I was on the lig the other day at the Conservation Centre’s Sound & Vision exhibition of Francesco Mellina’s pictures of Liverpool during the birth of punk, new wave and new romanticism.
Francesco Mellina was Dead or Alive’s manager – a dubious honour, I’d've thought – and once asked a cricketer friend of mine to play bass for the band. Wisely, I think, he declined.
Mellina’s role in the scene at Eric’s and other bars with fantastically- ridiculous names between 1978–1982 was outlined by the always-entertaining Paul du Noyer.
The exhibition is a genuine visual record of the music scene at the time, with an impressively wide range of images – both in terms of their style and content.
The film grain that dates these kind of pictures lends a stylised filter to images like Mellina’s, as does the low-light high-contrast black and white tone.
Like the difference between vinyl and digital, they are technically inferior but have much more character.
Two superb and, certainly in one case, distinctly bizarre updates from two of the Crucial Three – the trio of Julian Cope, Pete Wylie and Iain McCulloch that made up the core of the new wave of Liverpool talent that emerged from Liverpool in the early 80s.
Another cautionary tale about Twitter, and about April Fool’s Day – this one concerns Tommy Scott, the bloke was in Space, and an internet rumour that he had died.
Not exactly the height of sophistication, and not remotely funny, and that’s before you factor the new somehow filtering back to Scott’s mother
I noticed this news circulating around Twitter’s Liverpool fraternity last night and though it a bit odd.
An official press release from his record company Antipop had said: “We are sorry for the untimely death of one of our great sons” and detailed that he died of heart failure.
It didn’t surprise me an hour or so later to see that it was, in fact, a hoax.
Ten years ago I accompanied friend and colleague Ross Charnock to an interview with Head Brothers Mick and John from Shack.
Ross was, and remains, very fond of Shack and the Heads’ various outfits and was writing for local magazine INK, which was a bit of a forerunner to Black+White.
I took along my trusty manual SLR as I was flirting with a career in rock photography that ultimately came to very little but was keen on Shack and The Strands too.
The interview began with Ross being invited to join the group as bassist, took in a ‘photoshoot’ at Crash Studios, detoured to several pubs around the city centre and finished in Ross’ flat with Mick and John playing an impromptu selection of Shack and Strands numbers. It was superb.
There’s a bit of a puff piece on Korova in The Guardian today that hits the nail on the head about Korova in that it ignored the jingly-jangly stoned cosmic scouse thing that was all the rage in Liverpool a few years ago,
I’m greatly amused by this Google Maps mash-up detailing Half Man Half Biscuit’s many and varied references to places of interest in their songs.
A party band par excellence, great musicians without being muso wankers – what’s not to like? Once again there’s a buzz about the Bees.
Those of you who know me personally may be aware that goodwill does not come easily to me, but in the spirit of the time of year here’s some seasonal goodwill, in the shape of Paul and his lovely late lady wife Linda McCartney with their weird 80′s psychedelia ‘Wonderful Christmas Time’
I asked esteemed countrysmiths Charnock and Russell to compile a Top Ten Liverpool albums article for Liverpool Culture Blog, fully aware that I’d get a list of Beatles-and-Shack-based folky stuff.