971 issue of British underground magazine Frendz (which had previously been titled Friends) I spied this ad, and wondered whether it might have been placed by the American photographer Joe Stevens. The number has a west London prefix and he was living in that part of town at the time.

I fired off an email and received this reponse earlier today:

Yes. That’s me. Ramen-scarfing “Straight Press” Joe. Looking for work, living on £10 a week, not eligible for the dole.

Times were tough. Living in a flat in Fulham where I later took photos of Malcolm (McLaren) and Vivienne (Westwood) with Rosie Boycott (newspaper columnist, Friends news editor, soon to be one of the founders of Spare Rib and later editor of The Independent) and some Frendz hippies.

Rosie and I did a spread on acupuncture for them. She submitted to the needles.

They let me use the dark room with (photographer) Phil Franks at the Portobello Road offices (next door to graphic designer Barney Bubbles’ studio). Jon Goodchild (later to move to Rolling Stone US) and Bubbles did layout. (Office gopher) Little Tony rolled the joints and Eric The Tramp brought teas from the Mountain Grill cafe.

Ah the days of innocence and utter poverty in the company of fabulous people!

Then I recieved a call from Linda McCartney – a Fillmore East photog friend – and was invited to be the first Wings Over Europe tour photographer.

My ramen days were over.

I remained at the flat till 1976-77 after taking over the lease and converting it to a photo studio, and joined NME with Nick (Kent) and Pennie (Smith, both of whom also worked for Frendz).

I don’t think the tres busy Rosie ever noticed the mad crush I had on her.

The wonderful Nicki Hepworth, Frendz’s editorial secretary, took my free ad but I didn’t get many straight press calls.The paper folded, the NME didn’t pay much and the flat was devoid of furniture so I took extra work where I could find it. I took pix for Felix Dennis for a Bay City Rollers Special and Tony Elliott over at Time Out.

By coincidence Elliott also placed a line ad in the same edition of Frendz. His appeal for a “hippy” was rather undercut by the offer of luncheon vouchers and a company car, but these perks can be seen as displays of Elliott’s business nous, the supreme lack of which had done for the rest of the British underground press and would soon poleaxe Frendz.

Read the story behind Friends/Frendz and the early 70s migration of Kent, Stevens, Smith and others from the underground to the mainstream music press in my book In Their Own Write.

You can buy signed copies of my Barney Bubbles monograph Reasons To Be Cheerful for £30 inc p+p UK , £35 Europe and £40 rest of the world by mailing me here.

I wrote about a Rolling Stone line ad placed by drummer Jerry Nolan three years before he joined the New York Dolls here.

The Cocoa Song is from the cult British Film Institute-funded multicultural musical Moon Over The Alley, directed by Joseph Despins and William Dumaresq.

Released in 1976 with a score by Galt McDermot, a fellow Canadian who is probably best known for his compositions for Hair, Moon Over The Alley is largely set around London W10; this scene was shot at the top end of Portobello Road market.

Use of non-actors notably helped kickstart the career of singer Sharon Forrester, seen here singing an excerpt of Spring In December.

A couple of years ago the BFI issued Moon Over The Alley on a two-header DVD with another London 70s b&w curio, Despins and Dumaresq’s deeply unsettling Duffer on its Flipside imprint. Details here.

//Signed bar menu. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

//Signed back cover of So Alone, Johnny Thunders, Real Records,1978. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

As demonstrated by my recent post, the west London house of collector/gallerist Jonathan Ross became a hive for the art/boho/punk crowd flooding the capital in the  70s.

Among the visitors were Johnny Thunders and Iggy Pop, who both left their marks in different ways.

Ross met Pop at Zanzibar, the chic nightspot at 30 Great Queen Street, Covent Garden, run by John Armit, Tchaik Chassay and Tony Mackintosh. The most notable flourish of the decorous interior – by Julyan Wickham – was the bar featuring inset mirrors, at the time a discreet reference to the drug of choice of the customers.

In fact, it was at Zanzibar that Ross sat for a portrait by his friend, the novelist/artist Isobel Strachey.

//Ross at Zanzibar by Isobel Strachey. The profile on the right is that of Kensington Art Deco dealer John Jesse. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

“Zanzibar was my favourite watering hole for several years – you met everyone there,” says Ross. “My mother once introduced me to Lucian Freud, I had drinks with George Melly and Felix Dennis tried to pick up my girlfriend. If the cocktails hadn’t been so darn good I could probably remember more. Just thinking about it I feel like getting high, putting on my  City Lights Studio suit and Johnson & Johnson shirt and calling a number from my little black book.”

Ross encountered Pop the evening after having witnessed his performance on The Idiot tour at north London venue The Rainbow in March 1977 (I was also there and still have the ticket, which brings back memories of my excitement not only at witnessing Iggy in full flight but also being absorbed by David Bowie quietly stealing the show by playing keyboards and singing back-up vocals, sporting a dress-down look: jeans, work boots, plaid-shirt and cloth cap).

“When I spotted Jimmy O (Pop’s real name is James Osterberg) at Zanzibar I asked the manager if he would get his autograph for me,” says Ross. “He beckoned me over and as we got chatting, I mentioned that (American performer) Judy Nylon was staying with me, so he said he would like to come over and say hello.

“His chauffeur-driven car parked outside my terraced house in Fulham and he came in, immediately took off his shirt and asked if I had any of his records. Raw Power went on the deck and we spent a few hours listening to him talk. Unfortunately I was out of film for my camera so no evidence – apart from the signed Zanzibar menu – survives.”

//Thunders, Pop and the late Sable Starr, NYC, 1977. Pic (c) Bob Gruen, from https://www.morrisonhotelgallery.com//

Eighteen or so months after Pop’s visitation, another founding punk figure dropped by Ross’s place. Johnny Thunders had recently celebrated the release of his solo album So Alone, whose contributors included Nylon and others in Ross’s circle such as Chrissie Hynde, Patti Palladin.

//Front cover, So Alone. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

//First attempt from the So Alone front cover. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

//From the back cover. Courtesy: Jonathan Ross//

Thunders signed Ross’s copy of the album (after a false start on the front) and thanked him for the hopsitality extended to fellow New Yorker Palladin.

The guitarist stayed the night and in the morning, the You’re Gonna Wake Up t-shirt Ross had bought from Sex a few years earlier had disappeared. Thunders had a penchant for the design, having been photographed in a couple of variations, although not that I have seen in his host’s that night – Ross’s had the word “cock” spelt out diagonally in capital letters – so the jury is still out as to wether another sticky-fingered soul helped themselves.

Read my complete history of the You’re Gonna Wake Up t-shirt here.

//All photos (c) Jonathan Ross//

Here are more previously unpublished images from London’s punk demi-monde.

Coincident to receiving Joe Stevens’ photograph of the pre-Pretenders Chrissie Hynde and photographer Kate Simon in Malcolm McLaren’s Sex Pistols Nude Boy shirts, collector/gallerist/Londoner Jonathan Ross supplied me with this fabulous selection of Polaroids taken at his west London house in the same period.

These include Hynde and Simon as well as their fellow Americans-about-town, the performers Judy Nylon and Patti Palladin and artist/tattooist Ruth Marten, writers Tamasin Day-Lewis and Jon Savage, Ross himself, his girlfriend Gina Louthan and Sir John Betjeman.

//Clockwise from left: Patti Palladin, John Betjeman, Tamasin Day-Lewis, Gina Louthan. (c) Jonathan Ross//

//Gina Louthan + Jonathan Ross. (c) Jonathan Ross//

//Judy Nylon, Ross, Chrissie Hynde. (c) Jonathan Ross//

So how is that John Betjeman was cementing the punk poetry connection in these photos? The Poet Laureate was Ross’s godfather (he is the son of another poet, the editor of the London Magazine, Alan Ross, while Tamasin Day-Lewis is of course the daughter of another Laureate, Cecil Day-Lewis).

//Nylon, Ruth Marten, Hynde. (c) Jonathan Ross//

//Louthan, Jon Savage, Nylon. (c) Jonathan Ross//

//Kate Simon, Nylon "spraying her throat to combat some infection rather than consuming illicit substances". (c) Jonathan Ross//

I’m very grateful to Ross; the down-at-heel glamour of the mise-en-scène – the decorated walls (by a character by the name of Bones apparently) and abandoned posturing – perfectly evokes this phase of London life, and in my next post I’ll be presenting the fascinating stories behind images Ross has also supplied me of artefacts relating to two of the scene’s prime movers: Johnny Thunders and Iggy Pop.

Read more about Jonathan Ross’s Gallery 286 here, while a piece based on an interview I conducted with Judy Nylon five years ago is on THE LOOK and her partner in Snatch Patti Palladin is featured here.

Ruth Marten has subsequently worked with the likes of Jean-Paul Goude and Peter Mayle, and most recently exhibited at the van Grinten gallery in Koln. Read more about her activities here.

Among Tamasin Day-Lewis’s current projects is a new book for crowd-funded publisher Unbound and Jon Savage’s latest published work is featured in the catalogue for the Met’s new exhibition Punk: Chaos To Couture.

Read my interview with Kate Simon here.

//Photographer Kate Simon and performer Chrissie Hynde (lifting the front of her mohair jumper from Sex), London, 1976. (c) Joe Stevens//

This photograph – taken by Joe Stevens in early 1976 in Fulham, west London – is featured in the exhibition Just Chaos!, which opens tomorrow (May 7) at Marc Jacobs’ Bleecker Street NYC bookstore BookMarc.

The T-shirts worn by Simon and Hynde were among the first variants of a limited edition designed by Malcolm McLaren to promote the newly formed Sex Pistols. A few were also sold in Sex, the environmental installation/shop operated by McLaren with Vivienne Westwood at 430 King’s Road in World’s End, Chelsea.

“Malcolm dropped the shirts off at my Finborough Road studio; they were freshly silk-screened from a limited edition,” says Stevens, then working for the NME and living with Simon (who was employed by rival music paper Sounds). “Chrissie was living in a squat and cleaning offices for a living. She’d drop by the pad to take showers. I’d hear her singing in there and realised she had a wonderful voice.”

McLaren produced the designs with the express aim of promoting the new group. “This was my first attempt at making a Sex Pistols T-shirt,” he told me in 2006. “I wanted to create something of a stir.”

The central image of the naked boy posed with a cigarette came from a copy of Hans Herbert Hubermahl’s paedophilic underground magazine Boys Express purchased by McLaren in Brixton, south London.

Working with sidekick and screenprinter Bernie Rhodes – later to manage The Clash – McLaren created a series of design variants, some emblazoned with the stencilled group’s name and the silhouette of Pistols’ bassist Glen Matlock’s guitar.

“Bernie was a bit frightened by the nude boy print,” McLaren recalled.”It was too much for him. He used to perspire as he printed at the kitchen table, as if somebody was about to break down the door, arrest him and charge him with being a paedophile, and haul him off to prison. That would have been all my fault.”

Rhodes confirmed this to me in 2007; he was still furious at McLaren for having involved him in the escapade, failing to see that this was one of a series of artworks aimed at making public the seamy sexual underbelly of Britain’s repressive society.

In the event, McLaren coerced Matlock, at the time a student at Central Saint Martin’s art school, to use the college printing facilities to produce the original run.  ”We didn’t make very many, 40 or 50 at most, and they were in quite small sizes,” said McLaren. “They were supposed to be sold in the store but at first I gave them away to people who looked cool.”

There’s no denying that he achieved the desired effect with Hynde and Simons. Says Stevens: “The shirts were supposed to be for me but the ladies kept them.”

Time to coincide with the staging of Punk: Chaos To Couture by The Costume Institute of the NY Met, Just Chaos! is curated by another photographer, Roberta Bayley, and includes her own work from the period, as well that of Stevens’ and photos by others such as Lee Black Childers, Bob Gruen and Godlis.

Dave Robinson, one of the British music business’s towering figures, has sent me this lovely pop-reggae tune from Madness man Lee Thompson’s project.

It’s great for this sunny Bank Holiday; Bitty McLean is on top vocal form.

Fair takes me back to seeing Madness in their North London Invaders incarnation support a jazz-rock trio (!) at Camden Town’s Dublin Castle, and before that the graffito ‘Kix’ emblazoned around 70s teenage nexus Golders Green tube station (courtesy of Thompson).

//1968 print of Vor dem Vorhang//

//Hipgnosis fashion shoot for Club International, 1972//

An antiques restorer friend has pointed out that the early 70s fashion shoot by design studio Hipgnosis I recently featured here calls to mind the preoccupations with the female form of the late German artist Paul Wunderlich.

My friend – who wishes to remain anonymous – has offered as evidence a print of Wunderlich’s work Vor dem Vorhang (“Before the curtain”). The story of how he came by the artwork one squally day in central London seven years ago is remarkable:

I had just returned from Paris and was walking through Manchester Square when I saw it sticking out of a skip along with what looked like the remnants of a very recent flat clearance. There was a diagonal crack across the glass covered by tape, but I liked how it had never been out of the original frame.

//Detail, Vor dem Vorhang//

//Gallery label//

It was just starting to rain, a really heavy shower; just a couple of minutes later and it would have been ruined, so I picked it out and although it was inconvenient I carried it around for the rest of the day, and not just because I had an interest in the artist.

Wunderlich was good with colours – this has a dark green in it which doesn’t show up well under the glass/in the photo. – but over the last 20 years his prints have been among the most undesirable at contemporary auctions. It has come round a bit lately, with interest from some illustrators.

What made it irresistible for me was the date of the sale label on the reverse: May 31, 1968. While some people were at the barricades that week, others were clearly buying pictures in Cork Street.

//1968 exhibition catalogue//

//Catalogue portrait of the artist//

//From the catalogue//

//"A long-limbed, gangly, grey-faced man"//

Later, in Portobello Market, my friend picked up a catalogue for the exhibition which included the print, which looks to have been owned by art dealer and Indologist Julian Sherrier before being discarded.

//Paul Wunderlich, Editions Filipacchi, 1979//

//Frontispiece and title page//

//Wunderlich portraits including, left, Evelyn Waugh//

Wunderlich died in 2010; visit the site dedicated to his work here.

Dazed Digital is featuring a précis of my investigation into the roots of the Anarchy Shirt as sold in Sex and Seditionaries at 430 King’s Road in 1976 and 1977.

See here.

Here is my series on the conceptualisation and realisation of this extraordinary garment:

Roots Of The Anarchy Shirt: Part 1

Roots Of The Anarchy Shirt: Part 2

Roots Of The Anarchy Shirt: Part 3

//An early 80s window display by Simon Haynes: Geometrically arranged brightly coloured platforms and ladders//

//This giant "toy" portcullis was produced by Haynes for Practical Styling in the mid-80s//

//Haynes' neo-classical backdrop for another mid-80s display//

These photographs from the archive of artist/set designer Simon Haynes convey the scope and ambition of the great 80s British independent retail outlet Practical Styling, operated by Paul Jones and Tommy Roberts on the ground floor and basement of London’s brutalist CentrePoint building.

//Tommy Roberts strikes a series of poses for Haynes for the neo-classical backdrop//

Jones and Roberts’ exuberant dismantling of the received ideas of selling furniture, home wares and interiors helped redefine retailing in the decade; design historian Catherine McDermott described the outlet as “a haven for the bizarre, the outrageous and the straight kitsch” and said Roberts “represents that part of British creativity which is able to delight and surprise”.

//Haynes + Roberts at work on a window display//

//PS shopfront with such trademark items as a Dexion shelving unit, an artist palette-shaped coffee table and pink metal-framed sofa. Poignantly, the steeple reflection in the window is that of St Giles-in-the Fields, where the memorial service for Roberts was held earlier this year//

Meanwhile, Edinburgh College of Art’s principal Chris Breward has pointed out that Practical Styling represented an extremely important cultural moment:  ”A connection to the development of post-modern practice in the 80s.”

For the duration of the store’s existence between 1981 and 1986, Jones  - who says the pair “introduced design to functional objects (by) referencing the past or playing with colour or quirky shapes” – was largely happy to stay in the shadows, sourcing items from Japan, Mexico or continental Europe, scanning catalogues, talking manufacturers through design ideas and visiting embassy trade missions.

//Note section of PS logo on metal mesh grille above main entrance; this was designed by Roberts (on left in this photograph) and created by Peter Denmark. Also note artist signature-style fascia//

The mediagenic Roberts was naturally the focus of attention given his history having run Kleptomania, Mr Freedom and City Lights Studio and worked with such figures as Ian Dury. Utilising the canvas of the large street-level window space, he drew on the talents of in-house designer Peter Denmark for fascia and other flourishes, and brought Simon Haynes on board to execute a series of daring displays, as you can see here from these previously unpublished working shots taken during installations.

//Section of backdrop by Simon Haynes//

All photos: Simon Haynes Collection.

Buy my book Mr Freedom – Tommy Roberts: British Design Hero here.

I’m making a presentation on Bowie’s visual style and in particular his relationship with clothing designers as part of the V&A’s Sound & Vision event today.

Among those I’m referencing will be the theatrical costume designer Peter J. Hall, who was commissioned to create the stagewear for the 1983 Serious Moonlight tour. I wrote about their fruitful working relationship here.

//Peter J. Hall//

//Ola Hudson//

I’ll also mention the very talented Ola Hudson, who contributed so much to Bowie’s look in the mid-70s LA years, including clothing he wore in The Man Who Fell To Earth and during the Station To Station tour.

Bowie is wearing Hudson designs in this performance of Stay on the Dinah Shore Show in 1976.