Public Service Re-Invention
IT WAS A perfect night for dressing up like Public Service broadcasting...
I used to 'hang-out' a lot (if that the right term for frequenting a comfortable bar) at the British Film Institute, or its better TLA name: the BFI. It's one of those treasures of a place right "on your doorstep" (well it is if you live in a building on the Southbank of the Thames). I became a Member of the BFI, watched lots of films, dragged my kids along to see a restored print of The Railway Children and met Marton Scorsese there (if 'met' is the right term for having attended an intimate Q&A with him and a film historian). In 2010, I had the most extraordinary night at the BFI when I met (and this time met is the right term) Damon Gough [aka Badly Drawn Boy]. Unfortunately, I spent much of the evening calling him Damian, which he didn't seem to mind, but in hindsight, my getting his name wrong was probably less tiresome than my non-sensical ramblings about the wonders of his Once Around The Block. The man with a beanie, it seems, did not take himself as seriously as some. Damian, I mean, Damon and a number of other Members had managed to blag tickets to an 'audience with Bruce Springsteen' [if that is the right term for watching from afar Bruce being interviewed by some rock journalist] as he introduced a new film about the creation of Darkness On the Edge of Town. The bar of the BFI was heaving, and Bruce joined the crowd after introducing the premiere of the film to an adoring throng of genuine Springsteen fanatics. Now it's not every night of the week you get to have a beer within shoulder-rubbing distance of a living rock legend. But Bruce was all humility and graciousness to all the punters asking for a photo, or an autograph, or those genuinely wanting to know what some obscure lyric referred to. I stood with a friend agog. Bruce Springsteen. He shook my hand. In the bar at the BFI.
Despite this ready exposure to genuine rock and film making legends, I lazily let the BFI membership lapse when I joined a proper "grown up" Club. Here, no one comes in who's famous, or rather if they are famous, everyone there pretends they are not famous and the famous person likes that and the non-famous members like that they like that and then everyone continues to eat too many chips. So it was guilty nudge in my ribs this month when I spent so much time listening (and watching) and being wholly absorbed through some dull commutes by the rather wonderful Public Service Broadcasting. A London-based band made of J. Willgoose, Esq. on guitar, samplings and electronic instruments; and his friend Wrigglesworth on drums. They make great use of samples from old public information films, archive footage and propaganda material and while writing their album The War Room they formed a close relationship with the British Film Institute, using their material during live-shows. They have scoured the archives to great effect, not just in to use of visuals, but in the finding inspiration. Check them out on Spotify, or better on You Tube. Night Mail is particularly evocative and provides echoes of some of the best moments from Dreadzone's Second Light.
So it seems those hours spent in the BFI (either through some Membership subs) or contributed across a counter o'er which drinks may have traversed, continues to have been a wise investment, not just in the preservation of some old 'silent' Hitchcock films [which the BFI have magically restored] but in the creation of a new fusion of guitars and samples and old-film footage. For a taster, try this on the subject of Yuri Gagarin, the Russian hero of the Space Race which happened in the late 1960's [allegedly].