When I were a lad...

I've done it! I've bloody done it! After months of searching through thousands of negatives, scanning hundreds of strips of film and cleaning up the scratches and dust of 35 years in a box .. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you .. MY ARCHIVE!

At last! It's finished! Over 900 photographs from my early photographic years! Man, I can't tell you how good that feels! And it looks amazing! I can't believe (he said modestly) that I was taking photographs like these when I was just 17 and 18 years old. They're fantastic! And they work on two levels (I think!) They work as pure and simple 'documents' of the 1970s and early 80s, recording the styles, fashions and environments of the time, but they also work (I like to think!) as interesting, amusing, eye-catching photographs in their own right. And they're so descriptive of my small-town upbringing as a teenager. (Never went to restaurants! Never travelled abroad! Aw...) They show Eccles market (a lot), they show the estate on which I grew up - and the people I grew up with - they show Barton Air Show, they show the bus rides I took as a lad, the shop-fronts, the power station, the old Morisson's supermarket, the chip shops, the Army Cadets, the clubs I began to go to, the cars, the flares .. and the all-prevalent smoking, and it's sad to think that so many, many of the people and places in the pictures are now all long gone! It's been a real trip back for me, and I have such a sense of pride that I've finally managed to finish the project. Of course, the important thing now is getting it seen, so it's over to Flickr and the hope that you all might let your pals know about my body of work. I've decided to release 80 images on the first day of each month of the coming year and all, of course, will be available for licensing or for purchase as prints. There'll be a small exhibition in Eccles in January, too - finalised details to come!

Man, I am so pleased I joined St Pat's camera club when I was thirteen...

Call me...

This is a blog that I'm going to Tweet and put on Facebook about an email I sent to a chap on Linked- In because, for the first time ever, networking on the 'Social Meeja' has worked! After days, weeks, months and probably a couple of years now, I've finally got a PR job directly from t'internet! My name has been sent round an office after I 'linked' with the MD of a PR company and, at last, an account handler has picked up on it and booked me to shoot a job this morning. The irony is, the job's for a company I worked for for years but, as with all these things, contact was lost as staff moved on. All it would have taken, in 'the old days', was a quick phone call and a trip into their Manchester office with a great big smile and a little book of cuttings. You know the sort of thing ... this is me, that's my work, what do you think?

Of course, you can't beat 'word of mouth', and that's how I got a Wedding enquiry from a bride who's getting married next August. A snapper pal of mine put her on to me after she rang his studio. That man he don't do Weddings, you see! Thing is, a full week after her initial email, I still hadn't heard back from this girl, so I thanked my friend but sadly had to tell him that his recommendation had come to naught. "But you're already booked on that date, aren't you?" he asked. No, I said, I wasn't. Apparently she'd told him she thought I was booked, as she hadn't heard anything from me since her initial email. Turns out all my emails to her had gone straight into her Junk folder, and she hadn't bothered to follow up her enquiry and has now booked a different photographer.
 Oh, for the days of phone calls....

Livin' off the wall...

Oh, I do love a good project, and there's plenty to keep me busy over the coming winter months! First of all I am so, so close to finishing off my archive! Man, it's taken months, but it's looking fantastic and I'm managing to get it all done just in time for my next undertaking - a solo exhibition in Eccles in January. Alongside that, and very excitingly, I've been invited to be one of the 'core participants' in a new creative undertaking at a gallery in Altrincham!

So, the details...

Well, my archive is looking like it'll be at least 875 pictures strong, including this one of the frozen shadow of an old Ford Cortina in about 1980. Topical, eh? I'm gearing up to hopefully make a new book, or get an exhibition together of some of the best of the shots, though I've been working on it so long that I almost feel sad I'm nearing the end of this part of the project! However, the next assignment calls, and that will be a month-long exhibition at Eccles Community Art Gallery from mid-January. The gallery's based in an old shop in the precinct and I'm being given the whole place to myself. I'm going to show a large number of shots of 'old' Eccles, similar to the exhibition I had for the library's 100th anniversary a few years back, and I'm hoping to run workshops on Saturday mornings, too, so watch this space! There'll be a local writer getting involved, too, and maybe even a couple of actors! Ooooh....

Thirdly, as I said, I'm going to be taking part in a forthcoming shoot and exhibition at a gallery called Local Creation, in Altrincham. We're all getting together next week to mash out the plans over a glass or two of mulled wine, and I'll let you know how that goes once it's all sorted.

Wow! Exciting! Life ain't so bad at all, if you live it off the wall...

Over the moon...

Caught some sport over the weekend. Took me right back to the time we used to huddle round the 'box' at four o'clock of a Saturday afternoon. You know that sport where grown men drop to the floor, writhing in pain? The one go where they go flying through the air, the more artistically the better? The one where shouting at the ref's as much a part of the game as tackling one another?

No, not tag-team wrestling .. football!

I caught some of the Manchester derby on Saturday although, as Withnail and I might say, it was by accident! I didn't mean to start watching Match of the Day and although at first I thought I'd gone back on my vow not to deliberately watch a game this season, I was actually glad I saw some of the match, as it made me realise I am not missing a thing! These days a football game to me seems like 90 minutes of cheating, fakery and fawning, pathetic idol-worship.
Oh, and coin-throwing!
Nice!

Fancy a brew?..

Slogging through the compilation of not one, but three Wedding CDs today, so I reckon I've earned a nice cuppa and a couple of minutes' breather! Appropriately enough, here's one of the photographs I've just added from a Wedding last September. Gosh, that seems so long ago! Remarkably, though, most of this year's brides have been pretty much 'on-the-ball' when it comes to deciding on their selections of images from their Big Days. I actually only have two couples who haven't yet got their choices finalised, which reminds me of a chat I had recently with the parent of a child I'd just photographed. I'd joked that some parents have been known to take two years to choose which photographs they wanted from a shoot. "You're joking.." she said "How can it take them so long?" That was 18 months ago and she's only just sent me her choice!
Two sugars, please!

Standards!

I swear the country's going to the dogs! The hotel we stayed at in London the other day was .. what's the word I'm looking for? Awful! Yes, it was awful. The smallest room on the planet, with a freezing wind howling through windows that didn't shut, and a mattress that looked like it had been a prop in 'It's a Knockout' in 1977! When we checked out my girlfriend asked to see the manager to make a complaint. 'Oh.." said the receptionist "Just put it on Trip Advisor!"

Huh? Let everyone know your hotel stinks? Oh, ok, we will! So, folks, on the instruction of the receptionist, I can officially say that the Eden Plaza Hotel in Kensington is the pits! Now, where was I going with this? Ah, yes! Standards! A bride sent me an e-mail the other day. She wanted me to quote for photography "at the ceramony and at the after do" .. and this hot on the heels of a Linked-In message from someone who described her job as being a "Wedding Coordinater." I mean, hey, nobody's perfect, but I'm afraid I must put a winner's medal for 'Crap Standards' straight round the neck of a GWAC in Somerset. (GWAC? Girl/Guy with a camera, as opposed to photographer!) She starts off by saying she hopes you "like what I have advertise", lets you know that "personlised memory boxes come's with the wedding" and offers, amongst many things, photographs as "Cnvuas Frames" ...  I couldn't resist emailing her to ask what a cnvuas frame was and, gawd bless 'er, she replied saying she wasn't quite sure how to describe it, but she had a page on her website that would explain! 

Is it just me? Am I being too pedantic, or is the younger generation really as ignorant as it seems? Ah, fcuk it, hoo caers?..

There is hope...

I'll drink to that! A smile has been spotted at the National Portrait Gallery! Yes, folks! They're showing a photograph of a smiley person in their heavy, heavy Annual Portrait Photography exhibition! You see, every year I go down to London to put myself through the torture of viewing wall after wall of dour, serious, "important" portraiture, and every year I come away depressed. They just don't like smiles in their pictures! No smiling in our show! But .. what's this? They've let one slip through! And not only that, they've thought it so unusual and striking that .. they've put it on the front cover of their catalogue! I got so excited that I gave 'em fifteen quid of my hard-earned dosh just to own it! Hurrah! There is hope, after all. I'll drink to that! Glühwein! Get me a hot toddy, pronto!..

The next part of this blog was supposed to be about the Hyde Park Christmas market but, er .. I can't remember anything about that!...

Oh, and the photograph's another from my ever-expanding archive! Just loving what I'm finding..

Ye Gods!...

 Jeez, I know times are hard, but f*cking hell! I had a stall in my local shopping centre on Saturday, selling a range of items from my Florescence range of Flower Photography. I took £5! A fiver! A paltry, pathetic fiver and  .. I won't mince my words .. it was an absolute soul-destroying pisser! And I get to do it all again next week! Brilliant!

Off to London today. It's time for my annual moan at the Taylor Wessing Portrait Photography exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. Something tells me that, after Saturday, I might not be in quite the right mood to view the images fairly! I'd love to think my shot of this poor little fella would stand a chance in the contest but I'd be wrong. He's actually showing some emotion, and we can't have that in public...

Party party...

Well, it's that time of the year again, folks! Today's the Annual Office Christmas Party - hurrah, hurrah! Trouble is, being a self-employed one-man-band, that can turn out to be a pretty boring affair, so it's off into town to meet up with all those other crazy freelance photographers out there. Yeah, both of them! I've complained about this before, but do you have any idea how hard it is to get a bunch of freelance photographers together for a booze-up? They won't - not even for an annual get-together - give up any work that comes their way. Mind you, I can't blame them, so it's just me and two mates who're set to meet up at the Christmas Market later. I guess it says a lot about the state of our diaries eh, so spare a thought for the three saddo snappers sipping shandies in the shade of the super-sized Santa in Manchester's Albert Square this afternoon! (Cue violins!)

Naaah! We'll have a blast! Of course we will! It's a tradition we've upheld since the heady work-filled days of the mid-eighties, and it says a lot that the three of us are all still working as photographers to this day! I'll have to watch the suds though, because tomorrow I'll be working as a stall-holder in Culcheth. I'm setting up a stand in the CPS centre to offer my Florescence work, as well as Gift Vouchers for Portraits and Camera Tuition. Come on down from ten o'clock! Bring Paracetomol! Cheers!

God, I hate smoking!

Ugh! Cough! Splurt! Yuck!...

I had to go into a flat yesterday where FIVE people were smoking! God, it was awful, and absolutely astonishing to think that smoking indoors in a public place was the norm right up until recently! As in days of old, of course, it meant that my clothes stank, and thus went straight into the wash once I was home. My nose still feels yucky almost 24 hours on, too. I won't go into detail..

So just what is it with smoking? Why would you do it? And why the f*ck do you all drop your empty cigarette packets in the streets, you inconsiderate, lazy bastards? I grew up in a world where everybody smoked, and I've hated it with a vengeance from an early age. Years on, my Dad's popped it from smoking-related illnesses and, whether by chance or design, I do not have a single friend that smokes. At a Wedding recently it was raining so hard that no-one would go outside to be photographed. They'd go outside to smoke, though! Didn't matter how wet they got, they still went out for their fags! I allowed myself a wry smile and a nod of approval that the venue hadn't supplied them with their own area in which to smoke under cover! Still, it's the non-smokers that get it in the neck, having to squeeze through those disgusting door-way huddles of foul-smelling smokers to get into pubs and the like. The object is defeated, too, when a door opens and a foul cloud of shit wafts in to a room, all the more noticeable because of its previous abscence! Oh, and a word of advice, dear smoker. Chewing gum does not stop us all knowing you've just had a fag! Your breath still stinks! So there!...

God, I hate smoking!

You spin me round..

I watched a great little documentary last night called 'Sound it out', the actual name of the only remaining record shop in Stockton, near Newcastle. It's a lovely little film, and I'm glad to know there are still plenty of music 'nuts' out there keeping vinyl well and truly alive. By sheer coincidence - as so often happens - I came across this shot in my archive the other day. It's the family record player, purloined by me and being played on my top bunk bed in 1977. I can just make out 'No more heroes' by The Stranglers on the top of the pile of singles and, before you ask, yes, I've still got it! It's filed alphabetically between Rod Stewart and the Stray Cats (I know, I know but forgive me, I was young!) I was talking about LPs with a lady once, and her teenage daughter butted in as we chatted. "Lps?.." she said, pulling a funny face "Aren't they those black plate things that you scratched with a needle?"... !

On yer bike...

Well, you'll be delighted to know that I've survived my annual jaunt to the Motorcycle Show in Birmingham. Poor me, having to spend the whole of Saturday wandering around the NEC with two nubile beauties but .. Man, the number of times we were stopped by punters asking if they could have a photograph with the girls! I'm not getting into the 'Sex Sells' debate but I swear half the guys in those halls actually forgot they'd gone to look at motorbikes! Anyway, that's that job done and dusted for another year, and the client's sitting happy with over 400 shots to play with.

I'm swapping broadband supplier today. The company I'm currently with seems to think that wireless connection is spelt Why-Fi? ... Terrible service! Let's just hope BT can come up with the goods and, on that note, if you've emailed me lately and not had a reply, it's probably because my current supplier has put me on hold for my traitorous side-step! I've not had any mail for four days!

Remember my Florescence work? Framed flower photography and images on place-mats and coasters and the like? Well, I know how desperate you are to buy some to give as Christmas presents so... every Saturday in December I'll be selling these much-sought-after items at a stall I'm going to have up the stairs above Sainsbury's supermarket in Culcheth. I can hear your sighs of relief from here! Yes, folks, I've solved your gift-giving dilemmas in the click of a Mac keyboard! Come on down! Just don't look for any beautiful models!..

Blushing!...

Now, you know me. You know I hate to be the centre of attention, so I've really had to step out of my comfort zone for today's blog. However, now that I'm out of it..

Hey, everybody, look at ME!!!!! That's me! It's me! Look! Meeee......
And whilst I'm at it ... Look, it's MEEEE.... again!

Yes, folks! I've made it onto the gallery pages of not one, but two, rock photography websites, and I know I've only just blogged about the shot of ME with Terry O'Neill, but I thought it only right that I gave you another opportunity to look at a photograph of ME!!!!....

Rock Paper Photo in New York, and the online T-shirt company 'Don't Talk to me about heroes' have both added me to their list of prestigious music photographers and, truth to tell - fake bragging aside - I am really, really flattered! It's so cool to think that people might want to see my work and, hey who knows, maybe even buy a print or a T-shirt! A new link went active yesterday allowing music-lovers around the world to log into Amazon and get themselves a tasty little piece of rock history.

Now, what was I talking about? ..

Bubbling along ..

A whole week without a blog! Dear, oh dear, what is going on? Well, fear not, loyal reader - both of you! - things are bubbling along nicely here and it's just taken me this long to park my bum and get something written!

I've had so many rainy, wet Weddings this year that I often joke that I've forgotten how to take photographs in sunshine. Well, I relearnt that pretty quickly on Saturday when I shot a Wedding in Chorlton. The sun was so low in the sky that I had no choice but to shade the lens with my hand, meaning it appeared in half the shots and knowing that I'd have to crop it out of 'em all later. This little nipper was one of the younger guests, making his or her - I'm useless with little 'uns! - own entertainment whilst they waited!

Another fab mish-mash of PR photography to shoot this week. Everything from kids' clothing for a new fashion website to a 70th birthday party at Willington Hall, and this Saturday sees me on my annual jaunt to the NEC in Birmingham for the Motorcycle Live show, where I have to go round all the stands accompanied by two pretty leather-clad young models! Sigh! Actually, I just googled it and on YouTube there's a whole video dedicated to the 'Babes of the NEC Motorcycle Show'! Yay! Sod the bikes, what did the birds look like? (Tell the truth, I've just watched it. For research purposes, you understand! It was filmed by a guy called Keen! I'll say he was. Bum, bum...)

Musically, I went to see The Swans on Saturday and can hearby declare, hands on ears, they are the LOUDEST band I have ever heard! Too loud to enjoy! In fact I spent the whole gig in the bar with Mick Middles, watching them on a TV screen and feeling the drums pulsing through the seats as we shouted across the table at each other! How's that for twenty quid down the drain? Wilko Johnson on Thursday, and then I think that's it for the year.

So, that do you for now? I promise I'll get my ass back in gear and be a little more regular from now on. Actually, does that sentence sound odd to you?...

Welcome to England!...

It's great, living in Britain. You have all these rights, you see. And it doesn't matter how wrong those rights are in the eyes of the majority, they're your rights, so it's right that you have them, right? Oh, I know we say we have laws here, but...  aaaah, don't worry about them, my friend! Want to smoke in a no-smoking area? Fine! Use your mobile whilst you drive? No problemo! Plot terrorism whilst living off the very state you want to destroy, and be allowed to stay in that country whilst you do it? Excellent! Let me just clarify exactly how big a house you need. Wouldn't want you crammed in a small space, say like .. a cell, now, would we? Not when it's your right to be free. Of course it is..

Where's my mojo?...

I must say, I was starting to get rather flattered by all the attention I've been getting this past week or so. Fancy calling a month after me! Movember? Very honoured, I'm sure! You see, my nickname has, for a very long time, been .. Mo!
(It all started when my old boss at the Warrington Guardian used to dish out the photography jobs in the diary, adding the initials MO to the jobs he wanted me to do -  the ilitarrette old fart! Oh sorry, Eddie! Didn't realise you read my blog!) Anyway, Mo I am and Movember it is, although - of course - I realise it's not all about me, and just want to wish good luck to everyone that's trying to grow a moustache for charity this month. Even the men!

So, my motivation at the moment is getting ready for tomorrow's Wedding at Mottram Hall, in Cheshire. I'll motor over in the morning, getting most of the detail shots in the bag before I start to shoot the Bride and her Mother! I imagine photographing, too, a montage of modern men in morning suits, modelling their .. oh God! You get the idea! Somebody get me a mojito! Aaaagh......

Call me....

The phone rang yesterday morning.

That's it! That's the whole blog for today! Why are you still here?

Ok, sorry! A word of explanation. My phone rang yesterday, during office hours, and it was such an unusual occurence I thought I'd share it with you today, that's all. It just came from nowhere - a loud, tribbling bleep - so strange a sound at 'work' that it made me drop my copy of the morning's TV schedules. (I quite fancied yesterday's episode of 'Moving to the country after being told where the nice houses are 'cos we're too stupid to find our own') Anyway, off it went - trill trill, trill trill - and the whole of our wunnerful Social Meeja world went flying out the window. Facebook Messaging? Email, Twitter, Texts, Blogs (Oops!)..? Naaah, I thought, this is it! I'm actually going to talk to someone! On the phone! Almost in person! How good is that?

It was a tele-sales geezer from Virgin Wine. I put the phone down...

Hello Dad...

Well, look at me, hob-nobbing with the rich and famous! This is the 'Photographers' page on RockPaperPhoto, the New York on-line gallery that's stocking my Limited Edition Music Photography. At least, I hope they are, after Superstorm Sandy! I got added to the page about two months ago and now just look who's popped up beside me. It's me old mucker Tel Boy O'Neill, the snapper from Darn Sarf who's been there, done it and definitely got the T-shirt! What esteemed company I keep these days! Mind you, I'll bet his sales are going a little better than mine...

Ay, Caramba...

Nice to see Michael Palin following in my footsteps on his TV programme this week! He travelled between Belem and Manaus in Brazil this week .. a trip I made as a missionary in the eighties, single-handedly introducing The Smiths to those poor, musically deprived Brazilians! Here I am - mullet intact and T-shirt artistically de-sleeved - sailing up the Rio Negro with a French guy whose name I've forgotten and the Brazilian cook who made us spaghetti every night of the trip! I'll never forget getting back to Rio only to find Sugarloaf Mountain hidden by fog and the statue of Christ The Redeemer covered in scaffolding! Sounds like a good excuse to go back...

Remember, remember..

And so to November, and what used to be some of my most exciting days as a kid .. the lead-up to Bonfire Night. The gangs on our estate would all, at this time of year, be ardently guarding their soggy, wet 'bonty' wood - trying to prevent the pilfering of the pile of pallets, planks and discarded furniture that they planned to see go up in smoke on The Fifth! And I see some things never change. Here's a 'Then and Now' of kids collecting 'Penny for the guy' outside shop doorways (Although I'd hardly call stuffing a teddy bear into a t-shirt an effort worth rewarding, would you?) The settings are interesting, though. Thirty five years ago that kid was sitting outside a boarded-up shop and, Lord knows, he'd have had any number of choice of doorways in today's recession but, interestingly - and perhaps more astutely - our 'modern' lad's plonked himself outside a 'Cash Converter' store, where people sell their unwanted items for dosh! Come to think of it, he made £1.50 in the time it took to take this photo! Now that's a conversion!
Quick! Get me a teddy bear......