Dave Shenton: Cartoons of Gay Life and Death

Space Station 65 in Kennington is currently hosting These Foolish Things, an exhibition of works by cartoonist/illustrator David Shenton. Shenton's work has been featured in the UK gay press since the late 1970s,  in publications such as Gay News and Capital Gay, as well  in a range of other papers and magazines from Positive Nation to The Guardian. 

As Graham McKerrow writes: 'Shenton's cartoons are often camp but they're not just camp, and they're not that awful apolitical offensive camp, but a light, knowing, meaningful camp; their first task is to entertain and to make the audience laugh - and often they do much more because the liberation politics that informs his work means that with the laugh there is an acerbic point - a wry observation on how we live or a satirical comment about society and a wider political context, contained in the lives and musings of plausible and likeable characters

David Shenton's knitted medals, featuring the lyrics of 'I Will Survive'

On a more sober note there is a series of images commemorating victims of homophobia including this one which highlights some London murders. Gerry Edwards was killed at his home in Page Heath Villas in Bromley in 2009; David Cooper was killed in Calderwood Street, Woolwich in the previous year. Edward Highwood was murdered in Hollymount Close, Greenwich. Ian Baynham (from Beckenham), was beaten to death in Trafalgar Square in 2009 by Joel Alexander (from Thornton Heath) and Ruby Thomas (from Anerley).

Space Station 65, 373 Kennington Road, SE11 

The exhibition continues until 27 July, open Thursday-Saturday 12.00–18.00 (admission free). Next week on 28th June, the artist will be giving a tour and he will also be giving a talk on the final day of the exhibition.

Siouxsie at the South Bank - and Horniman Juju

I wasn't  quite sure what to expect at the Siouxsie gig at the Royal Festival Hall on Monday night. I thought it might be one of those polite 'an audience with...' sit down South Bank affairs, where ageing punks perform interpretations of Jacques Brel and Kurt Weill and labour through the Great American Songbook. But no, as soon as she came on and started with Happy House everyone stood up and stayed up for nearly two hours-  there was actual pogoing upstairs in the stalls and dancing in the aisles. Siouxsie and her band played the whole of the Banshees' Kaleidoscope album and much more, finishing with the great Spellbound as second encore. The gig was part of  Yoko Ono's Meltdown, and Yoko was in the Royal Box, standing and clapping for Siouxsie's version of Dear Prudence (which of course John Lennon wrote).

photo by jamesalternation at Slicing Up Eyeballs

The setlist for those interested was:

1. “Happy House”
2. “Tenant”
3. “Trophy”
4. “Hybrid”
5. “Clockface”
6. “Lunar Camel”
7. “Christine”
8. “Desert Kisses”
9. “Red Light”
10. “Paradise Place”
11. “Skin”
12. “Eve White/Eve Black”
13. “Israel”
14. “Arabian Knights”
15. “Cities in Dust”
16. “Dear Prudence”
17. “Loveless”
18. “Face to Face”
19. “Careless Love”
20. “Here Comes the Day”
21. “Into a Swan”
22. "Spellbound"




(She played the same set on Saturday night without Spellbound as second encore)

Juju and the Horniman Museum

I have been reading 'Siouxsie & The Banshees: the authorised biography' by Mark Paytress (2003). Of course there's lots in the early days about  Chislehurst (where Siouxsie grew up) and the 'Bromley Contingent' from which the band emerged. But there are also a few other interesting connections further into South London. 

The band's original drummer, not counting Sid Vicious for one gig, was Kenny Morris who packed in a course at Camberwell College of Art to play on the band's first two albums. Steve Severin, bassist and co-songwriter, was living with his friend Simon Barker in Bermondsey/Borough during the lead up to the 1980 Kaleidoscope album, and wrote the music for 'Christine' in that Southwark Council flat. But I was most interested to read about the origins of the African image on the cover of the 1981 album Juju (which includes Spellbound and Arabian Nights). According to Severin, 'we saw a definite thread running through the songs, almost a narrative to the album as a whole. The African statue on the cover, which we found in the Horniman Museum in Forest Hill, was the starting point for a lot of the imagery'. Interesting to wonder how many songs, stories, visions and more have been incubated in the Horniman over the years.

London: City of Resurrections and other Machen wisdom

You can never have too many London quotes by Arthur Machen (1863-1947), he had a great appreciation for the mysteries to be found in wandering the streets of the city. Here's a few favourites:

'Villiers had emerged from his restaurant after an excellent dinner of many courses, assisted by an ingratiating little flask of Chianti, and, in that frame of mind which was with him almost chronic, had delayed a moment by the door, peering round in the dimly-lighted street in search of those mysterious incidents and persons with which the streets of London teem in every quarter and every hour.  Villiers prided himself as a practised explorer of such obscure mazes and byways of London life, and in this unprofitable pursuit he displayed an assiduity which was worthy of more serious employment.  Thus he stood by the lamp-post surveying the passers-by with undisguised curiosity, and with that gravity known only to the systematic diner, had just enunciated in his mind the formula:  “London has been called the city of encounters; it is more than that, it is the city of Resurrections" (The Great God Pan, 1894).

'I searched for Mrs. Beaumont in the dark waters of the life of London... assuming, as I had to assume, that her record was not of the cleanest, it would be pretty certain that at some previous time she must have moved in circles not quite so refined as her present ones. If you see mud at the top of a stream, you may be sure that it was once at the bottom. I went to the bottom. I have always been fond of diving into Queer Street for my amusement, and I found my knowledge of that locality and its inhabitants very useful' (The Great God Pan, 1894).

'London in September is hard to leave. Doré could not have designed anything more wonderful and mystic than Oxford Street as I saw it the other evening; the sunset flaming, the blue haze transmuting the plain street into a road 'far in the spiritual city'' (The Shining Pyramid, 1895)

'And it is utterly true that he who cannot find wonder, mystery, awe, the sense of a new world and an undiscovered realm in the places by the Gray's Inn Road will never find those secrets elsewhere, not in the heart of Africa, not in the fabled cities of Tibet. 'The matter of our work is everywhere present', wrote the old alchemists, and that is the truth. All the wonders lie within a stone's throw of King's Cross Station" (Things Near and Far, 1923)

OK I would have preferred 'All the wonders lie within a stone's throw of New Cross station' but the same principle applies!

See also: Arthur Machen: South London 'Behind the Scenes of the Universe'

Farewell Faircharm

Looks like the final open studios at Faircharm on Deptford Creekside this weekend. Creekside Artists say 'Come and visit our humble home for the last time before the bulldozers move in! Saturday 15th and Sunday 16th June 2013 11am – 6pm'. Not sure when building work is due to start, but the Faircharm trading estate site is to be redeveloped shortly by Workspace plc, displacing around 130 art studios and local businesses. There will be 148 residential units, a mere 21 of them affordable (see Crosswhatfields? for details).

MAS Exhibition

Meanwhile at Number 82, Tanners Hill SE8 there's a 'one night pop up exhibition' on June 20th with people invited to submit work on paper and then exchange works with each other. Further details here: http://usedthreads.wordpress.com/2013/06/08/mas-exhibition/. The MAS exhibition is intended to 'explore notions of value, ownership and exchange' in art and is part of the ongoing USED project focused on upcycling, swapping, and reclaiming textiles.

As well as the exhibition there will be a free screenprinting workshop.

Gemini City: stories and songs from Nigel of Bermondsey

Tonight (Thursday) at South East London Folklore Society:

London: Gemini City: Stories and songs from Nigel Of Bermondsey

Join Nigel Of Bermondsey on a musical journey through the streets of this fair capital. You may meet a ghost or two, cross the occasional underground river or encounter a cursed ironclad. There may be scenes of mild terror and the possibility of a duel. Have a drink ready to join in a toast to one of this fine city’s forgotten mystic artists.

8 pm at the Old Kings Head, King's Head Yard, 45-49 Borough High Street, London SE1. £2.50, £1.50 concessions

Nigel, who once played with Gay Dad and also makes dance music as part of Cage & Aviary, is a 'site-specific troubador' who has produced a finely crafted body of song about London, South London in particular.

Nigel of Bermondsey from Superimpose Magazine on Vimeo.

History Corner: Jessica Mitford in Rotherhithe

The Mitford sisters became notorious in the 1930s and 1940s as aristocratic socialites who pursued widely divergent political paths. Unity and Diana both became Hitler enthusiasts, the latter marrying British Union of Fascists leader Oswald Mosley.

Jessica Mitford (1917-1996) on the other hand ran away to Spain with her boyfriend Esmond Romilly to back the republic against Franco's fascist rebellion. Back in London and married, they ended up in 1937 living at 41 Rotherhithe Street in a large house 'wedged between warehouses' on the river. The house belonged to Roger Roughton (1916-1941), surrealist poet, who also stayed there. Another frequent guest was their friend the writer Philip Toynbee (Polly's dad). They held 'bottle parties... frequented by a motley crowd of journalists, writers, night-club singers, students' and spent a lot of time arguing about the merits of joining the Communist Party (Toynbee and Roughton did).

It's easy to mock the idea of a couple of upper class lefties slumming it in SE London, and indeed there is some condescension in Mitford's account: 'The bus ride from Rotherhithe to more familiar parts of London (Kensington, Hyde Park, Oxford Street) takes well over an hour. It winds past miles and miles of workers’ flats with such incongruous sounding names as Devon Mansions, Cornwall Homes. Five or six storeys high, these gloomy red-brick structures house a shorter and paler race of people than the inhabitants of London's West End. In appearance, dress and speech they form so radical a contrast as to give the impression of a different ethnic group'.

According to a 2002 Southwark Council Rotherhithe history map the former 41 Rotherhithe Street is now on Fulford Street,
the 'sole remaining terraced house from a whole row lining Thames'. So pretty sure this is it - or it could have been one of the now demolished adjoining buildings, where the Londonphile notes John Betjeman, Marlene Dietrich, Lord Snowdon, Princess Margaret and Noel Coward variously hung out!

Nevertheless, despite living in a comfortable house, Mitford and Romilly were largely cut off in disgrace from their family wealth and struggled to get by. To an extent they did share some of the life of local working class people, eating 'fish and chips at the nearest Lyons teashop' and getting involved in the local Labour Party:

'The Bermondsey Labour Party was much more to our liking. At the monthly meetings, held in a shabby hall not far from Rotherhithe Street, vigorous discussions would take place on the important political events of the day. Tired, white-faced dockers and their wives would join in "The Red Flag", a popular Labour Party anthem in that part of London. Fund-raising campaigns for milk for Spanish orphans or for aid to Hitler’s Jewish victims were planned and carried out, often in defiance of the wishes of Transport House [Labour Party national HQ]. If they lacked the glamour and the special, high-flown language of some of our Communist friends, these members of the local Labour Party branch seemed to display a seriousness of purpose and a down-to-earth understanding of issues that quickly won our respect. The Labour Party in that section of London was considerably more militant than the Party's official spokesmen. It was said that the schoolchildren lined up to boo Princess Mary, symbol of hated charity, when she made her infrequent expeditions to the local orphanage.

On May Day the entire community turned out, men, women and children, home-made banners proclaiming slogans of the "United Front against Fascism" waving alongside the official ones. The long march to Hyde Park started early in the morning, contingents of the Labour Party, the Co-ops, the Communist Party, the Independent Labour Party marching through the long day... Everyone took lunch in a paper bag, and there was much good-natured jostling and shouting of orders, and last-minute rounding up of children who had darted away in the crowd. Philip and Roger taught us some new songs to sing on the way- parodies on Communist songs: “Class conscious we are, and class conscious we’ll be, And we'll tread on the necks of the the bourgeoisie !”, "Oh, ’tis my delight, of a dirty night to bomb the bourgeoisie!”, and a sarcastic version of "The People's Flag": "The People's flag is palest pink, It's not as red as you might think."

We had been warned that the Blackshirts might try to disrupt the parade, and sure enough there were groups of them lying in wait at points along the way. Armed with rubber truncheons and knuckle-dusters, they leaped out from behind buildings; there were several brief battles in which the Blackshirts were overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of the Bermondsey men'.

Sadly, they shared another feature of local life - the tragedy of infant mortality. In December 1937, Mitford gave birth to a daughter, Julia: 'She became the centre of my existence. Esmond gleefully watched her grow, learn to smile, learn to wave her feet and catch them with an unsteady hand. We planned her future, growing up among the rough children of Rotherhithe Street, born to freedom and May Day parades, without the irksome restraints of nanny, governess, daily walks and dull dances'. Within six months however the baby had died in a measles epidemic.

Later in 1938 they were forced to move out of Rotherhithe Street when they couldn't afford to pay their electricity bill, and the following year they moved to the United States. During the Second World War  Romilly, who had fought with the International Brigades as a teenager in Spain, joined the Royal Canadian Air Force. He was killed in action in 1941. In the same year, Roughton committed suicide in the midst of despair about the Nazi-Soviet pact. Mitford remained in the United States where she lived a long and fruitful life as a writer and civil rights activist.

Esmond Romilly and Jessica Mitford

Source: Hons and Rebels - Jessica Mitford, 1960

Music Monday: Naresh Sohal

The composer Naresh Sohal  was born in Punjab in 1939 and moved to the UK in the early 1960s.

Sohal was profiled in the Financial Times last week: 'he lives in a modest house in Brockley, southeast London, and draws ideas for his music from cosmology, Sanskrit philo­sophy and the European classical tradition'. The feature included a photograph of him in the garden of his home, where he has lived for the last 18 years.

 The 2013 Proms will feature the premiere of a BBC-commissioned work by Sohal entitled 'The Cosmic Dance'.

The youtube clip below features the soprano Sally Silver and tabla player Sanju Sahai performing Sohal's Gitanjali, a setting of writing by Rabindranath Tagore. Incidentally Silver also lives locally in SE14, in fact sometimes I hear her practicing when I'm walking the dog!

Back to the Broca (and remembering The Brockley Bean)

The Broca by Brockley station was opened six years ago by Erin and Rob 'inspired by the coffee shops in Western Canada and Berlin' and 'using found objects, second quality equipment, and ethical products'.  At one time I used to be in there several times a week, but changes in work/school/ukulele patterns put an end to that. I was glad to pop in there last week though for the first time since some changes were made earlier in the year. It still has that non-corporate, bohemian feel, the biggest change is that the kitchen/counter area has been moved in to the area that was previously an extension, creating more space for preparing food and drink.

The space hangs together better, in the past it felt a bit like a tiny cafe with a big room stuck on the side. Of course the coffee is still very good, and as I had just run 5k round Hilly Fields I also allowed myself my traditional banana and almond muffin.

The book exchange has returned to just a few shelves, with the tide of old books no longer threatening to overwhelm the space. I love second hand books and picked up some really interesting reads at Broca over the years, as well as adding some into the mix. But one thing I have noticed in watching a few of these take a book/leave a book schemes is that there seems to be an iron law for the quality to diminish over time, so that you end up with a lot of books that nobody wants.

Next step for Broca is a planned alcohol license so that they can open as more of a bar in the evening.

The Broca is at 4 Coulgate Street SE4.

The Brockley Bean

In the 1980s/early 1990s there was a wholefoods co-op at 2 Coulgate Street called The Brockley Bean. I came across a 1993 article from The Independent which describes it as the base for the South East London Permaculture Community, then planning to grow food at Brickhurst Farm, near Pembury in Kent

'Since qualifying as a permaculture designer two and a half years ago, Steve Reaad has been spreading the word around his base in Brockley, south-east London. The local food supply system was set up 18 months ago after eight locals attended an introductory course on permaculture.


Based at the Brockley Bean, a pretty, cottage-like house with balloons painted along the facade and runner beans growing up the walls in summer, the South-East London Permaculture Community provides a monthly supply of wholefood - soya milk, organic flour, rice, cornflakes, muesli, bread, cheese and the like - to its 50 members. It also provides organic fruit and veg from Spitalfields Market. 'The mark-up is only 5 per cent and you're doing your body a favour. It's not so much a business as a proper community,' says Leslie Wills, a member who makes a living recycling clothes into an extraordinary range of patchwork coats and skirts. They plan to grow all the green goods for the community at Brickhurst Farm as well as providing free-range eggs, honey and organic wine from the nearby vineyard' (12 November 1993).   Anyone remember the Brockley Bean or related projects (I think there was also a cycle repair project)?

Walworth radical history walk

Interesting radical history/geography walk last weekend from 56a InfoShop in Crampton Street,  around the the top end of Walworth Road and the Pullens Estate SE17 courtesy of Past Tense.

How the poor die

One theme was who gets remembered and who get forgotten in the official record, with reference to Orwell's How the Poor Die. We were reminded of Ayikoe Atayi, found dead in 2006 in the cupboard where he had been living in Perronet House SE1 while working as a cleaner sending money back to his famiy in Togo.

Reminded too of Richard O'Brien, a 37 year old father of seven who 'died in April 1994 after being pinned to the ground by three officers who said they were arresting him for being drunk and disorderly... Mr O'Brien's family say that his pleas that he could not breathe were ignored, and alleged that officers shouted anti-Irish abuse at him. Mr O'Brien suffered injuries in 31 areas including 12 cuts to the face and head' (Guardian 14 May 2002)

O'Brien was arrested while waiting for a taxi outside English Martyrs Catholic Social Club and taken to Walworth police station. A jury found that he had been 'unlawfully killed' by the police, but in 1999 three police officers were found not guilty of manslaughter. Nevertheless after being found liable for his death under the Fatal Accidents Act, the police finally paid £324,000 compensation to O'Brien's family in 2002.

Walworth Working Men's Lecture and Reading Rooms

There was also some reflection on the parallels between the 56a InfoShop -  a radical bookshop and archive in the area since 1991 - and an earlier local institution, the Walworth Working Men's Lecture and Reading Rooms in Camden Street. The poster from the 19th century invited people for lectures, discussion meetings, 'all the best of the periodicals' and 'books lent from the library' - all for 'one shilling per quarter'. Though don't think we would want to advertise today 'take your Wife that is, or is to be'!

'Just the place to go when work is over, you can see there all the news of the day'
(not sure of the date of this, though the place was certainly going in 1855)

Centenary of Emily Davison's Derby Protest - Blackheath-born Suffragette

One hundred years ago today, on the 4 June 1913, suffragette Emily Wilding Davison was hit by a horse at the Epson Derby. She died in hospital four days later. Emily was a militant campaigner for votes for women as a member of the Women's Social and Political Union, and had endured nine periods of imprisonment and force-feeding while on hunger strike.  At the Derby, Davison ran out and was hit by the king's horse. While she had previously indicated that she was prepared to die for her beliefs, it is not clear that she intended to become a martyr at the Derby. Recent analysis of newsreel film suggests that she may have intended to attach a suffragist banner to the horse when she was hit.

Davison was born in Blackheath at Roxburgh House, Vanbrugh Park Road West on 11th October, 1872.  I am not sure if this house still stands - anybody know?

There's an exhibition on the Suffragette movement in the Greenwich area at the Greenwich Heritage Centre in Woolwich until the end of August. See report at e-shootershill on the 'plot' to blow up Shooters Hill reservoir that never was.

Music Monday: Brockley Ukulele Group at Amersham Arms

Brockley Ukulele Group continue their tradition of fine flyers with this uke-toting clangers image:

They are playing at the Amersham Arms on Sunday June 9th with  their ever expanding repertoire of songs available for you to request in the Sunday night Ukebox. They've got more records than the KGB don't you know?

Summer Solstice in Telegraph Hill Park 2013

For the third year running, the Summer Solstice will be celebrated in Telegraph Hill Park following a parade around nearby New Cross streets. Last year was great, complete with marching band and plenty of sunshine!

'A revival of an old tradition in SE14, a summer solstice parade between New Cross and Telegraph Hill. A marriage between the Garlick Man (of Plow Garlick Hill) and the Green Woman of New Cross.

A celebration of our diverse community now and its past heritage as a place of food production, orchards and market gardens. Come to play and perform themes about green growth, local food, fertility, pollinating insects, fruit trees etc etc. Musicians, dancers, costume makers, declaimers of words, sharers of food... and all others are welcome. Let us know on this wall what you can do.

There will be drop in sessions beforehand so you can make a parade item:

We'll be making pollinating insects and flowers (on sticks) in the Telegraph Hill community centre on June 15th 12-4.00 pm. Grow Wild will also run seed bomb making, and the Craft Collective will be running a range of craft activities.

New Cross Learning are hosting a making session led by Jess Easter on afternoon of the 19th, inviting children from Childeric school to help make the woman figure and more.

On 21st June, parade meeting points at New Cross Learning (TBC 4.30 ish) and the Telegraph pub (5.00 ish), ending with a picnic on Telegraph Hill. Grow Wild is setting up a field kitchen and providing garlic-inspired vegetarian and vegan food.  Rumour has it that the evening will carry on with a music knees up in the Narthex/Community Centre - watch for more details'

Facebook event details

Bridget at Beuysterous

Transpontine report and photos from 2012

Transpontine report and photos from 2011

From Delores' slide show

Gaggle Cave Opens

The Gaggle Cave opened on Thurday night in InSitu, the new art space attached to the Royal Albert on New Cross Road. The Gaggle choir sang a couple of songs outside, and there's lots of stuff happening there over the next few weeks. There's quite a few fee paying workshops; among the free stuff is a talk by Kerrang editor James McMahon on June 9th about the importance of music journalism and on 16th June an event on Feminism for Boys with Hannah Philp.

The Gaggle Cave closes on 21st June.

Simply the Jest - new comedy night in New Cross

Black Bird Comedy are launching a new fortnightly comedy club at the White Hart in New Cross, starting next Friday 7 June. They say:

'Three up-and-coming London comedians, Thanyia Moore, Athena Kugblenu and Natalie Roberts have joined forces to create Black Bird Comedy and are bringing a new comedy night to New Cross. Simply the Jest will be a night for new and established comedians to show off their best material and will soon establish itself as one London’s best and warmest free comedy nights.Taking it in turns to host each night, the three ambitious and witty members of Black Bird Comedy will keep each show fresh, entertaining and fun, resulting in audiences wanting to come back time and time again.

Showcasing amateurs, semi-pros and some undiscovered gems, Simply the Jest is shaping up to be a fantastic addition to London’s free and funny comedy scene. It launches on Friday 7 June at the White Hart Hotel, 183 New Cross Road, SE14 5AA, a locally renown public house with a large back room, friendly atmosphere and punters with a thirst for mirth.

There aren't many London comedy nights run by women and ones run by black comedians are few. Black Bird Comedy will use their uniqueness to bring a bit of edge to the night, stamping their own personalities on every show. Launching on Friday 7 June 2013 and held on 1st and 3rd Fridays thereafter, the line up for the first show has award winning acts mixing it with fresh, new talent.


Thanyia says, “There is an exciting entertainment and social scene growing in New Cross and we’re going to be part of that. Simply the Jest is going to offer locals, students and comedy fans all over London something new, different and above all, hilarious to do on a Friday night. All for free!” Natalie says, “We don’t discriminate. We'll be showcasing a diverse range of acts and talent. The only thing they have in common is that they are brilliantly funny!” Athena says, “Simply the Jest is a must for great acts looking for a fun, friendly audience and a well promoted comedy night in a vibrant area of London where free and quality comedy is currently hard to come by".'

Contact details:
blackbirdcomedy@gmail.com
Twitter: @blackbirdcomedy
Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/507891749274019/?fref=ts
Facebook event Friday 7 June: https://www.facebook.com/events/243840789091332/
Facebook event Friday 21 June: https://www.facebook.com/events/132885180241558/

The White Hart is a big old pub in a good location that's been crying out for some decent promoters to get things going there, so all the best to Black Bird Comedy, get down and check it out.

Details of Saturday's anti-BNP Protests [updated Friday lunchtime]

Update Friday 31 May, 13:15 pm - the latest position is as follows:

- The BNP have now been banned by the Metropolitan Police from marching to Woolwich to Lewisham and told they can only march in Whitehall;
- Having initially said that they would defy the ban, the BNP has now agreed to switch its demo to Downing Street.
- Unite Against Fascism has therefore cancelled its protest in Woolwich and is calling for people to come to Downing Street at 12 noon tomorrow to oppose BNP there.
- South London Anti-Fascists will be meeting tomorrow at 11 am at the Imperial War Museum Gardens (Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park), near the Russian memorial, and then travelling en bloc to Downing Street.
- according to South London Anti-Fascists the rally at Lewisham Islamic Centre has also been cancelled.

Events at the weekend remain unpredictable, to keep up date I would keep an eye on twitter - including @southlondonAF, @uaf and @MPDNUT

The following post was written on the morning of Thursday 30 May before news of the police ban was announced:

Plans are firming up to respond to the planned British National Party march from Woolwich to Lewisham on Saturday June 1st. Or to be more precise what the BNP are now calling a 'march and motorcade'. I thought the effort of the walk from Woolwich to Lewisham might be a bit much for them,  I suspect that they may  stage some kind of demonstration in Woolwich and then travel by coaches/cars to somewhere near Lewisham and then try and march towards the Lewisham Islamic Centre.

The BNP have announced that they plan to assemble at 1300 at the junction between Woolwich New Road and Gunner Lane,SE18 6XN opposite the Barracks

Unite Against Fascism have called for people to meet in Woolwich from 12 noon in General Gordon Square (next to Woolwich Arsenal DLR/Rail station). They say: 'The BNP has called a national demonstration in Woolwich this Saturday, 1 June. Fascists and racists are trying to take advantage of the terrible murder of Lee Rigby to whip up racism and hatred for their own anti-democratic ends. We call on everyone to join with Unite Against Fascism, local trade unionists, faith groups and community groups in a peaceful show of unity against the BNP and its Islamophobic poison. We will not let them divide us'

Ideally the BNP would be stopped in Woolwich, but it's likely that under heavy police protection they will then head on to Lewisham, presumably round the south circular/A205. In Lewisham the main focus for opposing the BNP will be a rally at 2 pm outside the Islamic Centre at 365 Lewisham High Street (by the Shell Garage near to Lewisham Hospital). The Lewisham National Union of Teachers call out says: 'No to terrorism, no to racism... The horrific murder of a young soldier in Woolwich has rightly been met with overwhelming condemnation. However, now the British National Party (BNP) are trying to use the understandable outrage at this attack to gain support. On Saturday afternoon, they are planning to march on the Islamic Centre in Lewisham. Lewisham has a proud record of standing united against all those who would divide our community. Join the protest to show the BNP that the trade unions, residents and young people of Lewisham are standing united against this provocative march'.

South London Anti-Fascists and others will be gathering by the Islamic Centre from 1 pm onwards to guard against any early arrivals. While the Islamic Centre is naturally going to be a focus, it seems unlikely that the police will let the BNP get too close to it on Saturday - a rally nearby looks the most obvious ending to their protest (Lewisham Park opposite the hospital is the nearest open space so is one possibility). Clearly it is intolerable for several hundred (?) open racists to be wandering around Woolwich or Lewisham, and we don't want groups of them trying to head in to Lewisham town centre or Catford at the end.

I note that South London Anti-Fascists have used a photograph from 'the Battle of Lewisham' in 1977, when the BNP's predecessors the National Front marched from New Cross to Lewisham amidst riotous scenes - see a detailed report of that day here.

The National Front also marched in Lewisham, from Forest Hill to Catford, in April 1980. 72 people were arrested, most of them anti-fascists (see earlier post about this)

History Corner: Charles II returns from exile via Blackheath and Deptford.

On this day in 1660, King Charles II entered London on return from exile in Holland. Having landed at Dover on May 25th, he spent time at Canterbury and Rochester before making his way into the capital on his 30th birthday, May 29th.  The journey is described in a contemporary pamphlet 'England's Joy or a relation of the most remarkable passages from his Majestry's Arrival at Dover to his entrance at White-Hall' (1660).

While personally I don't think that the restoration of the monarchy was anything to celebrate, the pamphlet is interesting for a number of reasons. For one thing it shows the significance of the road between London and Dover, now the A2/Old Kent Road/New Cross Road/Shooters Hill. Almost all traffic heading from Kent into London passed along that road in the days before railways, which meant that royal processions, peasant insurgents, visitors from the continent etc. all came through Blackheath/Deptford/New Cross. In the case of Charles II, such points along the route were marked with festivities which are vividly described in the pamphlet: 

'he set forth from Rochester in his coach, but afterwards took horse on the farthest side of Black-heath, on which spacious plain he found divers great and eminent troops of horse, in a most splending and glorious equipage; and a kind of rural triumph, expressed by the country-swains in a morrice-dance, with the old music of taber and pipe, which was performed with all agility and cheerfulness imaginable...

... proceeding towards London, there were placed in Deptford, on his right hand (as he passed through the town) above an hundred proper maids, clad all alike in white garments, with scarves about them: who having prepared many flaskets covered with fine linen and adorned with rich scarfs and ribbands ; which flaskets were full of flowers and sweet herbs, strewed the way before him as he rode.
From thence passing on he came into Saint Georges Fields in Southwark, where the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of London in their scarlet, with the Recorder and other City Council, waited for him in a large tent, hung with tapestry'

A 19th century re-imagining of Charles entering London, painted by Alfred Barron Clay

As discussed previously at Transpontine, the restoration was followed up by repression of religious and political dissidents, with hundreds of Quakers, Baptists and Fifth Monarchists rounded up, and reports of planned uprisings at Deptford and elsewhere.

Greenwich Community Food Co-op Box Scheme

Greenwich Community Food Co-op has been going as a not-for-profit organisation since 2002 with the aim of providing 'fresh fruit and vegetables at reasonable prices through the provision of market stalls throughout the borough of Greenwich'.

Now they are expanding their 'local affordable box scheme' delivering 'ethically and locally produced fresh fruit and vegetables'.  You can also order free range eggs from a farm based in Greenwich.

They now deliver across Greenwich and Lewisham (including New Cross/Deptford/Brockley) and have a flexible offer - you can have a delivery weekly, fortnightly or monthly and you can choose what you want to have in your box. Prices range from £7 to £20 depending on size of box.

For further details contact Sue 077602364672 walsubo@yahoo.com or Jane janegcfdownes@yahoo.co.uk

BNP plan march on Lewisham

Just got back from opposing the English Defence League in central London. Considering it was a sunny bank holiday, they failed to make a big breakthrough in terms of numbers in the aftermath of the killing of Lee Digby. But we shouldn't be complacent, the opposition was only of a similar size, and at times the EDL seemed able to march around the streets at will. At one point I bumped into several hundred of them wandering in the road along Victoria Embankment with no police around them (other than some vans coming up behind). With the rise in support to UKIP too, the racist far right does seem to have some momentum and they are obviously trying to capitalise on popular outrage at the Woolwich killing.

...enter the British National Party, desparate to re-establish their brand amidst internal faction fights and fading support. The BNP have now announced that they are planning a march next Saturday June 1st from Woolwich Barracks to the Lewisham Islamic Centre (363-365 Lewisham High Street, SE13 6NZ)

Will provide more detail as it becomes available but for now anti-racists in South East London should probably put aside any other plans for next Saturday...

[the source for this information is the BNP website, they say they are planning to meet in Woolwich at 1 pm and then march seven miles to Lewisham]

Update (28 May 2013):

South London Anti-Fascists Call Out: 'There are a whole host of fascist actions coming up in the next two weeks:
1) Nick Griffin has appealed to all fellow travelers to attend the British National Party march and motorcade from Woolwich Barracks to Lewisham Islamic Centre on Saturday 1st June from 12pm. They are distributing leaflets locally to prepare.
2) The English Defence League will be assembling outside Woolwich Crown Court on Thursday 6th June to celebrate their “Day of Justice”

This Saturday, we must be stop the fascists from marching to Lewisham, from attacking Islamic centres and mosques. We won’t “cheer up”, this week we will be holding a planning meeting, knocking on doors, visiting local Islamic centres and mosques to organise against the scum that dare to intimidate our communities and darken our streets. NO PASARAN!'

(Lewisham Councillor) Mike Harris: 'Racist political party, the BNP, are organising a march on Lewisham Islamic Centre this Saturday starting in Woolwich at 1pm.  The BNP’s support has collapsed in South-East London in recent years. In the whole of Lewisham (in 2009) they had just 20 members – out of 280,000 people. This march is a clear attempt to capitalise on the appalling murder of Lee Rigby to stoke up community tensions and give the BNP local profile.  I’ll be speaking to Labour party members tonight about what our response should be. Lewisham and Greenwich Councils are also working with the police to ascertain the likelihood of the march going ahead.

We don’t want to give the BNP the oxygen of publicity – nor do we want to leave the Mosque feeling unsupported and isolated. Counter-protests are likely. It’s essential that counter-protesters behave peacefully unlike the thuggish BNP.  People in Lewisham have a long tradition of standing up to racism and I’m sure we will do so again. Let’s make their racism history'.

Update 29 May: Lewisham National Union of Teachers and others are calling for people to meet at 1 pm on Saturday at the War Memorial opposite Lewisham Hospital to oppose the BNP - this is also in the vicintiy of the Lewisham Islamic Centre which is the focus of the march.  The start of the march in Woolwich will be opposed by an anti-fascist gathering in General Gordon Square from 12 noon.

Update 30 May: Lewisham protest has now been confirmed for 2 pm by the Lewisham Islamic Centre - for full details of all protests in Lewisham and Woolwich go to this new Transpontine post.

Music Monday: Life on Mars (Bowie on the Beckenham-Lewisham bus)

'David Bowie: Five Years' was an interesting documentary shown on BBC2 at the weekend. Bowie must have one of the most documented lives of any musician, so I did wonder if there could possibly be anything new. But there was some great footage I hadn't seen before and some interesting interviews.

His 1971 song 'Life on Mars' featured heavily, with Rick Wakeman being interviewed about his role in arranging the piano part. But what the programme didn't mention was that the song was written in Beckenham,  via a bus journey to Lewisham. In a 2008 article in the Daily Mail, Bowie recalled:

'This song was so easy. Being young was easy. A really beautiful day in the park, sitting on the steps of the bandstand. 'Sailors bap-bap-bap-bap-baaa-bap.' An anomic (not a 'gnomic') heroine. Middle-class ecstasy. I took a walk to Beckenham High Street to catch a bus to Lewisham to buy shoes and shirts but couldn't get the riff out of my head. Jumped off two stops into the ride and more or less loped back to the house up on Southend Road.

Workspace was a big empty room with a chaise longue; a bargain-price art nouveau screen ('William Morris,' so I told anyone who asked); a huge overflowing freestanding ashtray and a grand piano. Little else.  I started working it out on the piano and had the whole lyric and melody finished by late afternoon. Nice. Rick Wakeman came over a couple of weeks later and embellished the piano part and guitarist Mick Ronson created one of his first and best string parts for this song which now has become something of a fixture in my live shows'.

The park with bandstand he mentions is presumably the Croydon Road Recreation Ground in Beckenham where Bowie and friends once organised a festival (the subject of his 1969 song 'Mermory of a Free Festival'). The house in Beckenham was the  now demolished Haddon Hall at 42 Southend Road, where Bowie lived in the ground floor flat from 1969 to 1972 (working on the classic Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust albums).

David Bowie outside Haddon Hall in Beckenham
(he also lived for a while in 1969 in Flat 1, 24 Foxgrove Road, Beckenham)

More Transpontine Bowie posts

The Transmitter: Bowie in Beckenham

Another Nickel in the Machine: Bowie's early years in Brixton and Bromley

Reggae bass shakes Telegraph Hill Park

A little taste of carnival in Telegraph Hill Park this afternoon, with several hundred people relaxing on the grass bathing in the sun beams and the fine sounds drifting across from the sound system in Arbuthnot Road. The beer and the barbecue helped too - at one point the queue for the latter stretched round the corner.

The RumBQ & Street Party was put on by locally-based music production company Trinity and Unit 137 Sound System. Thanks to them for a fine afternoon.



If you want to hear some more of this sound get down to the Bussey Building in Peckham on Friday 14th June.when Unit 137 are putting on a night also featuring Gorgon Sound and Lionpulse Sound.

Another report at Hatty Daze

Woolwich Killing

Is there anything useful left to say about the killing of soldier Lee Rigby his week? Writing a South East London blog with occasional pretensions to a critical political perspective I feel like I should, and the local connections to the story are not limited to the scene of the killing in Woolwich's John Wilson Street. It seems that the two suspects arrested at the scene had both attended Greenwich University, and one of them grew up locally,  attending Kidbrooke School and living in a flat in Macey House, in Thames Street, Greenwich.

But when I think about a young man being hacked to death in the street by two other young men I just have a sense of horror and futility. It can be reassuring to try and find moments of 'bravery' and 'heroism' amidst the carnage, to offer some meaning or redemption. We've seen plenty of that this week, and of course it was remarkable that people comforted a dying man while his killers stood nearby. But the fact is that the victim had no opportunity to display any 'bravery' or 'heroism' as he was cut down in the street, and those who stood to talk to the killers did not alter the course of events in any way: the assailants seemed glad of an audience by which to relay their self-mythologising accounts to the world.

Another reassuring narrative is to put the events in a wider context, to see the killing as a moment in an international story of imperialist warfare and its impact, or of 'global terrorism'. And sure what happened in Woolwich plainly has a connection to the fact of British forces waging war in Afghanistan and Iraq for more than a decade, and to the violent fringe of the wider Islamist movement.

But I think Lee Jasper is right to pose the real question as 'how can a seemingly ordinary couple of black British guys from South East London end up committing such an act?' The issue might be less Al-Qaeda and more home grown issues of alienated, marginalised young men growing up amidst desensitising experiences of  violence. The same culture that leads to (mainly) black young men killing each other year in year out on the streets of London. As Jasper notes, 'Horrific, and symbolic as the killing of this young soldier was, there were similarities in its barbarity of the recent murder of Daniel Graham [in East Dulwich], who was chased by a gang and stabbed multiple times on a London bus or that of Andrew Jaipual of Islington stabbed between 20-40 times. Both in broad daylight'.

Still making such comparisons shouldn't be used to detract from the specific horror of Woolwich. F*cked up blokes killing another bloke might not be so unusual, but standing around explaining it to passers-by, getting photographed and waiting for the police to turn up, perhaps in hope of some 'martyrdom' terminal exit - that is hardly typical. It felt like the assailants had written themselves a dramatic script with themselves as the key actors, and didn't know quite what to do when the other actors didn't turn up on time. So it seems naive to complain that the media have treated it as such a big story - it was a media event par excellence.

EDL and BNP

The racist clowns of the English Defence League were out on the streets of Woolwich on Wednesday night, gathering outside The Queen’s Arms pub on Burrage Grove and attempting to get to the Greenwich Islamic Centre. There have been attacks on Mosques and Muslims, and the British National Party are mobilising for a protest in Woolwich next Saturday (their fast fading leader Nick Griffin was in the area yesterday).

EDL 'Bexley Division' in Woolwich on Wednesday - laughing and clearly enjoying themselves.
- I'm sure Lee Rigby's family weren't laughing that night

South London Anti-Fascists and others are already planning community defence, and this is necessary. But it is also the fabric of daily life in London that will undermine the racists' effort to provoke inter-communal violence on the back of the Woolwich killing.  Les Back of Goldsmiths University is surely right that:  'The violence and the reactions to it will damage the social choreography of London’s multiculture but not fatally... We’ve seen this all before but the reality of life in the city is paradoxical. For London is both the stage for divisions and violence and also a meeting place where those differences are routinely bridged and made banal. “I was just thinking today, there was a woman fully veiled walking through the market buying her shopping. It was just ordinary I didn’t even notice her,” said a white neighbour. This captures something about the reality of an everyday, unspectacular co-existence. The blood-stained headlines will not be easily forgotten but they will inevitably become yesterday’s news. The rhythm of multicultural life in South East London will re-establish itself and find its balance again'.

Small march by Nigerians in Woolwich today (photo by Helen Donohue via twitter)

RumBQ Street Party by Telegraph Hill Park

This Bank Holiday Sunday 26 May 2013 sees a free street party in Arbuthnot Road SE14, next to Telegraph Hill Lower Park. RumBQ will  feature the Unit 137 reggae sound system, with DJs including:

- Hylu & Jago
- DJ Snuff
- Ed West
- Decks Ray Spex
- Lionbeat

They say: 'This is a FAMILY FRIENDLY event, please bring your children, make the scene nice. There will be food and drink on sale. Please support our food and bar, as that's how we're backing this event. All the artists are playing for free. It's a family affair, a community happening. LOVE, every time. Some HEAT this time round please Missa British Wedda. All prayers for sunshine appreciated and no doubt noted'.

The event is scheduled to run from 1 pm to 5 pm (facebook event details here).

An atttempt to stage something similar in March had to be cancelled due to snow, and relocated at short notice to the Golden Anchor pub.

History Corner: John Evelyn of Deptford

John Evelyn (1620-1706) has cropped up a few times for me in the last week. The seventeenth century diarist, writer, gardener and government official is remembered in the names of the local Evelyn Street and Lewisham's Evelyn Ward, among other places.

Portrait of Evelyn by Robert Walker

Last Saturday I gave a history tour of the Deptford riverfront to New Cross Commoners, ending up with a picnic on the beach. We looked at the Convoys Wharf site, and I mentioned that part of it covered the site of Sayes Court - Evelyn's home from 1652-1690.

While preparing for the walk, I had been reading a lot of Peter Linebaugh. The historian's various works provide a good context for understanding Detpford history. 'The London Hanged' in particular includes lots of information about the working practices on the Royal Dockyard in the 18th century; 'The Many Headed Hydra' deals with maritime radicalism and the circulation of sailors, pirates and slaves across the Atlantic; and 'The Magna Carta Manifesto' deals with commons and enclosure through the lens of the Forest Charter sections of the Magna Carta which sought to safeguard the common rights of access to woodland  from Royal encroachment.

In the latter, Linebaugh writes of Evelyn as an apologist for enclosure, seeking to put the knowledge of trees at the service of empire:

'English forests were cut down at such a rate that toward the end of the century John Evelyn despaired of the national security, inasmuch as the navy provided the island’s “wooden walls.” The expansion of the British empire was by means of wood products and it was to the end of acquiring wood products. Restoration diarist and gentleman environmentalist John Evelyn (1620–1706) inherited a fortune that his grandfather had accumulated under James I and Charles I through his royal monopoly on saltpeter, essential ingredient (with sulfur and charcoal) to gunpowder. The “saltpeter man” forcibly ransacked stables, barns, dovecots, pigeon houses in search of potassium nitrate. The grandson’s project was to make an inventory of English trees in terms of their use values, and to convey this knowledge from commoners to commercial, scientific, and military markets. Not once does Evelyn mention the Forest Charter. Enclosed woods thrive better than unfenced forest. He wrote disdainfully of “satisfying a few clamorous, and rude Commoners.” He could not escape a millennium of custom, but he could bury it within Latin and Greek obscurantism. He concluded by quoting a Latin proverb of Erasmus, who was paraphrasing the Greek poet Theocritus, Praesente Quercu ligna quivis colligit, “In the presence of an oak every- one collects firewood.” Referring to An Act for the Punishment of Unlawful Cutting or Stealing or Spoiling of Wood (15 Charles II c.2), he coolly noted that ancient law punished the “beheading” of a tree by the forfeiture of a hand'.

Others have seen Evelyn more positively as a proto-environmentalist, writing against London pollution and for the preservation of trees. One strand of the campaign against current development plans for the Convoys Wharf site is the call to acknowledge or even recreate Evelyn's historic garden there (see Sayes Court - London's Lost Garden for lots of interesting historical material).

Evelyn's Cabinet

As reported in the Guardian at the weekend (18 May), a cabinet of Evelyn's features (along with the Horniman Museum's walrus) in a new exhibition in Margate. Curator Brian Dillon writes

Consider this curious item of furniture, which belongs to the Geffrye Museum in London and appears at Turner Contemporary, Margate, as part of Curiosity: Art and the Pleasures of Knowing. The object in question, at once austere and elaborate, is a cabinet of intricately carved ebony that stands on eight slender legs and opens to reveal a prismatic array of interior drawers and doors, rendered in fruitwood and ivory. The thing is said to have been made by the renowned Dutch craftsman Pierre Golle, though we cannot be sure. What's certain is that it was bought in Paris in 1652 by Mary Evelyn: wife of the polymath John Evelyn, who used it to store prints and small items. The empty cabinet is a reminder of the capaciousness of Evelyn's intellect and imagination: by the time he died in 1706, he had completed not only half a million pages of his celebrated diary, but treatises on medicine, mathematics, air pollution and the cultivation of trees. He had even written a discourse on salads'.

Evelyn and Slavery


It can't be denied though that Evelyn had a role in the administration of slavery. A royalist during the Civil War, he was later appointed by the King as an official to the Council of Foreign Plantations in a period when plantations were expanding in America and the Caribbean on the backs of slave labour. Even in this period, there were controversies about this in the face of slave demands for freedom. In his diaries Evelyn mentions the arguments about whether slaves should be allowed to be baptised as Christians - since some argued that as Christians they should no longer be treated as slaves: 'I may not forget a resolution which his Majesty made, and had a little before entered upon it at the Council Board at Windsor or Whitehall, that the negroes in the plantations should all be baptized, exceedingly declaiming against that impiety of their masters prohibiting it, out of a mistaken opinion that they would be ipso facto free; but his Majesty persists in his resolution to have them christened'. Evelyn also mentions the attempted slave revolt in Barbados in 1692: 'there was a conspiracy among the negroes in Barbadoes to murder all heir masters, discovered by overhearing a discourse of two of the slaves, and so preventing the execution of the design' - alleged conspirators were hanged, burned alive and castrated by the authorities.

Save our Fire Stations

Boris Johnson's life threatening closure programme for London fire stations is still formally in the consultation phase, with The London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority (LFEPA) holding public meetings across London boroughs. Some have already happened, but several key South London events are coming up in the next week as follows:

- Lewisham, Wednesday, 22 May 7-9pm at Sydenham School, Dartmouth Road, London SE26 4RD


- Bexley, Bromley and Croydon, Thursday, 23 May 7-9pm at Bromley Central Library, High Street, Bromley BR1 1EX


- Greenwich, Wednesday 29 May 7-9pm at Lecture Theatre 315, King William Building, University of Greenwich, 30 Park Row, Greenwich, London SE10 9LS


So get along and say your piece to try and save New Cross, Downham, Southwark, Woolwich and the other stations under threat.

(h/t to Trinketization for the heads up on this).

See Red Women's Workshop: feminist posters from SE5/SE17

See Red Women's Workshop was a feminist screenprinting collective based in Walworth/Camberwell from around 1974.

According to Jess Baines: 'See Red's activities included the designing and printing of their own posters and calendars, as well as taking on design and print commissions for other organisations. See Red developed a range of feminist posters that attempted to address different issues ranging from the domestic isolation of mothers and unethical marketing by pharmaceutical giants to racism in Britain and solidarity with anti-imperialist struggles abroad. The posters were distributed internationally both from the workshop and through alternative bookshops. They also gave talks and demonstrations on screen-printing. The group varied in number; overall 25 women worked at See Red during its lifetime. After working from home in the early days, the collective progressed to renting shared space with Women in Print, at 16a Iliffe Yard, off Crampton St, London, SE17. The workshop was initially run without grant-aid, and the women contributed up to three working days a week to the workshop while earning a living elsewhere. In the early 1980s the collective was supported by funding from the Greater London Council. This facilitated a move to new premises at 90 Camberwell Road, SE5. Women in Print (an offset litho collective) moved with them but folded in 1986'. See Red closed in the early 1990s.

See Red in action at Iliffe Yard in the early 1980s

Ink Now: Posters, Collectives and Art

Recently there has been a revival of interest in the work of See Red. There was an exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Arts last year, and next month members of the collective will be taking part in 'Ink Now: Posters, Collectives and Art', an event at London Met. 'Ink Now' will be 'An evening of presentations and discussion about how posters have been used in different radical, political, feminist, collective and community settings. By looking at specific historical moments we hope to open up a conversation about radical ideas and collective practices in the contemporary art context'.

WHEN: 6.30-8.30pm, Tuesday 4th June. Refreshments available from 6pm
WHERE: Lecture Theatre CR100, London Met University, 41-47 Commercial Road, London, E1 1LA

Suzy Mackie and Pru Stevenson, founding members of the See Red Women's Workshop Collective, which produced silkscreened feminist and community posters from c1974 up to the early 1990s, will show poster images and talk about why and how the collective was set up and the first 8 years.

Jess Baines (LSE/LCC) will be presenting her research on the history of late 20th century radical and community printing collectives and co-ops in the UK - including: poster collectives, service printers, typesetters and print resource centres. Jess is also a former Member of the See Red Womens Workshop

Dean Kenning (Kingston University and CSM) will be talking about the recent show at Portman Gallery: ‘Poster Production’ where he worked with art students from Morpeth School, Central St Martins and ReadingUniversity, and with several contemporary artists to produce posters based on different themes and according to various methods of working.

Rachael House and Jo David from artist run Space Station Sixty-Five on posters and archives in the art space, including poster-related shows such as 'Shape and Situate'. 'Rachael will also talk about her recent exhibitions 'Feminist Disco' and 'A Space of Potential' which draw on feminist cultures'

Chair: Anne Robinson (senior lecturer at London Metropolitan University and former member of See Red Womens Workshop). Admission free and all welcome, but please register at: http://inknowposters.eventbrite.com

See Red anti-National Front poster, 'Don't let racism divide us'
The photograph used was taken in the anti-NF  'Battle of Lewisham' in August 1977

Music Monday: 30 years of Band of Holy Joy

It is now 30 years since Band of Holy Joy were formed in New Cross, and they're still going strong (albeit with some big gaps along the way!).

One of their first releases was a 1984 cassette  'More Favourite Fairytales'  put out by Glasgow-based Pleasantly Surprised. The sleevenotes say:

'Holy Joy were formed in the summer of 1983 when Johny and his sister Max found a synthesiser in the cellar of the house they were living in and started messing around on it. They then brought in Brett (Test Dept's visual genius) as he had an organ and could also play various instruments. John at this time was taking photographs that had everything in common with the songs Johny and Max were writing. They persuaded him to trade in his camera for a mouth organ, tambourine and various other instruments. Test Dept then took them under their with and they played places like Manchester, Sheffield and Retford. After these performances Holy Joy decided to go into the studio then came a few more dates in London at their own club "The Stomach Pump" Situated in a crypt in Deptford and also playing with Einsturzende Neubauten.

"More Favourite Fairytales" was recorded on a four track portastudio in late winter / early spring '84 and is a follow up / progression to a previous cassette entitled "Favourite Fairytales For Juvenile Delinquents" which they consider to be more background music than anything else.Plans for the proper studio and record a 12 inch version of "Liquid Lunch" and a 7 inch of "Consumption" and one day soon M.F.F will appear properly recorded on a record. Also being talked about is a video film tentatively called "Seven Days Of Agony And Holy Joy". At present more songs are being written and recorded. They have also made some new instruments and have come up with a whole host of new sounds and noises. Ideas are also underway for some film music. All in all "Holy Joy" are a very creative and exiting conception and in my opinion you shall be hearing a lot more from them in the near future'.

Well a lot more has certainly been heard, latest from them is the third in an ongoing series of films featuring tracks from this year's return to the cassette 'City of Tales, Volume 1 and 2'. 'Empty Purse Found in Hotel Lobby' features band drummer William Lewington and Joanna Pickering.



Lots more Transpontine BoHJ