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That’s Entertainment: A telephonic tribute to ‘Sound Affects’ by The Jam

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It seems like ages ago when I was commissioned by  Gravesham Borough Council to create an installation in a telephone box, as a tribute to The Jam’s 1980 studio album, Sound Affects, as part of  the Winter Light Festival 2020.  But as with most things lately, COVID got in the way and the event  was cancelled. I got paid and I kind of forgot about it.

But now it’s back again!  And my installation will be one stop on a circular trail of light around the ‘Heritage Quarter’ and along the river.

Gravesham Old Town Hall: Telephone box 2022
The telephone box outside Gravesham Old Town Hall (2020) photographed by Bill Smith for ‘Sound Affects’

Sound Affects
I’m not sure quite how well known it is , that the telephone box outside Gravesend Old Town Hall was featured on the Sound Affects album cover.

The original photo was taken by art director, Bill Smith, who worked with The Jam over the three most important years of their career. During that time he designed five album covers and 16 singles bags for the band, as well as a range of promotional ads, posters and videos.

BBC Sound Effects with Paul Weller annotations
If you zoom in you can see Paul Weller’s annotations on the BBC ‘Sound Effects’ cover

‘The idea came from Paul [Weller] who was working in the studio at the time making the album, and they used some effects from the series of BBC Sound Effects records,’ Bill explains. ‘Paul gave me a sleeve with the BBC scrubbed out and replaced with JAM and the number altered to 80 (to reference 1980, the year Sound Affects was recorded) and “Effects” changed to “Affects”. He asked me to recreate the cover, using images that related to the songs on the album.’

Bill was brought up in Gravesend but, by 1980, had moved away.  It was while he was visiting his mother-in-law in Gravesend to photograph her dog for the Sound Affects cover that he took the picture of the phone box.

The Jam - Sound Affects 1980. Art direction and design Bill Smith. Photography Martyn Goddard and Bill Smith
Bill and Martyn’s cover for ‘Sound Affects’ 1980

Bill shared the photography for the Sound Affects cover with renowned rock photographer, Martyn Goddard.

‘I just chose subjects around my home – the jukebox, record player and even my sister’s friends baby,’ Martyn says. ‘Then I walked around the streets of Camden Town and the West End of London shooting interesting subjects, such as the funeral hearse in York way and  a taxi at Kings Cross Station. The power station at Dungeness was mine, plus the police car and the Brunswick Centre.’

Martyn has since met one of the funeral staff. a young undertaker who was in the hearse that he shot for the cover. Thirty-odd years later he was running the firm and Martyn was able to provide him with a print of the photo.

The “baby”, by then aged 36, also turned up at  the About the Young Idea exhibition at Somerset House, in 2015, where she met Paul Weller.

Bill Smith: Gravesend telephone box
Bill Smith’s original photograph taken from the ‘Sound Affects’ cover – they still haven’t mended that railing!

The Sound Affects album was released on 28th November 1980  It sold over 100,000 copies and spent 19 weeks in the UK album charts. making it to number 2. The track Start!  was a number one single for the band. And although That’s Entertainment was never released as a domestic single,  it did chart as an import single, making it to number 21.

Sound Affects was the last album cover Bill and Martyn ever did for The Jam. 

‘We created the sleeve and inner bag and I designed a series of ads and posters that used Roy Lichtenstein pop art influences for these,’ Bill remembers. After that there were three or four more covers for singles that I did, including 1981’s Funeral Pyre , for which I also wrote and directed a promotional video. And finally, Absolute Beginners. I also wrote and shot a video for that with Gered Mankowitz  but the band weren’t happy with our initial edit and, rather than let us do a re-edit, we were sacked and they did a brand new video shoot. It was the last time I spoke to Paul Weller until the 2015 Jam exhibition at Somerset House.’

Wooden prototype of the original K2 now at the entrance of the Royal Academy of Arts in London

Red telephone boxes
The first public telephone boxes were introduced by the Post Office in 1921. They were made of concrete  and some local authorities, including the London Metropolitan Boroughs, refused permission for them to be installed. Eastbourne Corporation stipulated that the kiosks could only be installed if they had thatched roofs!

In 1924, Sir Giles Gilbert Scott won a competition to design a telephone kiosk  that would be acceptable  to the London boroughs. You might have heard of Scott. He designed Our Lady of Assumption Catholic Church in Northfleet…oh yeah, and Liverpool Cathedral, Battersea Power Station  and the Bankside power station (now the Tate Modern). Scott’s  winning design featured steel structure with a silver exterior and a greeny-blue interior. The Post Office, however, decided to make it in cast iron and to paint it red. Kiosk Number 2 (K2). The boroughs were won over and K2 was installed in and around London.

K6
K6

After three more iterations, the Post Office commissioned a new ‘Jubilee kiosk’ to commemorate the  silver jubilee of George V. The  K6, as it is known, again designed by Scott, went into production in 1936. It was a bit more streamlined than the K2, designed to be cheaper to produce and to take up less pavement space. The number of glazed panels were increased from 18 to 24.

Thousands  of K6 boxes were made and installed all over the country, replacing most of the existing  telephone boxes, as well as introducing them in thousands of new sites. The telephone box by Gravesend Old Town Hall – the one on the Sound Affects cover – is a K6.

Although there was some objection early on to the bright red paint used on the boxes, the K6 box quickly became a national icon. In 1980, British Telecom’s plan to paint all telephone boxes in their corporate yellow caused a national outcry. Battered into submission by the Daily Mail. BT backed down.

By 1985, BT announced that the old red telephone boxes would be replaced because they no longer met the needs of customers and were expensive to maintain and clean. Once again their was a vociferous campaign to stop this but, this time, BT held firm.

In the late 80s, just before deregulation of telecoms, I worked for BT for a bit, identifying  new sites for payphones around the country for BT to develop, before they were nabbed by their main competitor, Mercury Communications.

With the old red boxes being replaced by more utilitarian versions, many local authorities used legislation designed to protect buildings of architectural or historic importance to keep  their red telephone boxes. Around 2,000 red boxes were given listed status. Lots more were sold off.  But more than 6,000 were bought by organisations and converted for community use, as libraries or to house public defibrillators. The only use forbidden by the regulations was ‘telephony’.

In 2021, BT announced that about 5,000 public phone boxes around the UK would be protected from closure in areas with  high accident or suicide rates or poor mobile signals.

Duncan Grant: artist
Me as callow yoof

The Gravesend mod revival scene in 80’s Gravesend
In the 1980 when Sound Affects I was released, I was working just around the corner as a Saturday (and holidays) boy, alongside my mum,  in Boots.  I was 15.  At around the same time, my now wife,  Davina, and her mates were part of the mod revival – hanging round the town centre showing off the look and dancing  the night away at mod clubs. Davina’s friend Kay Sugg even had a scooter.

The Jam, with their mod styling  and energetic, punky post-60s mod sound was the soundtrack to their lives. And with no mobile phones then, telephone boxes were essential for keeping in touch.

Mod night, Northfleet
Davina (centre) at a mod night in Northfleet

Davina and her friends still have really good memories of those times.

‘I wasn’t a fully fledged mod when Sound Affects came out but Quadrophenia had been out the previous year, so the revival was in full swing,’ Davina reminisces. ‘The album reminds me of just turning 17, dancing at every opportunity and a continual round of parties with my school friends. My favourite track was and still is Start!

Davina Grant and Kay Sugg
Davina and Kay ready for a night out around 1982

‘Sound Affects is as good today as it was 40 years ago,’ says former teenage mod, Yvonne Lynn.  ‘Listening to the album back when I was a 16-year old mod living in Gravesend consolidated my feelings of belonging in the mod scene. The lyrics and music made sense to my teenage rebellious self and it was the glue that held our group together.’

‘The album tied in with so much,’ agrees Derek Forbes. ‘Mods, scooters, my first girlfriend and my favourite band.’

Kay Sugg on her scooter
Kay Sugg on her scooter

‘I was desperate to become a mod,’ Davina admits. ‘But I was too shy so a boy from my school took me to my first mod night  in Wings in  the Battle of Britain  pub in Northfleet. I couldn’t believe that so many other kids of my age were so into 60s music, like I was, so I was soon hooked – and that’s where it all began. After that, most of my time was spent in second hand shops and Kensington Market perfecting the mod look, and dancing! It took hours to get ready. Getting the make up just right – the eyeliner was the hardest bit  as well as back combing your hair – normally with a bathroom full of giggling mates and a Supremes album on for inspiration!’

Mod Life, soul music, scootering and Carnaby Street filled my youthful heart, took me on an amazing journeys and left a lasting legacy of wonderful memories that still make me smile at the love we all shared, ‘ says Kay Sugg. ‘From the sharp cut of a suit, a neat bob hairstyle, ski pants or mini, we danced our style, to our music and looking cool round town was an every Saturday treat.’

‘That’s Entertainment’ installation
So back to my installation.  Because the phone box was featured on the Sound Affects album, Gravesham Council wanted my installation to be a tribute to The Jam.

I tried to combine all this in my piece.  I started with some initial sketches – two  figures – mods – speaking  lyrics  from Start! one of the tracks on Sound Affects, to go on either side of the telephone box.

And then a eight smaller drawings – my take on some of  Bill and Martyn’s images from the Sound Affects cover.

The  Old Town Hall box has 24 panels, eight on each side, so the next job was to measure them up and draw them to scale. While it was pretty straightforward to cut paper to size for the smaller drawings, I drew out the people full size and then cut them into panels afterwards, discarding the bits of the pictures where the metal window frames would go.

Gravesham Council then took those drawings and transferred them onto white vinyl to stick onto the inside of the box. The plan for the Winter Festival is to light the box from the inside, illuminating the drawings, while the Sound Affects album plays on a loop.

So come on down next weekend and have a look and a listen. I’ll be hanging around the phone box and it will be nice to see everyone there – sharp suits,  Chelsea boots and Parkas optional.

Follow the link below for the full programme but don’t miss  the interactive installation, Light and Thread, in St Georges Arts Centre, created by friends of this blog Filaments Art Collective, who work aboard LV21 was featured last May.

Also, check out Bill Smith’s book which tells the stories behind some of his covers – you’ll recognise pretty much all of them, I reckon.

Further information

Filaments Art Collective: Light and Thread, 2022
Filaments Art Collective: Light and Thread

The Winter Light Festival 2022, will take place at the end of this month, on Saturday 29th January and Sunday 3Oth, between 5 and 8pm.

Light and Thread by Filaments Art Collective
A collection of light installations and digital projections made from textiles, thread and paper.
19th – 30th January 2022
Tuesday – Friday 10am – 5pm
Saturday and Sunday  10am – 4pm

Cover Stories: Five decades of album art  by Bill Smith

Over the years, Bill has designed album covers and sleeves for artists including Kate Bush, Led ZeppelinKing CrimsonMarillionGenesis and Mike Oldfield . Check out the link to his book ‘Cover Stories’  which tells the stories behind some of those covers
https://redplanetmusicbooks.com/collections/full-catalogue/products/cover-stories

Martyn Goddard images
https://www.martyngoddard.com/

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Updates: Christmas cards, book cover, spotted in Japan and chewing gum

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A few updates to give you in this blog.

Christmas cards
In April, I put out a call for designs for Christmas cards to raise money for Christmas dinner, this year, at No. 84 Tearoom and Eatery at Echo Square in Gravesend https://www.no84.co.uk/  Owners Adrian and Andrea offer a free Chrstmas dinner to anyone in the local community who would otherwise be alone on Christmas Day. Well, the cards have been printed and boxed up. They are available on this website https://duncangrantartist.com/product-category/charity-christmas-cards/ and in various venues around the Gravesend Riverarea, including https://www.no84.co.uk/ https://www.visitgravesend.co.uk/event/hope-and-glory/ (more sellers to be added soon) or you can get them from me directly, if you know where to find me.

There are 42 original card designs, plus envelopes, in each box. Boxes costs £20 (plus postage and packing if you order them from the website). All profits go to helping those less fortunate than ourselves this Christmas. You can find out more about the 2019 Christmas card project here https://duncangrantartist.com/2019/04/07/only-261-more-days-until-christmas-time-to-think-about-lunch/

A big thank-you to everyone who took part! These pictures posted by Cafe No.84 from last year’s Christmas dinner, show the impact the money we raise can have https://www.facebook.com/groups/125240881313495/permalink/680243952479849/

Book cover – The Milkman by Anna Burns
In May, I found out that one of the prints from my winning #LibertyOpenCall Small Town fabric design had been chosen for the cover of a special edition of Faber & Faber’s Booker Prize winning publication, Milkman by Anna Burn. https://duncangrantartist.com/2019/06/02/can-you-judge-a-book-by-its-cover-maybe/

Each year Faber & Faber bring out a classic book, covered in a Liberty fabric (actual fabric, not a picture of it) from the year of publication. This year’s book was to be Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, which was first published in 1963.  But because of their Booker Prize success with Milkman, Faber & Faber published an extra edition this year and my Small Town design was in the right place at the right time when they asked Liberty, ‘Have you got anything with houses on it?’

Last week Milkman it appeared in the shops, followed closely by a gift wrapped copy through my letterbox.

Lovely!

Spotted in Japan….
Small Towns have been spotted in Japan!
Japanese company AmandaMandy https://www.instagram.com/amandamandy_official/ seems to have bought a lot of different Liberty fabrics and is turning them into objects for sale – anyone for a Small Town water bottle holder, or a handy fabric covered notebook?

Ben Wilson: Chewing gum man
Artist Ben Wilson completes his latest miniature artwork on chewing gumThree weeks ago my blog featured artist, Ben Wilson aka ‘Chewing Gum Man’ https://duncangrantartist.com/2019/08/25/ben-wilson-chewing-gum-man/ 
Ben paints mini-artworks on discarded chewing gum and at that time was working his way down the Millenium Bridge just outside Tate Modern. My sister Annie met up with him again last week and was pleased to report that he’d reached the door of the Tate. His Kickstarter project to raise funds to produce a book of the Millenium Bridge Chewing Gum Trail reached its total, with just four days to go. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/studiomoe/ben-wilson-the-chewing-gum-man-the-millennium-bridge-gum Congratulations!

Tate Modern has agreed to allow Ben to hide some of his artwork around the gallery. You can see those pieces and keep up with his project on Instagram. benwilsonchewingumman https://www.instagram.com/p/B2EpjpjHzTR/?igshid=hwu58bt7f3t6

Think that’s all the updates for now! I’m trying to add some new artwork to my gallery – some of the stuff I’ve been posting on Facebook and Instagram lately – but have encountered a technical problem. Will let you know when I’ve managed to upload them, or check in here over the next few days https://duncangrantartist.com/product-category/new-artwork/

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Ben Wilson: Chewing Gum Man

Artis Ben Wilson aka Chewing Gum Man on the Millenium Bridge

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Crossing London’s Millenium Bridge always involves negotiating a crowd. There are Londoners with their gaze fixed straight ahead, or on their phones, trying to get from A to B, and tourists taking in the stunning views down the Thames on their way to St Paul’s Cathedral or to see the international art collection at the Tate Modern.

But the bridge hosts a secret art collection. An art collection that you will only see if you look down. An art collection painted on the spat-out chewing gum left on the bridge and its surrounding walkways.

My sister Annie was out around London last week filming and taking photographs for a travel guide project she’s doing. She was taking pictures of the minature artworks on the bridge when she (almost literally) stumbled across the Chewing Gum Man himself – artist, Ben Wilson – lying on the ground, surrounded by a small crowd, adding the finishing touches to his latest mini-masterpiece.  She stopped to take some pictures and he was happy to be photographed and to chat about his work.

Ben is a professional artist with a background in painting, wood-carving and sculpture. He has exhibited all over the world. Check out his listing on Wikipedia to find out more https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Wilson_(artist)

Driven by his dislike of waste and a desire to improve the urban environment, in the late nineties, Ben started experimenting with occasional chewing-gum paintings. Has now created thousands of them across London (particularly in Muswell Hill where he lives) but also around the UK and in Europe. He says he loves the idea of taking something that has been thrown away and transforming it into something amazing.

Each transformation takes between a couple of hours and three days to complete, using a special technique that involves heating the gum with a small blow torch, then coating it with three layers of acrylic enamel, before painting it with special acrylic paints and sealing it with clear lacquer. With the public ‘donating’ an endless supply of canvasses, Ben needs constant inspiration for his creations. His subjects include requests from the public, portraits, mini-landscapes and strange creatures from his imagination. The shape of each painting is determined by where the gum spitting has taken place. On the bridge, where it is squashed into the metal, the images are made up of slightly disconnected oblongs. On the ramps down from the bridge to the river banks, they tend to be round.

Britain spends about £150 million each year cleaning chewing gum from pavement and although Ben’s work does get eroded when the bridge is cleaned, there is no deliberate effort to remove it. In 2009, he was arrested in Trafalgar Square but, he explains that, technically, what he does does not count as criminal damage, because he is painting the gum, not the pavement.

There is a serious intent behind Ben’s chewing gum art. He sees it as a small way of helping people reconnect with their environment. In an Observer article some years ago he said, ‘Kids are not allowed to feel any connection with where they live … They can’t play in the streets because they are likely to get run over; then you have the national curriculum, and all this testing at school, and no opportunity to play or to make things, and everything you do outside is recorded on surveillance cameras. The only imagery that children see around them are billboards and TV; every part of their environment is out of bounds or sold off. That’s why they don’t care about their streets. This is a small way of connecting people.’

At the moment, Ben is using Kickstarter to try to raise funds to produce a book featuring a picture trail of his chewing gum art from St. Pauls, across the Millennium Bridge and into the Tate Modern. He hasn’t reached the Tate Modern yet – he is nearly there – but with only 19 fundraising days to go (ends midday 13th September) he has only raised just over £3000 of the £8000 he needs for publication. You can find out more about the project and, if you want to support him, pledge a donation, here https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/studiomoe/ben-wilson-the-chewing-gum-man-the-millennium-bridge-gum. With Kickstarter projects you only pay if the project reaches its target amount. Ben is offering free paperback copies of the book in return for donations.

If you want to see more of Ben’s fascinating work, follow him on Instagram @benwilsonchewinggumman https://instagram.com/benwilsonchewinggumman?igshid=5jm87/ijcs264

And next time you’re in London and you cross the Millenium Bridge, just remember to look down as well as up, if you want to appreciate all the cultural richness the area has to offer.