Thursday 9 March 2017 – The British Music Experience national pop museum re-launches in Liverpool, “the home of British music”

Apologies for the month-long gap in my posts. Apart from a post to Donald Dump News, this is my first blog post since 6 February. I have been in hospital with pneumonia and, although now back home and recovering, I have not been in the mood for posting.

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After a five-year spell at the O2 Arena in London, which ended in 2014 with closure and £16 million in debts being written off by the Arena’s owners AEG, the British Music Experience national pop museum is re-launched today in Liverpool. The museum is now located in the former Second Class passenger lounge in the Cunard Building at Liverpool’s Pier Head. The building (pictured below left) was the former home of the Cunard shipping company and is now owned by Liverpool City Council. it is one of the so-called Three Graces at the Pier Head (pictured below right) – three  magnificent buildings built a century ago. The Cunard Building sits in the middle of the Liver Building and the Port Authority Building. These three iconic buildings, which for generations have been a symbol of Liverpool and a welcoming sight for returning sailors coming up the River Mersey, form the heart of the World Heritage Status granted to Liverpool’s waterfront and parts of its city centre 

In Liverpool the museum  will have a proud home in a prominent and magnificent iconic building at the heart of the city’s city centre, which spreads out from the waterfront and the Pier Head. It is also within walking distance of Matthew Street, the home of The Cavern and “ the birthplace of The Beatles”. The music promoter Harvey Goldsmith thinks the move to Liverpool is a positive one and that that the museum is a good fit for the city, which he described as “the home of British music.”  Liverpool boasts more Number One chart singles than any other British city, and Goldsmith feels the museum will naturally be popular with the hundreds of thousands who visit Liverpool to experience the history of The Beatles. He said:

 

“I don’t know why we didn’t come here in the beginning […] There’s more of an emotional tie with music in Liverpool than there is in London. Liverpool is the home of British music.

 

“To be honest, where we were in London at the O2, we were lost, even though we had pretty good crowds coming.

 

“But we were a bit of an also-ran, stuck on the second floor at the back of the O2. I think being up here, we’re a focal point, we’re a feature, and not everything that goes on in life has to happen in London.”

 

The location of the museum in the Cunard Building is also significant as this building played its own role in the history of Liverpool and British music as it was through this building that many Americans and others coming to Britain from the States and around the world arrived, bringing with them their music. The American influence in particular was vital in the development of The Beatles and other bands in post-war Liverpool. They would hear the blues and rock ‘n’  roll records brought in by Yank sailors and, as they say, the rest is history.

 

The museum features displays covering the spectrum of British music since World War Two from Skiffle, The Beatles and the Rolling Stones, through Bowie, Glam Rock, Punk, New Romantics and Britpop,  to the Spice Girls, Honey G and X-Factor. There is a special display about David Bowie, featuring three of his ZIggy Stardust outfits. Other items in the exhibition include…

 

• an outfit worn by John Lennon;
• Geri Halliwell’s Union Jack dress;
• Lonnie Donnegan’s bango;
• a snakeskin suit worn by Bill Wyman of The Rolling Stones;
• Marc Bolan’s feather boa;
• a silk suit owned by Duran Duran;
• Noel Gallagher’s Union Jack guitar;
• suits and other memorabilia belonging to The Beatles;
• and a graffiti-covered door from The Beatles Apple Corps headquarters.

 

The pay-to-enter museum (£16 for adults) opens today. You can visit the official website, where you can book tickets, HERE.

Friday 15 January 2016 – David Cameron’s embarrassing “tribute” to David Bowie

I came across the picture above online yesterday. At first I thought it was a joke, that someone had photoshopped the picture. But no, It is real and was posted on Twitter  by David Cameron himself! Quite pathetic and deeply embarrassing.  I guess he thought he would look “cool” by paying a “tribute” to the Ziggy Stardust singer who died on Sunday aged 69.  Instead he just looks like a  prat.  What Cameron could possibly have in common with Bowie to feel an affinity with him  is hard to understand.  I imagine he enjoyed the songs on a superficial level – nice tune, great melody, etc, but what he understand about their meaning beyond that or what he understood about Bowie’s philosophy who knows?  In an additional post on Twitter, also on the 10 January, Cameron said that “I grew up listening to and watching the pop genius David Bowie. He was a master of re-invention, who kept getting it right. A huge loss.”  I don’t know what Bowie’s politics were but I can’t imagine he would have thought much of David Cameron. The makeup Cameron is wearing is based on Bowie’s famous look pictured below, which featured on his album: “Aladdin Sane”.

As you can imagine David Bowie fans, on Twitter and other social media sites, reacted with venom to the post by Cameron. Some examples of the reaction on Twitter were featured in an article in The Huffington Post: 

 

* Atletico Belgrano (@VivaLaBelgrano) posted “Name a song you melt.”

 

* Clare Deegan (@TheLazyGirlBlog) said “seriously, fuck off Dave. He represented everything you are not. Don’t try and earn kudos from a legend mate. Jesus.”

 

* While Bob Inapples (@Binapples) thought “Bowie would puke if he read this,”

 

* and Callum (@callumhalpin_) thought Bowie would “hate you you prick.”

 

* Trojan Horse, posting under the name @Trojanhorseuk, had a message for Cameron: “Don’t presume you’re still allowed to engage with popular culture when you’re so determined to destroy people who make it.”

 

*  Meanwhile, the Socialist Party of Great Britain (@OfficialSPGB) posted a surreal image of “Davey Cameron” with a pork pie as his head and the phrase “davey cameron is a pie.”

 

* While Angry Exile (@AngryExile) was to the point: “Duck off, Fishface”

 

David Cameron, who in an interview after Bowie’s death, described himself as a “Ziggy Stardust” fan and called Bowie a “genius”, must have known that posting the image would get these reactions. It is truly embarrassing when out-of-touch politicians attempt to look as if they are trendy, cool, with it – whatever you want to call it. This is particularly so for posh, privately-educated twats like Cameron who have no concept of what real life and popular culture is for most people in Britain.

 

The comedian Mark Steel, writing in The Independent, in an article entitled “Go on then, Dave. Put on your red shoes and dance the blues,” mocked the Prime Minister’s and other‘s attempts to be in the popular culture moment: “Then David Cameron made his statement about being in ‘deep mourning’ for someone was was a ‘master of reinvention’, which certainly makes sense because the first thing that comes to mind whenever you see David Cameron is: ‘I bet he’s devoted to David Bowie’.”  Mark Steel pointed out that Cameron has never mentioned Bowie in any interview, didn’t choose  any of his records on Desert Island Discs and didn’t mention him in his autobiography. Steel joked that politicians may have an affinity with Bowie as the singer was famous for rejecting the commercially successful and doing the opposite – which would be initially derided only to become popular and successful.  Steel suggested: “Because if there’s one trait in modern politics, it’s adopting a principle and sticking to it, even if commentators say this might not be popular.”

 

Links referred to in this post:

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2016/01/11/david-cameron-david-bowie-tribute-twitter_n_8954370.html

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/go-on-then-dave-put-on-your-red-shoes-and-dance-the-blues-a6812976.html

 

http://www.twitter.com/david_cameron

Monday 11 January 2016 – Death of David Bowie

Sad to hear of the death of David Bowie. He died yesterday, just two days after his 69th birthday. He had cancer.  He had also released his last album, “Black Star” on his birthday on Friday and released a video for his final single, “Lazarus.” In the video he is seen in a hospital bed and the opening line is apt: “Look up here, I’m in Heaven.”  “Black Star” was his first album since “The Next Day” three years ago, which itself was his first in a decade. “Black Star” only contains seven tracks but critics and fans have been raving about it.

Bowie’s career has spanned nearly fifty years with his fame becoming worldwide with the creation of his alter-ego Ziggy Stardust in the early 1970s. Beyond Ziggy Stardust, he created masterpieces with Brian Eno, worked with legends Iggy Pop and Lou Reed – revitalising their careers, and became one of the biggest pop stars in the world in the early 1980s with the help of producer Niles Rodgers with hits such as “China Girl”  and “Let’s Dance.”  He was also an actor. I have always held an abiding memory of his role in the film “Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence” from the early 1980s. He played Maj. Jack ‘Strafer’ Celliers,  an English prisoner  of war in Japan during the Second World War, opposite Ryuichi Sakamoto who played the prison camp’s Commandant.  The Commandant had a sexual desire towards Bowie’s character, which partly helped to keep him alive.  The soundtrack of the film was also memorable, being composed by Sakamoto. Tom Conti played the title role of Captain John Lawrence.

 

David Bowie and Ryuichi Sakamoto in “Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence.” (1983)

An interesting quote by him on the news coverage today of his death came from around 13 years ago when he was 56. He said that he couldn’t understand how he was 56 or come to terms with ageing. He summed up what many feel in their 50s that he still sees himself as, and feels like, a 20-year-old.   More recently, he said he was really lucky to have had a full life. He said that apart from the drug-fuelled 70s, he had harnessed every opportunity in his life and hadn’t wasted it.

 

His death has been headline news around the world, in such diverse countries as Russia, China, Japan, the United States, Iceland, Australia, and even in the Vatican where a spokesman tweeted lines from his song “Space Oddity.” British astronaut tweeted from the International Space Station.  Many radio stations, including in Australia and Iceland were playing his music non-stop in tribute to him.  Musicians have also been paying tribute to him, including from Iggy Pop, the Rolling Stones and Madonna.  The BBC, as they always do when a musician dies, brought in the Disc Jokey and expert Paul Gambaccini to comment.  I remember him commenting on the death of John Lennon in 1980 – after hearing of his death on the plane home from New York where he had just interviewed the former Beatle.  Everytime I hear Gambaccini speaking about the latest star of music to die I always think of that John Lennon connection and I also wonder who is going to comment on Pau Gambaccini when he dies?

 

A sad day for music.

 

Last photo of David Bowie, taken by his wife on his 69th birthday just two days before his death