Dead Men Make Good Mould

Decay is the Laboratory of Life

(SA/2023)

 

 

Because so much of my thinking has been informed by the work of D. H. Lawrence - and because, as the author of a book of essays on thanatology, all aspects of death are a matter of continued philosophical interest - it means I can never see a pile of fallen wet leaves slowly decomposing without recalling the following lines from Fantasia of the Unconscious:

 

"Old leaves have got to fall, old forms must die. And if men at certain periods fall into death in millions, why, so must the leaves fall every single autumn. And dead leaves make good mold. And so dead men. Even dead men's souls." [1]   

 

That's quite a hard teaching from the materialist school of general economics - one that Bataille would happily affirm - but its apparent callousness in the face of some kind of huge event that results in the mass destruction of human lives doesn't detract from the essential truth that life is rooted in and thrives upon death, and that "the whole universe would perish if man and beast and herb were not putting forth a newness" [2] out of the decay of the old.

 

Or, as the Iranian philosopher Reza Negarestani puts it: "Through decay, life and death multiply and putrefy each other to no end." [3] 

 

So, next time you see a pile of rotting leaves - or, indeed, contemplate a mass grave of human bodies - try to overcome your horror and console yourself with the knowledge of how compost enriches the soil with organic nutrients and provides sustenance for a range of detritivores on both the macro and micro level; for dead men make good food as well as good mould.    

 

 

Notes

 

[1] D. H. Lawrence, Fantasia of the Unconscious (1922), Ch. XV, p. 266. 

      For readers who prefer to consult the 2004 Cambridge Edition of Fantasia, published jointly with Psychoanalysis and the Unconscious and ed. Bruce Steele, see p. 189.   

[2] Ibid.

[3] Reza Negarestani, Cyclonopedia: Complicity with Anonymous Materials, (re:press, 2008), p. 184. 

Three More Cool Cats: CC, Room 8, and Henri, le Chat Noir

Three Cool Cats: CC, Room 8, and Henri, le Chat Noir

 

 

Opening Remarks 

 

Some cats have so captured human affection that they've secured a place in the cultural imagination and achieved a degree of fame bordering on celebrity. To illustrate this, I recently discussed the cases of Félicette the Space Cat, Casper the Commuting Cat, and Oscar the Therapy Cat: click here.

 

Here, at the request of several cat-loving readers, are three further examples drawn from the modern period that particularly interest or amuse ...

 

 

CC (Copy Cat)

 

Just as many people know the name of Laika, the Soviet space dog, but are unfamiliar with the French cat Félicette, so it is that whilst most have heard of Dolly the Sheep, very few are acquainted with a shorthaired, brown and white tabby cat called CC - an initialism standing for either Copy Cat or Carbon Copy, depending on who you ask - even though she holds the distinction of being the world's first cloned pet, born in Texas, in 2001 [1]. 

Whilst figures ranging from Jean Baudrillard to Adam Gibson have expressed reservations about cloning as a technique - Doesn't anybody die anymore? - I'm pleased to say that CC appeared to be a happy, healthy cat who, in September 2001, gave birth to four genetically unique kittens (one of whom was, sadly, stillborn), fathered naturally by another lab cat, named Smokey, before dying peacefully, aged 18, in March 2020. 

 

 

Room 8 (The School Cat)

 

If asked to identify my favourite type of cat, then I would have to say one that comes from out of the blue; i.e., not a breed, but either a fateful event in and of themselves, or the herald of such - a kind of feline angel with whiskers rather than wings.

 

My little black cat is one such creature, who just turned up one day and decided to stay ... And so was an American pussy who came to be known as Room 8 ...

 

Room 8 wandered into a classroom at Elysian Heights Elementary School in Echo Park, California, in 1952 and decided he was henceforth going to live there during the school year; vacationing for the summer months, but always returning when classes resumed in the Fall. 

 

This happy (somewhat unusual) arrangement continued without interruption until the mid-1960s. 

 

Eventually, the news media discovered what was happening and they would send reporters and film crews to await the cat's return. This resulted in him receiving fan mail (up to a 100 letters a day) and becoming the subject of both a documentary film and a children's book. 

When age, sickness, and injury began to take a toll - he was hurt in a fight when older and suffered from feline pneumonia - Room 8 was taken in by a kind family living close to the school.

 

When he died, in August 1968, thought to be aged around 21, his obituary in the LA Times ran to three columns and was accompanied with a photograph. Past and present students at the school raised funds for his gravestone and CC was laid to rest at the Los Angeles Pet Memorial Park in Calabasas, California. 

 

Finally, for those who find such details fascinating, Room 8's paw prints can be found immortalized in cement on the pavement outside Elysian Heights. 

 

 

Henry aka Henri, le Chat Noir 

 

Technically, Henri, le Chat Noir is a fictional cat created by the human William Braden, who wrote and directed a short series of films posted online that explored the existential musings of the former. 

 

But Henri was portrayed by a real (longhaired black and white) cat, Henry, belonging to Braden's mother, so I think it's legitimate to comment on his case here, particularly as videos featuring Henri have been viewed millions of times and received critical acclaim, making him one of the world's best-known and most celebrated cats.

 

Braden began his project whilst a student at the Seattle Film Institute. He was inspired by the American perception of French films as pretentious and self-absorbed. The first short, Henri (2007), was written, filmed and edited in eleven days. 

 

The second film, Henri 2: Paw de Deux didn't follow on YouTube until five years later in 2012, but it won the Golden Kitty Award for Best Cat Video On The Internet at the Walker Art Center's Internet Cat Video Festival. Critic Roger Ebert also declared Henri 2: Paw de Deux the 'best internet cat video ever made' [2].

 

Many sequels followed between 2012 and 2018 - seventeen short films in all. In the final film, Henri announced his retirement and thanked all his fans around the world for their support. 

 

During this period, two books were also published: Henri, le Chat Noir: The Existential Musings of an Angst-Filled Cat (2013) and Reflections on Human Folly (2016), both written (obviously) by Braden, but one likes to think with Henry's approval.  

 

I think my favourite description of Henri was provided by a journalist at The Huffington Post who wrote that he was 'like a feline Serge Gainsbourg, just without the singing, or the alcoholism, or the public scandal' [3].

 

It's actually a little disapointing to discover that in real life Henry was, according to Braden, a good natured and happy cat who never suffered a single moment of existential crisis and had nothing in common with the brooding character Henri he portrayed on film. 

 

In December 2020, Braden announced that Henry had been euthanized at the age of 17 because of a debilitating deterioration of his spine ... C'est la vie! as he fictional French self might shrug.      

 

 

Notes

 

[1] CC was genetically identical to Rainbow, the male cat who donated the genetic material. But the cats looked different because coat patterns and other features can be determined in the womb. Her surrogate mother was named Allie.  

 

[2] Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, (31 Aug 2012). 

 

[3] Written in a Huffington Post review (27 June 2012) of Henri 3: Le Vet (2012). 

Three Cool Cats: Félicette the Space Cat, Casper the Commuting Cat, and Oscar the Therapy Cat

Three Cool Cats: Félicette, Casper, and Oscar

 

 

Opening Remarks 

 

Although human cruelty towards cats has a long and terrible history - I discussed two methods for terminating their lives, cat throwing and cat burning, in a post published in April 2019 (click here) - so too can the human love of cats be traced back thousands of years. 

 

Indeed, some cats so captured human affection that they secured a place in the cultural imagination and achieved a degree of fame bordering on celebrity. Here are just three examples from the modern period that particularly interest or amuse  ...  

 

 

Félicette the Space Cat (Official Designation: C 341)

 

Everyone knows the name of Laika, the little Russian dog born on the streets of Moscow who was the first animal to orbit the Earth, in 1957, aboard the spacecraft Sputnik 2. 

 

But, outside of France, very few have heard of the small black-and-white stray cat called Félicette, who, sixty years ago, became the first (and so far only) pussy to be launched into space after two months intensive training, and who, I'm pleased to say, returned safe and sound (unlike Laika) after a brief (13 minute) flight. 

 

Sadly, I'm less pleased to report that Félicette was killed shortly afterwards by scientists keen to examine her brain - apparently the nine electrodes surgically implanted in her skull to record neurological activity during the flight didn't provide them with sufficient data. They later admitted, however, that they had learnt nothing of any significance from the autopsy. 

 

Félicette has since been commemorated on postage stamps and there's a 5 ft tall bronze statue of her sitting atop a globe gazing up to the skies, displayed at the International Space University (Strasbourg). Designed by the British artist Gill Parker, it was erected in 2019 after a crowdfunding campaign raised £40,000.

 

 

Casper the Commuting Cat

 

Although he didn't make it into space, a cat called Casper attracted worldwide media attention when he began navigating his way round his hometown of Plymouth by bus ... 

 

According to his human, Susan Finden, who adopted Casper from a rescue centre in 2002, he loved to roam and go on adventures, showing little fear of either people or traffic. Not only did he nonchantly wander into shops, offices, and the local GP's surgery in order to find a comfortable spot to sleep, he would also wait patiently at the stop opposite his house in order to catch a bus into the town centre and back.

 

Curling up on a seat with the driver's permission, he would enjoy the eleven mile roundtrip, before then hopping off. As one might imagine, his behaviour delighted his fellow passengers and he soon became a well-known and much-loved character. 

 

Unfortunately, his own bold - some might say slightly reckless - desire to lead an independent life and live dangerously, would have tragic consequences and, in January 2010, he was killed by a speeding car while attempting to cross the road outside his home.  

 

To help her cope with his death, Miss Finden wrote a book in memory of Casper which was published later that year and translated into several languages [1]. Proceeds from sales of the book were donated to animal rescue charities, which not only makes her a good egg, but counters any possible charge that she was cashing in on his fame.  

 

 

Oscar the Therapy Cat

  

Oscar was taken on as a therapy cat in 2005 by the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Providence, Rhode Island - a 41-bed facility that treats people with end-stage Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other terminal illnesses.

 

He came to public attention two years later when he was featured in an article by geriatrician David Dosa in the New England Journal of Medicine [2].

 

According to Dosa, Oscar seemed to possess an uncanny ability to predict the impending death of terminally ill patients by choosing to nap next to them a few hours before they died. It was suggested that Oscar perhaps noticed the lack of movement in such patients or that he could smell biochemicals released by dying cells.

 

Although Oscar was generally an aloof cat - certainly not one who liked to be overly friendly with people (he would sometimes even hiss when he wanted to be left alone) - staff noticed that he often chose to nap next to patients who would die in his presence. Whether this makes him a feline angel of death, or, in fact, demonstrates his desire to comfort and provide company to the dying, is debatable [3].

 

After Oscar accurately predicted a number of deaths, staff began calling friends and family members of residents as soon as they discovered him sleeping next to a patient in order to afford an opportunity to visit and say goodbye. By 2015, it was believed that Oscar had made 100 such predictions. 

 

Whether he was able to foretell his own death, I don't know, but one would imagine so. At any rate, he died, aged 17, in February 2022, after a brief illness. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Casper the Commuting Cat, by Susan Finden (in collaboration with Linda Watson-Brown), was first published in the United Kingdom by Simon & Schuster in August 2010. 

 

[2] See David M. Dosa, 'A Day in the Life of Oscar the Cat', The New England Journal of Medicine, Issue 357 (July 2007), pp. 328-329. Oscar's abilities were also the subject also of a book by Dr Dosa; Making Rounds with Oscar: The Extraordinary Gift of an Ordinary Cat, (Hyperion, 2010). 

[3] Based on my own experience, I'm pretty certain that cats are kinder and more patient around elderly people whom they know to be frail and not long for this life. The small black cat who wandered one day into the house from out of the garden and decided to stay, would spend many hours lying next to my mother when she was confined to her bedroom and in the final stages of her life, watching over her and providing a feline peacefulness to the room.

 

 

For a follow up post to this one on three more cool cats - CC, Room 8, and Henri, le Chat Noir - click here.  

When Jiggs the Chimp Met Dorothy Lamour

Jiggs and Dorothy Lamour on set in 1936 filming Her Jungle Love (1938), 

where things started happily enough, but sadly ended in tears ...

 

 

I.

 

In his day, Jiggs was the top chimp actor in Hollywood, starring, for example, as Cheeta alongside Johnny Weissmuller and Maureen O'Sullivan in Tarzan the Ape Man (dir. W. S. Van Dyke, 1932), as well as featuring in several later Tarzan movies (where he was sometimes cast as Nkima). 

 

He appeared too in the hilarious Laurel and Hardy short, Dirty Work (dir. Lloyd French, 1933), where he was even given a speaking role, uttering the famous last line of the film: 'I have nothing to say.' [1] 

 

Jiggs's was also cast (as Gaga) alongside Dorothy Lamour (as Ulah) in Her Jungle Love (dir. George Archainbaud, 1938). This was to be his final picture, for reasons we shall discuss shortly.  

 

 

II. 

 

Legend has it, that Jiggs had been brought over from Africa by Gary Cooper, but that the latter found him a bit too boisterous and so sold Jiggs to a pair of Hollywood animal trainers, who raised him alongside their pet collie, Spanky, of whom the young chimp was unusually fond - even refusing to work on set at times unless the dog, who exerted a soothing influence, was present. 

 

Unfortunately, it seems that although present on the set of the south seas adventure movie Her Jungle Love, Spanky failed to work his calming canine magic on his simian pal ...

 

For whilst Jiggs and the film's female star Dorothy Lamour initially had a happy relationship - he would lovingly groom her long hair for lice and make her laugh with his monkey tricks - things soured after Jiggs attacked the young actress and she had to be rescued by an on set assistant [2]. Afterwards, Lamour vowed never to work with an animal again (dropping Jiggs in favour of going on the Road with Hope and Crosby).  

That's certainly regrettable and it has left a black mark against his reputation ever since, even though Jiggs had previously shown himself capable of acts of great tenderness towards his female co-stars; one recalls, for example, the fact that on the set of Tarzan the Fearless (dir. Robert F. Hill, 1933) he carefully removed a thorn from the hand of Jacqueline Wells after she and lead actor Buster Crabbe had both failed to extract it.

 

Even more regrettable, however, is the fact that Jiggs died of pneumonia shortly before the release of Her Jungle Love in the spring of 1938; he was just 9-years-old. 

 

Jiggs was laid to rest in the Los Angeles Pet Cemetery [3]. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] See the post published on 27 Nov 2023 in which I discuss the idea of having nothing to say: click here. 

[2] Unfortunatey, I don't know what caused this incident. As Jiggs was a sexually immature chimp, one doubts that he was overexcited by the alluring presence of Dorothy Lamour in a sarong. Readers who are interested, however, in the erotic relationship between human females and male chimpanzees, might like an earlier post published on 9 Feb 2017: click here. 

 

[3] Lamour died in September 1996, at the age of 81. She was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park - Hollywood Hills, in Los Angeles. Unlike Jiggs, who has no star, Lamour has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, awarded for her contribution to radio and the motion picture industry.  

At Last the Legend of the White Rhinoceros is Fulfilled: Notes on Prehistoric Women (1967)

Martine Beswick as Queen Kari and Edina Ronay as slave girl Saria 

in Prehistoric Women (dir. Michael Carreras, 1967)

 

 

I. 

 

I like a good cavegirl flick as much as the next man, particularly when it deals with pressing social and political issues to do with class, ethnicity, and sexual relations. If the film also involves the religious worship of a giant white rhino, then that only sweetens the deal as far as I'm concened.

 

I couldn't, therefore, pass up the opportunity to watch Prehistoric Women when it was shown on Talking Pictures TV yesterday ...

II. 

 

Directed by Michael Carreras, Prehistoric Women was a fantasy adventure produced by Hammer Films, that was initially released in the US in 1967. An edited version, entitled Slave Girls, was released in the UK the following year. 

 

It starred Michael Latimer in the lead male role of David Marchant, a British explorer on safari in Africa; Jamaican-born beauty and Bond girl Martine Beswick, as Queen Kari; and the Anglo-Hungarian actress (who became a fashion designer) Edina Ronay, as the pouting blonde slave girl Saria, with whom David, all-too-predictably, falls in love.  

 

Central to the plot is the division of an all-female tribe into a ruling class of brunettes and a subordinate class of blondes. David, having accidently found himself caught up in the middle of things, is wanted by the beautiful dark-haired queen as her mate. He, however, appalled by her cruelty towards inferiors, spurns her advances. 

In fact, he has the hots for Saria and is soon encouraging her and her fair-haired comrades - as well as the men who are all kept as prisoners in a cave - to revolt against Kari, and against the Devils, a tribe of black Africans with whom she is in league (and who worship a large white rhino carved in stone). 

Long story short, this slave revolt against the dark-haired matriarchal order is a success and the rhino-masked devils are driven off. What's more, Kari is impaled and killed by the horn of a charging white rhino that mysteriously appears out of the jungle in a terrible temper.

 

Despite proclaiming his love for her, Saria tells David that her world is not his world and insists that he return home, which, via an act of iconoclastic magic he does, thereby fulfulling the legend of the white rhino.  

 

Once back at camp, David wonders whether it was all a mad dream - or he had really traveled back in time to reunite a lost African tribe and end a million-year-old legend ...? He begins to think it was probably the former, but then finds the white rhino brooch given to him by Saria in his pocket. So, it was true and it had happened!

 

The film ends on a happy romantic note: David is asked to greet some people joining the safari from London and, to his astonishment, one of the guests, called Sarah, is a reincarnation (or certainly a pretty good lookalike) of Saria.  

 

 

III.

 

What, then, do we learn from the film? 

 

Well, one takeaway could be that strictly enforced class divisions will invariably result in social tension and violence. That seems quite a progressive political message.

 

On the other hand, however, we might also note how the unconscious bias of the filmmakers results in fair-haired and light-skinned people being equated with beauty and goodness, whilst dark-haired, dark-skinned people are invariably portrayed as cruel, savage, devil-worshippers. 

 

A movie that promotes social justice can, it seems, still perpetuate racial stereotypes - and, indeed, sexual stereotypes. Because what Prehistoric Women confirms above all else is something established in One Million Years B.C. (1966). Namely, that barefoot cavegirls wearing fur-lined animal skin bikinis will forever find a place in the (male) pornographic imagination [1].

 

 

IV.

 

Critically panned and commercially unsuccessful, I still rather enjoyed watching this (politically suspect) Hammer film; not least of all for the sensual (and at times sadistic) scenes involving Martine Beswick. Push comes to shove, I'm not sure I wouldn't have chosen Queen Kari over Saria had I been in David's shoes.

 

There's something about a domineering dark-haired woman with a whip who also knows how to handle a knife and worships a rhinoceros, that excites even more than a virtuous blonde slavegirl (even when they look like Edina Ronay). 

 

It's arguable, in fact, that without a little coldness and cruelty a woman lacks character and I suspect that, ultimately, a great hunter like David would soon be bored by Saria/Sarah and seek out a woman more like Kari. 

 

For as Zarathustra reminds us, the brave man desires two things above all else: danger and distraction: 'And for that reason he wants a woman who will be the most dangerous plaything of all.' [2]

 

 

Beware the lash of the savage goddess Kari - ruler of a world

where men are chained, tortured, and made slaves to desire!

  

          

Notes

 

[1] Evidence of this can be found on the Dangerous Minds website: click here for an excellent entry on prehistoric cheesecake and the curvaceous cavewomen of B-movie cinema. 

 

[2] See Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883-85), Section XVIII of Zarathustra's discourses on 'Old and Young Women'.

 

 

Bonus: click here to watch the official trailer for Prehistoric Women (1967). 

 

Whatever Happened to the Likely Lasses?

Top: Brigit Forsyth as Thelma Ferris (née Chambers) 

Bottom: Sheila Fearn as Audrey and Anita Carey as Susan  

Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (BBC TV 1973-74)

 

I was saddened to hear about the death yesterday of Scottish actress Brigit Forsyth, who played Thelma, Bob's fiancée and - after their marriage in episode 13 - wife, in the hilarious British sitcom Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (1973-74), written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais.

Thelma, a rather prissy librarian who wished to enjoy a respectable, lower middle class life in suburbia, was in some ways intended to be an unsympathetic character and yet, as the series unfolded across 26 episodes, it became clear that she was a warm and loving woman. 

 

And, looking back now, she also strikes me as sexually attractive (or hot as people like to say today); particularly when dressed as Peter Pan in the Christmas special at the end of season two, or wearing her short black nightgown whilst on honeymoon in episode 14.

 

In fact, as one's desire becomes increasingly tied to nostalgia, it seems to me that the series was full of beautiful actresses playing memorable characters - not just Brigit Forsyth as Thelma, but also Anita Carey as her sister, Susan; and Sheila Fearn, as Terry's sister, Audrey; or Pamela Conway, who played Gloria, the barmaid; Elizabeth Lax, who played Bob's secretary, Wendy; Juliet Aykroyd, who played Anthea, Thelma's assistant at the library ... 

 

Even Sandra Bryant (as Glenys) and Margaret Nolan (as Jackie) appear in one episode entitled 'I'll Never Forget Whatshername' (S1/E5).  

 

Sadly, several of the above are now no longer with us [1]. But, thankfully, we can still watch them on film and remember them in our hearts; a special generation of women, born in the 1940s [2], who lit up my childhood in the 1970s and continue to enchant today. 

 

Why don't women - and, indeed, men - born after 1979 have the same allure? 

 

'Eras produce certain faces', says Mark Fisher [3]. And he got that right. 

 

Unfortunately, the present era seems to produce fresh-faced (or photoshopped) faces lacking in all character: almost ugly in their perfection (just as faces in the past were often beautiful in their imperfection).       

 

Notes

 

[1] Anita Carey died in July 2023; Elizabeth Lax died in June 1996; and Margaret Nolan died in October 2020. Some readers may recall I published a post expressing my admiration of the latter on 5 Nov 2015: click here. 

[2] Elizabeth Lax is the exception to this, born as she was on 8 Feb 1950. 

[3] See Mark Fisher, Ghosts of My Life, (Zero Books, 2022), p. 74. 

Passion Ends in Fashion: Notes on SEX

 

Malcolm outside his notorious boutique 

at 430 King's Road (1976)

 

 

I. 

 

When it comes to the band's name, there's an argument to be made that the Sex Pistols should have been stylised as the SEX Pistols, thereby emphasising the fact that their origins lay in the shop at 430 King's Road and Malcolm's penchant for the kinkier aspects of sexual activity and experience.

 

For Malcolm, as for Foucault, sex is best understood not as a natural function, nor as something to be scientifically studied in order to discover an essential truth about human identity, but, rather, as a sophisticated ars erotica - i.e., a form of pleasure which needs to be creatively cultivated and via which the subject might, in fact, lose (or reinvent) themselves. 

 

And for Malcolm, sex always needed to be thought in relation to two other terms beginning with the letter S: style and subversion (i.e., fashion and politics). Add these three elements together et voila! you produce a pair of bondage trousers.      

 

 

II.

 

McLaren's store at 430 King's Road - run in collaboration with his partner Vivienne Westwood - underwent a series of radical transformations and name changes during its history. 

 

It originally opened (in 1971) as the Teddy boy hang out Let It Rock, before then briefly becoming Too Fast To Live Too Young To Die (1973-74), selling a range of fashions for rockers who preferred to wear black leather jackets and biker boots, rather than drape jackets and blue suede shoes.   

 

In December 1976, the shop was reinvented as Seditionaries and it continued trading under that name until September 1980. As Seditionaries, the boutique adopted a brutalist aesthetic and attitude and stocked the clothes that are now considered the epitome of punk fashion (and sell for thousands of pounds at auction).  

 

In late 1980, the store was relaunched under the name World's End and resembled - as per Malcolm's design instructions - a cross between an 18th-century galleon and the Olde Curiosity Shoppe; punks had been superseded by pirates, Apaches, and buffalo gals. 

 

Each of these shops has a unique fascination and history and each has secured a place in the pop cultural imagination. But, for me, it is Sex that continues to most excite my interest ...

 

 

III.   

 

Quickly bored even with his own projects and uncomfortable with the idea of commercial success, in the spring of 1974, McLaren radically refurbished 430 King's Road and rebranded the shop as Sex: '"That is the one thing that scares the English. They are all afraid of that word.'" [1]

 

The façade included a 4-foot sign of pink foam rubber letters spelling out the new name in capitals. The walls of the interior of the boutique were also lined with pinkish foam rubber and covered with graffitied lines taken from erotic literature and Valerie Solanas's SCUM Manifesto (1967). Latex curtains, red carpeting, and various sexual paraphernalia used decoratively helped to create the sleazy (somewhat intimidating) look of an authentic sex shop.

 

Sex sold fetish and bondage gear supplied by existing specialist labels, as well as designs by McLaren and Westwood which were intended to be provocative rather than seductive. These included T-shirts printed with images of a nude adolescent smoking a cigarette; homosexual cowboys, bare female breasts; and - perhaps most notoriously - a leather mask of the kind worn by the Cambridge Rapist. 

 

Lines taken from pornographic texts were also often added to the designs, as were various Situationist slogans from May '68 - Sous les pavés, le plage, etc. - and references to some of Malcolm's heroes, such as the playwright Joe Orton.    

 

Pamela Rooke - known as Jordan - was hired as a sales assistant and quickly became the shop's face. 

 

In fact, Jordan embodied the spirit of the store better than anyone; better than the extraordinary clientele (which included members of the Bromley Contingent as well as the newsreader Reggie Bosanquet); better than members of the band; better even than Malcolm and Vivienne (though it can't be denied how great the latter also looked wearing her own designs) [2].  

 

Sex was far removed from the retro-revivalism of Let It Rock - although arguably Too Fast To Live possessed some of the same sense of danger and fetishistic appeal - and the customers who hung out at Sex were not the ageing Teddy boys who had so quickly bored and disappointed McLaren. They were, as mentioned, kids who had come out of glam and liked to dress up to mess up and weren't shy about challenging sexual and social conventions.

 

Paul Gorman provides an excellent summary:

 

"As an environmental installation, Sex was sensational; it literally assaulted the senses. The hectoring tone of the scawls on the 'soft' madhouse walls, the heavy jersey of the T-shirts showing severe images and text in queasy colours, the lack of natural light which produced a dull shine on the clinical black rubber garments and the powdery looking drapes, the clammy atmosphere, the 1960s garage-punk blasting from the BAL-AMi, all combined to make the experience unsettling, commanding commitment - a big Sex word - on the part of the visitor. When the door was closed, one felt less like a customer than a client entering a well-appointed dungeon, particularly when coolly appraised by the stern-faced Westwood." [3]  

 

Sex was, thus, a truly magical space aligned with McLaren's own artistic, sexual, and political obsessions. Whilst a million miles away from being what we now term a safe space inhabited by those who describe themselves as woke, it neverthless demanded that customers one day wake up and realise which side of the bed they were lying on [4].

Photo by David Dagley taken inside Sex in 1976 featuring (from L-R):

Steve Jones, Unknown, Alan Jones, Chrissie Hynde, Jordan, & Vivienne Westwood

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Malcolm McLaren, quoted by Paul Gorman in The Life and Times of Malcolm McLaren, (Constable, 2020), p. 220.

 

[2] As Paul Gorman notes, in 1975, aged 34, Westwood "cut a stunning figure stalking the streets of west and central London, with her shock of blonde hair complemented by such Sex designs as rubber knickers and stockings and a porn T-shirt or a studded Venus top". See The Life and Times of Malcolm McLaren, p. 251.

 

[3] Paul Gorman, The Life and Times of Malcolm McLaren, p. 226. 

 

[4] I'm referring here to the famous T-shirt conceived by Bernie Rhodes and known (by its abbreviated title) as 'You're Gonna Wake Up'. See the post published on Torpedo the Ark on 16 Dec 2012 on the political importance of making lists: click here.    

On Punks, Hippies, and the Boy in the Blue Lamé Suit

 Joe, Johnny, and Jello in their pre-punk days

 

One of the defining characteristics of punks back in the day, was that they hated the complacency, passivity, and untrustworthiness of middle-class hippies and they differentiated themselves from peace-loving flower children by their hairstyles and clothes: no long hair or beards and no flared jeans or tie-dyed T-shirts with groovy psychedelic prints. 

Having a close-cropped barnet was just as much a sign of radical militancy for the punks as it had been for the rank-and-file Roundheads and very few of them had flowing long locks covering their ears. So it's always a little disconcerting to come across old photos of figures central to the punk revolution - including Rotten, Strummer, and Biafra - and see them looking like ... well, hippies!

 

No wonder Jamie Reid later advised us to never trust a punk either (that punks were, in fact, often just hippies in disguise).

 

 

II. 

 

One is also reminded, upon seeing these pictures, that, essentially, we have Malcolm to thank for concocting an anti-hippie aesthetic and philosophy - not Johnny, Joe, or Jello. It was McLaren's provocative and fetishistic take on fashion, his anarchic politics inspired by Situationism, and a penchant for 1950s rock 'n' roll - all brilliantly expressed in the slogan Sex, Style and Subversion - out of which the look of what became known as punk developed. 

 

Vivienne Westwood would later recall just how odd looking 20-year-old Malcolm was when she met him in the mid-1960s; with his very, very pale skin and his very, very short hair he looked so unlike his contemporaries. If he was, in many regards, a typical product of his era and cultural environment, McLaren was never a hippie and only ever had scorn for them. 

 

Thus it was that, in 1971, Malcolm bought a pair of blue-suede creepers, which, as Paul Gorman notes, had by this date long gone out of fashion; street style was now defined by "feather-cut hair, the ubiquitous flared loon pants, stack-heeled boots, platform shoes and velvet suits" [1]. 

 

For McLaren, the shoes: 

 

"'Made a statement about what everyone else was wearing and thinking. It was a symbolic act to put them on. Those blue shoes had a history that I cared about, a magical association that seemed authentic. They represented an age of revolt - of desperate romantic revolt [...]" [2]             

Later, he combined the shoes with a 1950s style blue lamé suit (made by Vivienne) and a matching ice-blue satin shirt: "'I decided it would be really cool to be like Elvis, to be a Teddy Boy in a kind of defiant anti-world and anti-fashion gesture [...]'" [3]

  

And that - boys and girls - is the spirit of punk; more heroic than hippie (and it comes quiffed or spiky-topped, rather than lanky long-haired or feather-cut). 

 

Malcolm the proto-punk (1972)

 

 

Notes

[1] Paul Gorman, The Life and Times of Malcolm McLaren, (Constable, 2020), p. 119. 

[2] Malcolm McLaren, quoted by Paul Gorman, ibid.

[3] Malcolm McLaren, quoted by Paul Gorman, ibid., p. 131.

 

 

For a sister post to this one entitled 'Never Mind the Spiky Tops' (28 Nov 2023), click here.  

Never Mind the Spiky Tops

All the curly young punks:

Michael Collins and Adam Ant (top row) 

Mick Jones and Me (bottom row)*

 

 

I. 

 

Short spiky hair - often dyed an unnatural shade à la Johnny Rotten - was one of the defining characteristics of punks back in the day. 

 

However, there were plenty of individuals central to the scene who, even in 1977, were proud of their curls and ringlets, including Michael Collins, for example, who was recruited by Vivienne Westwood to manage the shop at 430 King's Road.

 

One thinks also of Stuart Goddard, who abandoned his pub rock outfit Bazooka Joe after seeing the Sex Pistols, transformed his look and changed his name (to Adam Ant), but still maintained his dark curls even at his punkiest.

 

And talking of dark curly-haired punks ... let's not forget Mick Jones; he may have chopped his curls off in 1976 when he formed The Clash, but it wasn't long before his pre-punk (less militant more glam) self reasserted itself.  

 

 

II.

I'm sure there will be some readers by now asking: So what?

 

Well, for one thing, it's always good to be reminded that before it quickly became just another mass-produced fashion and media-endorsed stereotype - as well as a fixed set of values and prejudices - punk was a highly creative form self-stylisation. It was not about following trends, conforming to norms of behaviour, or caring what others thought about the way you looked. 

 

As The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle attempted to remind us: Anyone can be a Sex Pistol - even with curly hair, like me, and, of course, like Malcolm:

 

           

Photo credits: Michael Collins by Homer Sykes; Adam Ant by Ray Stevenson; Mick Jones by Sheila Rock; Malcolm McLaren by Joe Stevens. I don't remember who took the picture of me, but it's dated October 1977. 

 

 

For a follow up post to this one on punks, hippies, and the Boy in the Blue Lamé Suit, click here.

 

In Memory of Geordie Walker and Keith Levene

Geordie Walker (1958-2023) and Keith Levene (1957-2022) [1]

 

November, it appears, is a mortally dangerous time of year for post-punk guitarists ... 

 

For last year, on the 11th of November, Keith Levene died (aged 65); and yesterday, on the 26th of this month, Geordie Walker passed away (aged 64). 

I'm not going to pretend that I have any great fascination for musicians; always banging on about their instruments and different playing and recording techniques, they are, as Malcolm used to say, amongst the least interesting people to be around.

 

However, Levene - as a member of Public Image Ltd. - and Walker - as a member of Killing Joke - did produce some of the most exciting and bewitching guitar sounds ever heard and I was a huge fan of their work in the late 1970s and early-mid '80s [2]. 

 

So, it was with a certain sadness that I heard about Keith dying last year and, similarly, I was sorry to wake up to the news of Geordie's death this morning. I never met either of them, but their music has significantly shaped (what is commonly referred to as) the soundtrack of my life and for that I'm grateful to both.       

 

 

Notes 

 

[1] The black and white screenshot of Geordie Walker is taken from the video directed by Peter Care for the Killing Joke single 'Love Like Blood' (1985); the black and white screenshot of Keith Levene is taken from the video directed by Don Letts for the Public Image Ltd. single 'Public Image' (1978).

 

[2] See the post dated 1 Sept 2023 for my memories of Killing Joke: click here.