#john gorman

[tavolgisvist]

In 1967 the Daily Telegraph, no less, produced a special on ‘the New Culture of Beat City.’ The prince of it all, perhaps, was a roly-poly poet and painter named Adrian Henri. With his fellow poets Roger McGough and Brian Patten he was responsible for a Penguin paperback, The Mersey Sound, which became the best-selling poetry collection of all time. And, this being Liverpool, Roger McGough found time to be in a chart-topping pop group, the Scaffold, as well. Once again Liverpool was not a provincial outpost but a creative hub which attracted progressive thinkers from far and wide. Henri would play host to the American beat poet Allen Ginsberg - who was, in his heart, something of a Beatle groupie and was moved to declare, ‘Liverpool is at the present moment the centre of the consciousness of the human universe.’ One day, the obscure performance artist Yoko Ono materialised, as Spencer Leigh recalls: ‘I am very proud of the fact that I touched Yoko Ono before John Lennon did. She came here in 1966 to the Bluecoat Chambers and had a “happening”. I had never been to a happening before, but it sounded very exciting and mysterious and avant garde so I went along. She invited members of the audience to wrap her up in bandages, so that is why I touched her before John Lennon did. I was doing her feet very delicately while Adrian Henri was doing the top half. She was covered in all these bandages and I remember John Gorman of the Scaffold shouting out, “You’re wanted on the phone!” ‘You could really see the influence she would have on John Lennon’s work. She had the black bags on stage and she invited people to come up on stage and take their clothes off inside the bag. About eight people did. It was an entertaining evening which went on for about two hours. Part of it was just watching her eat a tuna hsh sandwich. At the end of the happening she put a vase on the table and her husband Tony Cox smashed it and invited people to come up and take a piece. So I did and Yoko Ono said, “I want us all to meet in ten years’ time and piece this together.” I’ve never met her since.’

(Liverpool - Wondrous Place by Paul Du Noyer, 2002)

Part (I), (II), (III), (IV), (V), (VI), (VII), (VIII), (IX), (X), (XI), (XII), (XIII), (XIV), (XV), (XVI), (XVII), (XVIII), (XIX), (XX), (XXI), (XXII)

Mike McCartney:…I knew Yoko before John, she came to Liverpool with her husband and some American bloke. Q: Oh, that’s interesting… Mike McCartney: Yes, she was in the Bluecoat [Chambers], we went to see her in the Bluecoat in Liverpool because we’d heard about this Japanese artist. Q: He was putting on an exhibition or something? Mike McCartney: She did these wonderful exhibitions. In fact, we got thrown out of one of them because we were satirists… Q: You weren’t taking it that seriously then? Mike McCartney: We didn’t… Yoko, I’m sorry, now! I don’t know whether you remember this, but she did this thing where she would get people on the stage – and thank god she didn’t ask us to get up –  and she would wrap them in bandages. You know, what I mean? She’s taking it so seriously, and we’re scouting you know. Then, “any suggestions from the audience” and there’s these people wrapped up in bandages and John ‘Tiswas’ Gornman did a ‘mummy’ joke. And, we were thrown out –  “you’re not taking this seriously”.

(Mike McCartney talks to SDE about the reissue of his 1974 album ‘McGear’, September 2019, interview with Paul Sinclair)

[crepesuzette2023]

Mike McCartney on Linda, on being an artist in the shadow of Paul, and being thrown out of Yoko's show (before she met John)

SDE: Of course, Linda played keyboards on this album, doesn’t she? That must have been quite interesting, you know… she got a bit of a hard time at the beginning but she went on tour and played with them. MM: Yes, she bloody did it. The big thing is you can talk, but you listen to those harmonies, there are some lovely harmonies. And, it’s like her photography, I mean, people like us [i.e. Mike and Linda] when you are compared to an ex-Beatle. Of course, I will have that all my life and so did she. And so, always people put us down as, they’re just relatives, they’re not important, like all the Beatle children… Sean and Julian and all these kids, Ringo’s kids, etc. They put it down as … it’s a bit like ‘the poshies’, they’re no use to us, they don’t look at us as human beings and as artists in our own right. They just put up with us, they don't listen to us and so I had a bad time, Yoko had it bad, worse, my god, did she have a bad time. And, it’s so unfair, that when you think of the things that they’ve done, I knew Yoko before John, she came to Liverpool with her husband and some American bloke. SDE: Oh, that’s interesting… MM: Yes, she was in the Bluecoat [Chambers], we went to see her in the Bluecoat in Liverpool because we’d heard about this Japanese artist. SDE: She was putting on an exhibition or something? MM: She did these wonderful exhibitions. In fact, we got thrown out of one of them because we were satirists… SDE: You weren’t taking it that seriously then? MM: We didn’t… Yoko, I’m sorry, now! I don’t know whether you remember this, but she did this thing where she would get people on the stage – and thank god she didn’t ask us to get up –  and she would wrap them in bandages. You know what I mean? She’s taking it so seriously, and we’re scouting you know. Then, “any suggestions from the audience,” and there’s these people wrapped up in bandages and John ‘Tiswas’ Gorman did a ‘mummy’ joke. And, we were thrown out –  “you’re not taking this seriously”.

Mike McCartney interview about the McGear reissue and other things, Super Deluxe Edition, 2019

[disease]

"JOHN WATERS (LA EYE WORKS)" GREG GORMAN | LOS ANGELES, 1990 [archival pigment print | 50 x 40"]

[aw-shit-my-ulna]

100% believe this is what they got up to in the Hub when the rift was slow

[thekenobee]

TURN + Text Posts (Part 1)

[nobodyytodaylol]

[simcoesleftear]

turnposting: tweets edition

[taskmastersource]

Photos from the Taskmaster Live Experience Opening (via Instagram)

[the-torchwood-archive]

This photo, taken on the night that the first episode of Torchwood aired, makes me so nostalgic it almost hurts.

Crazy to think it was seventeen years ago.

[crosseyedcricketart]

MET Gala 2024, "The Garden of Time"

[nerds-yearbook]

In 1899, Captain Jack Harkness was sought out by the Torchwood institute who recognized his healing ability and picked up on him talking about (a time traveling alien known as) the Doctor and recruited him. Having been told by a fortune teller that he wouldn’t catch up with the Doctor for at least a century, Jack decided to join them to fill the time. ("Fragments", Torchwood, TV)

[zowiemortem]

Some TURN scribbles

[disease]

"JOHN WATERS (LOS ANGELES)" GREG GORMAN // 1992 [achival pigment print | 40 X 50"]

[thekenobee]

Has this been done

[nobodyytodaylol]

[queerquaintrelle]

Came to me in a vision (was rereading the biographies of the spymasters).