keepers

hi there

well, in a round about sort of way, no less than my sister Gillian mentioned that i have not done all that much on my blog of late. sorry about that, i just really don't seem to find the time to do it! that, you would imagine, means that i have a fair bit to report on here. this is pretty much the case, so i will try over the next few days.

to start with, as the last post i did on some t-shirts i am not keeping was for some reason quite popular, here are a few t-shirts that i shall keep until the end of time, whether they fit me or not. do not make any sort of approach or offer for them unless the idea of me saying "no" is one that amuses you greatly.

a couple of these shirts are, to say the least, offensive. these images are not for children, so please consider yourselves warned!

first up is one that has featured here before - an ace Station To Station t-shirt!

i got the above from the magnificent Record Store website without even asking for it! i ordered the 12" and the CD single of some Golden Years remixes and this arrived with it! quite a magnificent gesture and certainly an unexpected bonus!

it's a 'large' size and i doubt i will ever fit in to it, but it's mine!

next up is one i mentioned before, and here it is on its side, since Blogger insists on rotating it when i upload it.

one of two Stone Roses shirts i have that remains in decent condition and thus will be retained. the other is for the Waterfall single, but oddly i did not find it as i was sorting out. i suspect that if i had a look in Michele's cupboard i might just find it! 

i very much doubt i would flatter the She Bangs The Drums artwork if i attempted to squeeze into that shirt again, but yes, as you are aware, i am keeping it!

next up is perhaps my most treasured item of clothing, if one treasures clothing. well, there are probably one or two extra-special pairs of boxer shorts that i have, but i am not putting pics of them up here and further am certainly not saying why. a number of my friends shall instantly clock what the below is, even if it is not the logo one usually associates with the band.......

yep, that's my Frankie Goes To Hollywood tour jumper, purchashed after the concert via mail order, i think. i bought a t-shirt and the programme on the night!

it is in surprisingly very good condition still! i suppose i have quite by accident looked after it by means of not taking it out too much.

here's the back of it, and yes indeed that first date listed is the gig i was at with my Uncle Colin!

every now and then someone has a go at me for more often than not writing in lower case alone. well, looking at the Frankie name above, is it any wonder that i do? quite a big influence on me, Frankie. they were and shall forever remain to be. i do not, however, form part of the voices that want to see the band get together again. they were brilliant, but simply don't particularly get along with each other anymore. if they wanted to get back together and make new music then fine, but if they did it just for money it would be a very sad bookend to the band.

right, on to the "controversial" range of my t-shirts. all of these have caused trouble and offence in the past, so you have been warned - if you don't like, don't look!

where better to start than with two shirts from the 1991 Tin Machine tour? they had a fair range of shirts available, but with me being, what, 18 or so, there was only ever going to be two of them that i would buy. the first one is the one that i thought would cause the least trouble, but not the case!

the above is/are the Greek Kouros/Kouroi statue/s which appear on the Tin Machine II album cover art. unless you live in America, where the "fiddly bits" were covered up. on that note, i wonder if these shirts were on sale at the gigs in the USA? it's strange that accepted art gets censored when it is all of a sudden associated with music.

i thought that i would be OK wearing this one to college, but alas not! i was ordered to cover it up, and then never wear it again! i may have worn it once or twice at University after that, mind.

want to see the back? of course you do.

a trifle generic, isn't it? i would have loved to have the date on that one (November 5, 1991 if you are asking), but alas no. i am guessing that they went ahead with the t-shirts before knowing all the dates and venues.

now, the one that i assumed would cause the most trouble, for all sorts of reasons, but did not. don't read it if you don't like being told certain things by, as it happens, David Bowie himself.  i think, but more on that just after the picture.

quite a statement, is it not? there was no way at all that wasn't getting bought, if i have the correct use of language there. it says it all for me, really. as i have said on numerous times (most notably on a post that i am very happy to see as being popular, the Tin Machine myth), they were a great band and did some fantastic music. lazy music journalists seem to take delight at saying it was a "mess" of a project without either listening to the band or taking note of the record sales.

as for the statement on the shirt, is it something that David Bowie said? i believe so yes, although i have never found the interview in which it is claimed that he did. as he wore, for the encore, a shirt that says "I'm IN" Tin Machine rather than the above, he clearly endorsed the shirt!

want a close up look? of course.

i have no idea at all how many of these shirts are around. a quick look on that ebay thing says that none at all are for sale. i would imagine that people who bought them have kept and treasured them, much like i have and shall continue to do so!

neither of the above, oddly, has caused me as much trouble as the next, last t-shirt has. it's one i simply will not ever wear again and nor will i part with it. what could cause more offence than the above, you ask? a celebration of A Clockwork Orange, apparently. and in fairness, a pretty justified level of offence.

exactly what has caused offence in the above? well not, as you might have concluded, the images of one of the sinister rape scenes from the film, but the parts below it. the appearances of swastikas has upset more than one person in my lifetime, and it's hard not to understand.

exactly why whichever artist created the above insisted on using the Nazi imagery - it appearing only briefly as part of the Ludovico technique and hardly relevant to the film entire - is a mystery to me. it could be as thick as they were of a right-wing tendency and wanted to include it, or it could be as intelligent as underlining what Kubrick and of course Burgess were saying of the society depicted in the film.

a younger me no doubt argued the artistic merits and context of use (and all that cal) but i honestly think, outside of its appearance here, this one is best left on a shelf unseen.

if for some reasons you ignored the warnings and were offended by parts of this post, sorry! for everyone else, i hope you have seen something of interest!


be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!