Steve Reid Foundation

Logo for The Steve Reid Foundation. Set up by Gilles Peterson in memory of the great drummer Steve Reid who lost his life to cancer in April last year. The foundation will work with The Musicians Benevolent Fund to help struggling Musicians with long-term or life-threatening health problems. Look out for the Brownswood Pop-Up shop on April 16th were a limited number of these posters will be available. Gilles will also be running the London Marathon on the 17th April – you can sponsor him here: www.justgiving.com/GillesPeterson

I've used the skin of a drum as the canvas for the logo and chosen typography that feels classic and American. (some sneaking tweaking to Buffet Script). I'm really happy with how the double sided posters came out and it also looks great printed on a T-shirt. Just need to find a spare drum kit and see how it looks on there...

Floor to Wall

Between 1998 - 2003, I designed and illustrated over 60 flyers for Plastic People. For those that don’t know the club, it started as a basement space on Oxford Street, with an incomparable sound system playing a mixture of House, Soul, Jazz and Hip Hop. A small and friendly space, and free from the pretensions usually associated with clubs. It moved from the West End to Old Street in 1996 where it continues to draw an underground crowd thanks to its bespoke sound system and initmacy.

The clubs owner, manger (and DJ!) Ade Fakile gave me the freedom to do what I wanted (dream client). I treated the flyers like mini-campaigns with each series based around London or music. The club’s cornerstones nights were Saturday’s Balance Sessions and Friday’s Blueprint Sessions.

An introduction to a Blurb book at the end of last year inspired me to pull these flyers from their various hiding places; shoe boxes, between record sleeves, under beds, backs of drawers... and put them together in a book. After weeks of digging, scanning and writing, a book started to take shape. DJ and writer Charlie Dark kindly wrote the foreword for me, he also wrote a list of 10 memories too (see below). The memories and stories that have come from this have been inspiring, with the flyers acting like cue cards. Ten years on I realise just how special the period was, both socially and musically. A tracklist at the back of the book reflects this.

Thanks to everyone for their help in putting this together, Ade (goes without saying), Charlie Dark (foreword), Jim Lister (for the missing flyers), Becci (support), Justin (copy checking).

“The flyers in this book cover the clubs two homes, from the original space on Oxford Street to its current home in Old Street. Over this five year period, Augur celebrated the less obvious London landmarks through illustration and design. The series-of-8 carried a range of themes, from street scenes, to landmarks to underground seat patterns. On the reverse, the stella line-up of DJ’s who graced the decks from the likes of: Theo Parrish, Gilles Peterson, Madlib, Francois Kervorkian, Moodymann, Questlove, Benji B, Jazzanova. Like the nights they promoted, the flyers have become pieces of clubland past, and remain a tangible record of the nights events.”

“If you trace the flyers in this book from beginning to end you will soon see patterns developing within the names that graced the turntables. Warm-up DJs elevated to peak time draw. Old stalwarts switching genres. Hallowed masters who rarely played our shores pitching up and rocking well into the morning.”

The 7 inch sized 128 page book includes a foreword by DJ and Producer, Charlie Dark and an introduction by Ali Augur. It is being self-published through Blurb.com and is available to buy now.

10 memories courtesy of Charlie Dark:

There are too many anecdotes to list and some of them shall remain in the club but off the top of the dome here are ten with a special place in my record box.

1. Moodyman djing behind a curtain and then coming back a couple of years later and taking requests and entertaining the crowd like a wedding DJ.

2. Leaving my bed at 4am to go and listen to Francois K rock the early morning session. Five minutes of a tropical rainstorm followed by the Bill Laswell rerub of Bob Marleys ‘Exodus’. Heaven.

3. Jay Dilla playing two hours of his own productions on wax on the Plastic People system. Neck hurt for a week afterwards.

4. Dego dropping ‘This Ain’t Tom And Jerry’ on CDR and messing up everyones heads. Proto Dubstep Broken Grime monster. When the Bass dropped my drink fell off the speaker.

5. Black Thought turning up in a mink coat with platinum dog tags and then proceeding to the ghetto V.I.P area on the left-hand side of the decks.

6. Bugz in the Attic debut set at Forward. Dance floor would empty whenever the rhodes came in but the beats were mashing kids heads up.

7. Dego clashing IG Culture at Co Op. CDR’s flying and both dropping boombastic beats that were only ever heard on that night. To close to call it.

8. Theo Parrish. Too many sessions to mention. Always heavy, always different and always full of surprises. And no one rocks the EQ dance like Theo.

9. The 2002 New Years Eve Party. Pharaoh Sanders playing ‘You Gotta Have Freedom’ at 12 o’clock and the insane line up. One of my top ten gigs of all time. I still feel honoured to this day to even have been included on the DJ line up.

10. Mos Def ‘Universal Magnetic’ on the crazy Russion radio station turntables. They weigh a ton, takes ages to set up, impossible to mix on, but make kick drums sound like thunder. You’ll never play a record on a Techniques 1200 again.

Bonus memory: The undercover party room behind the DJ booth. Seek and you shall find.

Charlie Dark

Floor to Wall is available HERE

Worldwide 10 - Mulatu

Following on from the Q-Tip gig at the Roundhouse, Mulatu and the Heliocentrics are to play Camden's Koko next month. Here is another image in the same style as the Q-Tip poster that I did last month. No plans to print a limited edition this time, but open-editions will be available soon from my site.

Independent Record Shop Project

In May 2008 I put on an exhibition with photographer Spencer Murphy about Soho’s Independent Record Shops. Its a project I had originally planned to illustrate about 8 years ago (I’ve had a lot on!) The idea was inspired by the track, Saturday Morning Rush written by Rob Gallagher AKA Earl Zinger.

It captured a mood of an era of record shopping that is sadly on the decline. Over the years a lot of my favourite shops have closed, with each one closing I become more regretful that I hadn’t done anything. It was Reckless Records closing last year that made me finally take action. I decided that photography was key to making this happen rather than illustration.

Using some contacts in adland (thank you Sarah Pascoe, thank you Mark Reddy) I managed to persuade Spencer Murphy to help me out. I approached the shops and we decided to shoot 8 of them. I was tempted to venture North of Oxford Street and to Hanway Street where there are some gems, but we felt that keeping it ‘contained’ in Soho was better.

So on a cold November morning, suffering a ‘post-Dingwalls-hangover’ I met Spencer in Flat White on Berwick Street and we started work. Or rather, Spencer, and assistants Pablo and Linda started work while I browsed the vinyl. It was one of the easiest shoots I’ve done - all the subjects are naturally framed by the counter and their ‘stuff’! We started in Soul Jazz where things were pretty cramped with all the lighting and equipment, Chris stepped up and within ten minutes the first shot was done.

We then moved up to Sister Ray where the staff weren’t so keen on being photographed, but as time was running-out I spotted Matt who was happy (and very good) at being photographed. We were so close to not getting anything but ended up with one of the best shots. Spencer’s lighting is superb and he really captures the mood, especially when you consider the dark and compact space he had to work in. Harold Moores on Great Marlborough Street was next. While Daisy the dog was in make-up we went to Melati’s for lunch. Now the saying goes: never work with children and animals. Well this isn’t true for Daisy, who loved the moment - I’ve never seen an animal play to camera like that... amazing. We spent the last few hours shooting details in the basement of Harold Moores which is filled with interesting stuff.

Tuesday started late as we sat outside Vinyl Junkies waiting for Jean Paul to arrive. He was edgy and a little uncomfortable with us taking over his shop with all the equipment. But then he saw the test shot of himself looking cinematic and grand and soon came around to the idea. More great detail shots in here. I love this shop and the way its laid out. Some pleading with Tolu to join in the final shot and then we were done. Still on Berwick Street, we headed up to Mister CD. This was really cramped, but again Spencer worked his magic and managed to get a good shot in a tightly packed and busy shop. Just 1 month later, this shop would be closed. It was a pleasure to have been there and to record it.

We made our way over to Lexington Street to Wyld Pytch to see Zorra and Digger. When the married couple had stopped bickering with each other we got a good shot of Zorra. This is one of my favourites, Zorra looks great. As always, there was a nice vibe in Wyld Pytch with some good people passing through. I would have loved to have stayed longer but we had a schedule to stick to and we had to move on. A quick dash in the rain down Lexington Street and across Ingestre Place to If Music where we’re greeted with an order “wipe your feet”... yes, it can only be Jean-Claude. While a lot of the shops are cluttered and dusty, this one is the opposite, its pristine. Aaron held the fort while Jean-Claude went out to buy beer. Again the set-up was straight-forward and the shot simple. There were a few props that needed moving around; Fabric Bear and my man Martin Young (RIP) had to be in shot. I help pack Spencer and all the equipment into a people carrier and he’s on his way. Day two is finished and its almost a rap... just Nicky Blackmarket left to do.



A charismatic Nicky appears in the morning for his portrait. He’s happy to have his photograph taken in his shop (the first time anyone has done this) especially as its so close to his birthday. And too soon its all over, with a sense of relief and sadness. Its been an unforgetable few days, surrounded by some very passionate people. The future isn’t looking great for the record shop, I hope we have done something that goes some way towards remembering what we have, now, while its still here.

At the start of the year I set about organising the exhibition and producing a poster to go with it. The square was the starting point and everything was based around this, from the picture crops to the text boxes. The poster folds down to sit in a 7” sleeve. Quadroprint did an amazing job producing this. Originally we were going to source the sleeves, but the unusual way in-which the poster folded down meant the sleeve had to be custom made. Spencer got in contact with writer Cyrus Shahrad who put pen to paper and did a great piece for us. This was printed on the reverse of the poster and appeared large on the windows too - a big thank you to Grant at City Images who helped with these window vinyls and the flyers. The final prints were 1000mm square photographic prints mounted to foam board and supplied by SMP. All the production was managed under the expert eye of Andy Maw.

I learnt a lot about PR and how time-consuming it can be (note to self: out source it next time). Emails were sent with little or no responses - all very unnerving. But one morning I got an email from Gavin Lucas at Creative Review who wanted to meet up for a pint. He was a massive help in raising awareness of the project and wrote a great piece on the CR Blog. I have to thank Gilles too for giving it a push on the radio.







The Private View took place on the 15th May in Soho – with a massive amount of help from Ronojoy Dam. Jean-Claude, Aaron Jerome and Zorra played, while a steady flow of friends and shop-owners made their way through the doors. Having Rob Gallagher in attendance completed the project nicely. 8 years in the making. Better late than never.

More links here:
BBC
FLY
CREATIVE REVIEW

some posters are still available, either from my site or from the record shops themselves.