More Pussy – Dolls Put Out
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Feast for the Eyes – The Story of Food in Photography
Exploring the rich history of food photography through some of the leading figures and movements within the genre including: Nobuyoshi Araki, Nan Goldin, Martin Parr, Man Ray, Cindy Sherman, Wolfgang Tillmans and Weegee.
Encompassing fine-art and vernacular photography, commercial and scientific images, photojournalism and fashion, the exhibition looks at the development of this form and the artistic, social and political contexts that have informed it.
Food has always been a much-photographed and consumed subject, offering a test ground for artistic experimentation and a way for artists to hone their skills. But even the most representative images of food have rarely been straightforward or objective. Food as subject matter is rich in symbolic meaning and across the history of art, has operated as a vessel for artists to explore a particular emotion, viewpoint or theme and express a range of aspirations and social constructs. With the advent of social media, interest in food photography has become widespread with the taking and sharing of images becoming an integral part of the dining experience itself, used as instant signifiers of status and exacerbating a sense of belonging and difference.
Feast for the Eyes looks particularly at how food is represented and used in photographic practices and brings together a broad-range of artists all of whom harness the history and popularity of food photography to express wider themes. Crossing public and private realms the works on show evoke deep-seated questions and anxieties about issues such as wealth, poverty, consumption, appetite, tradition, gender, race, desire, pleasure, revulsion and domesticity.
Presented over two floors, and featuring over 140 works, from black and white silver gelatin prints and early experiments with colour processes to contemporary works, the exhibition is arranged around three key themes: Still Life traces food photography’s relationship to one of the most popular genres in painting and features work that is both inspired by the tradition and how it has changed in the course of time. Around the Table looks at the rituals that takes place around the consumption of food and the cultural identities reflected through the food we eat and people we eat with. Finally, Playing with Food shows what happens when food photography is infused with humour, fun and irony. The exhibition will also feature a number of magazines and cookbooks which provide an additional visual and social history of food photography.
Feast for the Eyes traces the history and effect of food in photography, simultaneously exploring our appetite for such images while celebrating the richness and artistic potential of one of the most popular, compulsive and ubiquitous of photographic genres.
Review
“a sugar rush of a show… ‘Feast for the Eyes’ proves it’s fun to play with your food.” — Timeout ★★★★☆
Shoot Your Load At The Photographers Gallery
Shot In Soho
Although the area of Soho is relatively small (one square mile) and bordered by some of London’s richest and most commercialised streets, it has remained a complex place of unorthodoxy, diversity, tolerance and defiance.
Shot in Soho is an original exhibition celebrating Soho’s diverse culture, community and history of creative innovation as well as highlighting its position as a site of resistance.
Through a range of photographs, ephemera and varied presentations, the project reflects the breadth of life in a part of the capital that has always courted controversy and celebrated difference. It comes at a time when the area is facing radical transition and transformation with the imminent completion of Cross Rail (a major transport hub being built on Soho’s borders) set to make a landmark impact on the area.
This is a rare opportunity to see outstanding images from renowned photographers including William Klein, Anders Petersen, Corinne Day, alongside other photographers whose work in Soho is lesser known such as Kelvin Brodie, Clancy Gebler Davies and John Goldblatt. The show also includes a new commission by Daragh Soden.
The exhibition draws on the history, the myths and the characters of this hotbed of unpredictability, disobedience, eccentricity and tightly-knit communities.
Part movie-set, part crime scene, part unfolding spectacle, Soho in recent decades has been the centre of the music, fashion, design, film and the sex industry – a place of unresolved riddles, a place of shadows and also somewhere to call home for incoming French, Italian, Maltese, Chinese, Hungarian, Jewish and Bengali communities – perhaps here is the prototype for multicultural open London.
Astonishingly Soho has remained a village at heart – maybe due in part to the way it was purposefully hidden from view behind Nash’s sweeping Regent Street crescent – there tucked away and locked within a tight street grid that has remained unchanged for centuries.
In many ways Soho has remained London’s rebellious teenager. It has been a place where anything goes and as creative as it has been sleazy.
The exhibition is curated by Julian Rodriguez, Head of the Department of Film & Photography, Kingston School of Art, Kingston University and Karen McQuaid, Senior Curator, The Photographers’ Gallery.
Reviews
“A movingly melancholic show that shuns the obvious” — The Guardian ★★★★☆
Rock and Fucking Roll – Aerosmith Tour
Four-time GRAMMY®-winning band Aerosmith have announced dates for their 2020 European Tour with two shows coming to the UK on 15th July at London’s O2 followed up by a show at Manchester Arena on the 18th of July.
The one and only Aerosmith, Steven Tyler (vocals), Joe Perry (lead guitar), Brad Whitford (guitar), Tom Hamilton (bass), and Joey Kramer (drums) are a living piece of American music history, having sold more than 150 million albums worldwide, countless awards and been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, there’s not much that this band haven’t accomplished in their five decades since forming.
They are the recipients of endless awards, including four GRAMMYs®, eight American Music Awards, six Billboard Awards, and 12 MTV Video Music Awards, as well as crossing all genre boundaries taking home a Soul Train Award for Best Rap Single for their remix of Run DMC’s “Walk This Way.” In January, Aerosmith will be honored by the Recording Academy with the 2020 MusiCares® Person of the Year. Along with scores of multiplatinum albums, Aerosmith continues to inspire generations till this day making them one of the most beloved bands of all time!
Aerosmith’s influence on rock music and the music industry has been undeniable. The band holds several chart and album sales feats, including the second highest number-one singles on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart for a group with nine, the only number one debut on the Billboard Hot 100 by a rock group with “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing,” the most gold albums by an American group, the most total certifications (including gold, platinum, and multi-platinum combined) by an American group, and are tied with Van Halen for the most multi-platinum albums by an American group.
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Chewing Up A Storm – The Dead South
Cheeky humour to their long tall stories of crime of passion in the corn fields. Steering away from the casual misogyny that often creeps into such topics, their gun totin’ killers are just as often female, such as the tragic Miss Mary, the anti-heroine of a sinister country number with a generous lashing of klezmer-style gypsy folk.
Replacing its older sibling the double bass, the higher pitched cello makes an unusual addition to its stringed cousins. Rather than played seated in the conventional way, it was held up to the hips, wielded bass guitar style, and swung around with an impressive feat of strength and stamina. Although mainly plucked and strummed, the bow did come out for Deep When The River’s High although it still never touched the ground.
While the lyrics may play to the standard liquor, sex, drugs and guns themes, the instrumentation and arrangements bring the originality, felt to full effect in That Bastard Son, with a jangly and annoyingly catchy mandolin backline giving way to a lamented chorus sung by the entire venue, and culminating in wild stamping, thrashy strumming and head banging under the strobe lights. For In Hell I’ll Be in Good Company, the musical accompaniment was left to cello and banjo, as Nate and Scott led the dancing with a nice bit of heel-toe and finger clinking.
The inevitable encore gave us a tambourine-slapping tale of cousin love and banjo trills, the appropriately titled Banjo Odyssey. Relentlessly thrashing the living hell out of their instruments, the night closed with Travellin’ Man, a hollering ditty with more than a touch of raucous Irish folk-punk amongst the bluegrass.
Breathing their whiskey soaked fumes back into bluegrass, The Dead South capture the very essence of folk music – three-minute stories of love, loss and alienation played with passion and a stomping great beat, that lend themselves to collective clapping, singing and dancing.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liKWdUvp_cE&w=560&h=315]
THE DEAD SOUTH played a sold out show at Kentish Town O2 Forum on 15/02/2019
Words: copyright Sarah Corbett-Batson
Photo: Carl Byron Batson
Article previously featured in Trebuchet Magazine
Election Blues – Billy Bragg Keeps The Faith
‘It’s like I booked an election for the tour,’ quipped the Bard of Barking as he began the first of three dates at Islington Assembly Hall.
Indeed the timing could barely have been better with the ink still drying on the Labour Party manifesto. The location wasn’t bad either – in the Labour heartlands of Emily Thornberry’s constituency, bordering onto that held by one Jeremy Corbyn. Although stereotyped as Blairite champagne socialist territory, Islington is, like much of London, a borough where rich and poor live in close proximity. Corbyn’s constituency includes sprawling council estates, where many flats are now owned by buy-to-let landlords charging free market rates rather than the social rent for which they were intended. Labour’s pledge to replenish the social housing stock is so desperately needed around these parts.
With his greying beard, Bragg seems to be morphing into Jeremy Corbyn as he ages but, as with the latter, the old Clash fan retains his youthful energy to change the world, despite the wording of his swansong, A New England. With the first three albums forming the set for the second night of the run, and the subsequent three for the third night, this first night was described as career spanning. There was a significant degree of overlap with the set list from his gig here two years ago but this time the impending election brought everything into sharper focus.
But isn’t he just preaching to the converted? No, said Bragg, before launching into I Keep Faith. Playing to kindred spirits recharges his own activism and drive to defeat the Tories, and he hopes that it has the same effect on the audience. Of course, any gig by an established artist, where long-time fans sing the words of every song, engenders a sense of solidarity, but when that is combined with a shared political purpose, it is all the more deeply felt.
He reminded us that the political is nothing without the personal, and that principles are nothing if they don’t inform the way that we conduct our relationships. Played straight, Valentine’s Day is Over and Levi Stubbs’ Tears remained the tear jerkers that they have always been; brutality and economy indeed being related. The jaunty Upfield took us to the alternative to barbarism – a socialism of the heart.
There were some more lightweight, almost Victoria Wood-esque moments, with anti-DIY song, Handyman Blues making a slightly incongruous appearance. There was plenty of his live trademark lyric changing going on. ‘Don’t threaten me with bigotry’ became ‘don’t threaten me with Morrissey’ in set opener, Sexuality. ‘The revolution is just a t-shirt away’ became ‘the revolution is just a tea towel away’ in Waiting for the Great Leap Forwards, with said tea towels available for sale in the foyer.
There were a couple of songs with Woody Guthrie lyrics thrown in for good measure (Ingrid Bergman and Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key), but it was the self-penned old classics such as The Milkman of Human Kindness and Greetings to the New Brunette that drew particularly lengthy applause.
In these dangerous times of climate change, rising bigotry, zero hours contracts and food banks, gatherings of the Left can tend towards collective therapy – a haven in a heartless world. But tonight was not one of those nights. This sold-out show was a call to arms that there is another way, and that we can take a great leap forwards to a fairer, more equal society rather than surrender to the ravages of neo-liberalism. While you can criticise Bragg for the costly ticket prices and merch stall, ultimately he’s only a musician, and the power is in our hands. Make it count on 12th December.
TOUR DATES HERE
Words by Sarah JCB
Photos copyright Carl Byron Batson – not to be reproduced without express prior written consent
Article previously featured in Trebuchet Magazine
Christmas Shopping – It’s All Or Nothing
Following 2018’s “The Official Body“, the songs that make up “All or Nothing” are the band’s boldest yet; confident, elastic, streamlined grooves that crackle with energy and intention. The trio’s vision – deeply queer; political by default – place them in a radical lineage of dance, a continuum connecting disco and post-punk to Chicago house.
(Photo Credit: Matt Draper)
Alongside the new album / single, Shopping have also announced a huge series of UK and North American tour dates starting in London with a series of Rough Trade in-stores and ending in Germany on 23rd May. The band will also play an intimate headline show at The Lexington in London on 5th May – full list of dates below…
Storming lead single “Initiative” was written in a Seattle basement. Like the album as a whole, the track thrums with purpose, marking a confident new phase for the band. Referencing governments who shirk responsibilities but place the blame on individuals, the song has a frustrated groove that’s propelling, motivated by necessity to keep going against the grain. The accompanying video, directed by Jack Barraclough, is brightly-stylized, and stars the band themselves.
WATCH THE VIDEO FOR “INITIATIVE” HERE
Though the band members now live countries away from each other – guitarist Rachel Aggs (Trash Kit, Sacred Paws) and drummer Andrew Milk (Current Affairs) in Glasgow and Billy Easter (Wet Dog) in Los Angeles – the trio returned to London for an intense, 10-day period. For “All Or Nothing”, they teamed up with US-based producer Davey Warsop to record, shifting their stripped-down ethos to one that took a leap into pop production. Talking Heads, YYYs, Bronski Beat and LCD Soundsystem are among the artists to feature on the production inspo playlist the band created for Nick Sylvester, who mixed the record, in Los Angeles.
Along with cleaner, new production values, “All Or Nothing” sees Shopping experiment further with the sonic additions that coloured “The Official Body.” Jubilantly ‘80s synths and electronic percussion add new textures to their signature minimalist dynamic.
Four albums in, Shopping are as committed and focused as ever, regardless of any distance. “We found ourselves singing about being true to yourself, in an often binary and belligerent digital age, and reclaiming agency when it feels like our personal freedom and privacy is constantly eroding.” In an era dominated by spin and surveillance, “All Or Nothing” invites us to remember what really moves us, in dance and in life.
Single art
SHOPPING TOUR DATES:
UK IN-STORES (Feb):
7th Feb – London @ Rough Trade East
9th Feb – Bristol @ Rough Trade
10th Feb – Nottingham @ Rough Trade
US / Canada (March – April):
w/ support from Automatic
5th March – Portland, OR @ Mississippi Studios
6th March – Seattle, WA @ Sunset Tavern
7th March – Vancouver, BC @ The Biltmore
9th March – Reno, NV @ Holland Project
10th March – San Francisco, CA @ Rickshaw Stop
11th March – Los Angeles, CA @ 1720
12th March – San Diego, CA @ UCSD
14th March – Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress (Spring Thing)
16th March – 21st March – SXSW
23rd March – Tallahassee, FL @ The Bark
24th March – Atlanta, GA @ The Masquerade – Purgatory
25th March – Durham, NC @ The Pinhook
26th March – Washington, DC @ DC9
27th March – Philadelphia, PA @ Boot & Saddle
28th March – Brooklyn, NY @ Elsewhere
29th March – Portsmouth, NH @ The Press Room
31st March – Toronto, ON @ The Monarch
2nd April – Detroit, MI @ Deluxx Fluxx
3rd April – Fort Wayne, IN @ The Brass Rail
4th April – Chicago, IL @ Subterranean
5th April – Minneapolis, MN @ 7th Street Entry
7th April – St. Louis, MO @ Sinkhole
8th April – Lawrence, KS @ White Schoolhouse
9th April – Denver, CO @ Hi Dive
10th April – Salt Lake City, UT @ Kilby Court
UK/EU (May):
5th May – London, UK @ The Lexington – Tickets
6th May – Paris, FR @ Supersonic – Free Entry
8th May – Utrecht, NL @ ACU – Tickets
9th May – Hamburg, DE @ Molotow (SkyBar)
10th May – Copenhagen, DK @ VEGA Ideal Bar – Tickets
11th May – Berlin, DE @ Urban Spree – Tickets
14th May – Vienna, AT @ Fluc Café – Tickets
15th May – Prague, CZ @ Meetfactory – Tickets
16th May – Munich, @ Milla – Tickets
17th May – Bern, CH @ Reitschule/Rössli – Tickets
19th May – Winterhur, CH @ Albani – Tickets
21st May – Luxembourg, LU @ De Gudde Wellen – Tickets
22nd May – Cologne, DE @ Venue TBA
23rd May – Offenbach, DE @ Hafen 2
Album Art
“ALL OR NOTHING” TRACKLIST:
1. All Or Nothing
2. Initiative
3. Follow Me
4. No Apologies
5. For Your Pleasure
6. About You
7. Lies
8. Expert Advice
9. Body Clock
10. Trust In Us
Pre-order All Or Nothing – FatCat Records / Shopping BandcampFOLLOW:
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Bandcamp | FatCat Records
The Wedding Present
The Wedding Present was born in Leeds, in the UK, in 1985 with the release of the debut single GO OUT AND GET EM’ BOY! and the band’s first album, GEORGE BEST, followed a couple of years later.
80’s Indie Rock Icons, the Wedding Present, mark the 3oth anniversary of Bizarro with a string of headline shows. This Saturday (7th December) sees them at The O2 Forum, Kentish Town.
With the early releases on their own label, the band acquired a reputation for bittersweet, breathtakingly honest love songs immersed in whirlwind guitars, so it was quite extraordinary that they decided to explore traditional Eastern European folk music for their major label debut on RCA Records in 1989 with UKRAINSKI VISTUPI V JOHNA PEELA. However, this was soon to be followed by the more traditionally incendiary BIZARRO, which featured their first hit single KENNEDY.
The band’s next step was to enlist the aid of the noise-mongering [and, at that point, relatively unknown] sound engineer Steve Albini. The resulting SEAMONSTERS, recorded in the snowy wilds of Minnesota in just 11 days, suggested a more thoughtful Wedding Present.
A unique plan was hatched in 1992. By the end of that year, The Wedding Present had released twelve 7” singles, one per month, and equalled Elvis Presley’s 35-year-old record for “most hits in one year”. A gang of impressive names, including Ian Broudie [The Lightning Seeds] and legendary Rolling Stones producer Jimmy Miller collaborated on the industry-challenging project, ultimately to be compiled on the two HIT PARADE LPs.
1994’s WATUSI, produced by Steve Fisk [a prime mover in the celebrated avant-garde scene of Seattle] whisked the band off into yet another new area with its lo-fi pop, three-part a capella harmonies and Waikiki-ready surf strains. The band returned to a more familiar sound in 1995 with the car themed MINI, in which Gedge cloaked his tales of love and lust with automobile symbolism.
The next album, SATURNALIA, was recorded in the studio owned by The Cocteau Twins and released in 1996 to the usual flurry of critical approval, but it was shortly after this point that Gedge started work on a solo project, CINERAMA. A fittingly titled outfit, Cinerama indulged Gedge’s love of film music from John Barry to Ennio Morricone… via Blaxploitation and The Ventures! Cinerama went on to record three stunning studio albums, VA VA VOOM, DISCO VOLANTE and TORINO.
At the end of 2002, Gedge split up with Sally Murrell, his long-time girlfriend and chief Cinerama collaborator. He decided to leave Leeds, his home for the preceding twenty-four years, and move to Seattle, where he began writing a collection of songs apparently influenced by his despair over the split. TAKE FOUNTAIN, the resultant album, was recorded by Steve Fisk and released, perhaps ironically, on St. Valentine’s Day, 2005. This long awaited LP brought The Wedding Present back into the spotlight with all the style and sophistication associated with a legendary group, but fans were also pleased to see the band had lost none of the growling angst with which they had burst onto the scene in 1985.
In January 2008 the band returned to Steve Albini for the recording of EL REY, which was released in the summer of that year to further critical acclaim. At the end of 2008 Gedge fulfilled a long held ambition by releasing a bona fide Christmas song, HOLLY JOLLY HOLLYWOOD, a duet with Los Angeles based chanteuse, Simone White.
In 2009, as well launching his own mini-festival, AT THE EDGE OF THE SEA, which he curates and which now takes place every year in Brighton [UK], he also took part in a major collaboration with the BBC Big Band for the biannual ‘Fuse’ Festival which was held back in his home town of Leeds. For the event he performed Wedding Present and Cinerama songs backed by eighteen world class musicians including legendary ‘James Bond’ trumpeter Derek Watkins. Also in 2009, two Take Fountain songs, I’M FROM FURTHER NORTH THAN YOU and RINGWAY TO SEATAC, appeared in the award winning independent film Skills Like This.
In 2012 The Wedding present released VALENTINA [which was mixed in L.A. by Grammy award winning producer Andrew Scheps] to further rave reviews. 2012 also saw the release of a new comic book series, TALES FROM THE WEDDING PRESENT, which, Gedge has hinted, is essentially his memoirs in graphic novel style.
In what turned out to be a huge and comprehensive reassessment of the band, 2014 saw Edsel Records re-releasing seven Wedding Present albums in critically acclaimed multi-disc ‘extended’ editions which brought together a wealth of historic recordings, radio sessions and videos.
Such has been the unpredictable nature of Gedge’s career over the years, hardly anyone could have be surprised when he announced yet another remarkable project in 2015. Collaborating with Spanish indie legend Pedro Vigil he decided to completely ‘re-imagine’ The Wedding Present’s VALENTINA album as Cinerama. The resulting album was also entitled VALENTINA and, with its “musical set pieces and vocal nuances fine enough to rival Bacharach and David”, was described as “a truly sparkling and uplifting concerto for the modern age” by Vive Le Rock Magazine.
Little By Little – Aloha From Ron
“That song’s an apology delivered at the start of a relationship, instead of the end, when it all falls apart,” says Little.
“I’d been thinking a lot about how I find myself repeating the same mistakes in different areas of my life. I find myself drawn over and over to the same qualities in different people, and sometimes the dynamic can become toxic. Pointing the finger is easy. I’m trying to be better at acknowledging my part of the problem.”
Recorded at Paris’s iconic Studios Ferber with producer Renaud Letang (Feist, Manu Chao), aloha is Little’s first album to be recorded with an outside producer. The result is his boldest, most self-assured statement yet. It’s an ambitious work of vision and reflection, and an ecstatic testament to the freedom that comes from trusting the currents of life to carry you where you belong.
Listen to “mahalia”:
https://youtu.be/Mpcl0_4cPns
In order to create aloha, Little began writing and assembling album demos in Petaluma, California. However, after his hard drive fried and he lost nearly a dozen detailed demos, he was forced to begin with a blank slate, leading him to write aloha in only eight days at a tiny house and its adjacent barn. While Little plays nearly every instrument on the album himself, he put his songs in the hands of an outside producer for the first time here. The entire project was an exercise in letting go, in ceding control, in surrendering to fate.
“With bluesy distorted guitar chords, a hint of Latin rhythm and perhaps a distant echo of the Zombies ‘Time of the Season,’ Son Little offers a genial comedown in ‘hey rose’…”
— The New York Times
“Son Little (real name Aaron Earl Livingston) blends old school soul, R&B and even indie sensibilities with added charisma.”
— CLASH
“The magic at the heart of Son Little‘s music is the way so many of his songs could be standards, but none of them could have come from anyone else.”
— Afropunk
Son Little – moniker of LA’s Aaron Earl Livingston – today shares “mahalia,” a new single from his forthcoming album, aloha, due January 31st on ANTI-. Following previously released singles “suffer” and “hey rose,” “mahalia” is infectious. The track marries sparse, distorted guitar tones with clean, dense vocal harmonies.
Little will tour Europe in March and April 2020. A full list of tour dates are below, with tickets available at sonlittle.com/tour.
Watch video for “suffer”:
https://youtu.be/xLo0a_mKmx4
Watch video for “hey rose”:
https://youtu.be/KTzEVH4f434
Pre-order aloha:
https://sonlittle.ffm.to/aloha
European Tour Dates:
Fri. March 27 – Brighton, UK @ Patterns
Sat. March 28 – London, UK @ Oslo
Mon. March 30 – Paris, FR @ La Maroquinerie
Tue. March 31 – Antwerp, BE @ Kavka VZW
Wed. April 1 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso Noord
Thu. April 2 – Rotterdam, NL @ Bird
Sat. April 4 – Hamburg, DE @ Bahnhof Pauli
Sun. April 5 – Berlin, DE @ Privatclub
Mon. April 6 – Cologne, DE @ Blue Shell
Tue. April 7 – Zurich, CH @ Exil
Thu. April 9 – Zaragoza, ES @ Rock & Blues Café
Fri. April 10 – Barcelona, ES @ La Nau