Tony Visconti and David Bowie at The Beckenham Arts Lab in 1969
INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT LAWS APPLY © 2002 Stephen F. Roberts.
I keep a photograph, It burns my wall with time...
Received my copy of the superb Beckenham Arts Lab Photo Pack this week. (Thanks very much Stephen) The pack is made up of eight exclusive 9"x6" colour prints of photographs taken inside The Beckenham Arts Lab by Arts Lab performer Stephen Roberts.
Of these eight, three feature David, (two of which he is performing with Tony Visconti) and a fourth is a picture that David took of some friends at a local Wimpy Bar. The remaining four are of other original Arts Lab performers, and all of the pictures were taken over thirty years ago in 1969. There are also two enlargements of the shots featuring David bringing the total number of prints to ten.
The set includes twelve A4 pages of exclusively written contributions from: David Bowie, Mary Finnigan, Stephen Roberts, Ken 'Wild Man' Simmons, Mark Carr Pritchett, David Bebbington and others. There are also four pages of background history, including a facsimile of an original Festival Issue of the 'GROWTH' newsletter. Here follows a bit from David regarding the Free Festival included in two pages of 'Arts Lab Snippets':
"I actually didn't enjoy the day at all! I was very grumpy, I remember. I thought everybody was just in it for the bread 'man'. I think I stomped off in a temper tantrum at the end of the day. I certainly turned it around by the time I came to write the song, (Memory Of A Free Festival) because I thought the idea of it was great, so I'll write about the idea. I do happen to know that a lot of people did enjoy it. They had a great time at this thing. I don't think anything had been quite like it in Beckenham."
The set is available
Here follows a few more excerpts from some of the written contributions, but rest assured, this is but a tiny sample of the fascinating recollections presented with the pack. Please remember that all of the material is copyright of each individual author.
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David Bowie
"We would spend Saturdays, about ten or twelve of us, on the grass at the local park talking up the Arts Lab and what we would do. Street theatre was big on the agenda I recollect. I had seen the Bread and Puppet Company when they had come to the UK and that had popped itself into my own personal 'collective'. I drew on it and the Living Theatre over the years somewhat, as inspiration for many a show but right here and right now we would hit Bromley and Beckenham High Street and bring down the Establishment....with puppets. Erm, no we didn't. But we did some dialogue ideas and Brian the puppet guy in our midst, drew some fabulous heads. I think Brian went on to be a mainstay of the Henson group."
© David Bowie - 4th December 2001
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Original Arts Lab performers, Mark Carr Pritchett and Steve Harley
with Steve's guitarist, Robbie Gladwell, backstage at the Beckenham
Arts Lab tribute day on 6th December 2001. Picture by Total Blam Blam.
Mark Carr Pritchett
"August 1969 was a defining month: the BecRec. Free Festival gave a sense of community, real achievement and change. Something, rather someone was changing too. That morning we were at the Rec. when David realised he was short of a couple of mikes. I had more at home in Southend Road - so it was in David's Fiat 500 (he toured Scotland in that!) and off to get them. Outside my flat, he nods across the road and says: "I've just agreed to rent number 7 over there."
Haddon Hall. A vast rambling place once the home of the Price family (of Victorian Night Light fame) having been converted into 'flats' (no. 7 was huge). It became a hub of creativity throughout the week, much of the week's output finding expression on the Sunday night at The Tuns. At this time songs like 'Cygnet Committee' started to appear and before long the likes of 'Andy Warhol', 'The Bewley Brothers' and 'Life On Mars' began to announce themselves in one form or another."
© Mark Carr Pritchett - 18th December 2001
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Stephen Roberts
"Sitting on a bar stool towards the back of the room was a performer I had not seen before. He had blonde hair and was playing a 12-string guitar and singing the Buddy Holly classic 'It Doesn't Matter Anymore'. I have to confess that he stopped me in my tracks. The guitar playing and singing were good, but nothing special. What he did have however was that magic 'Ingredient X' often called "star quality". Prior to this encounter, I had always assumed that star quality happened only because the person was a star already and that it was the fame itself that caused the aura of "star quality". But here before me was proof to the contrary."
© Stephen Roberts - 29th November 2001
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Christina Ostrom and Mary Finnigan during Mary's unveiling speech at
The Rat & Parrot, formerly The Three Tuns. Picture by Total Blam Blam.
Mary Finnigan
"When David Bowie suggested turning the Folk Club into an Arts Lab, a room-full of people cheered. After that, we were right in Beckenham's face. Saturday shopping was spiced with street theatre, walkers stopped to watch rehearsals in the park. There was a weekly newsletter, poetry, paintings, puppets and dancers. My neighbours in Foxgrove Road put up with a 24/7 stream of visitors, regular high decibel noise and whiffs of illegal substances. At one point I asked David to play his Gibson through an amplifier. I walked until I could no longer hear it and stopped about 100 yards from my flat. Nobody complained and we were not busted.
The music was the driving force of course. In Foxgrove Road David composed - song after song after song. We ate breakfast to 'Space Oddity' and lunched over 'Janine'. 'Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud' emerged from a play session with my son Richard. Daughter Caroline roadied for David, played Stylophone at the Three Tuns and went to school reluctantly. Spontaneous jams after The Three Tuns went on into the small hours. Sometimes there were 30 people squashed into my sitting room - many of them high calibre musicians. Some stunningly brilliant music happened during those sessions."
© Mary Finnigan - 27th November 2001 (Bristol)
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Ken Simmons
"The door to the Art Lab club was open - I could in the far corner see someone performing on acoustic guitar. He had incredible charisma and rapport with the audience. I had never met him before and it was David Bowie. I paid (very very cheap) and went in as Bowie continued his performance (people tended then to call him Bowie to each other rather than David - although face to face it was just Dave I think). I got to know him and Angie. On stage he had star quality but one to one he was really polite and unpretentious. I then performed some of my own, mainly humorous, song at the Tuns. One was an affectionate parody of 'Space Oddity' which I called 'Earth Odditty' (Odd Ditty!). It started: "I was the first Englishman on the moon, I did not know I would fall in love soon...""
© Ken Simmons - 16th November 2001
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David Bebbington
"At the time I was a professional photographer, working for the Ministry of Defence! At Bowie's request, I took many shots of him, both at the festival and elsewhere. Bowie was flat broke at the time and so was unable to pay me. I printed up one of the photo's and gave it to Bowie, who in turn presented it to his mother. I understand it was her favourite picture of her son for some time and was displayed on the wall of her home."
© David Bebbington - July 1995 / 18th December 2001
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Steve 'Hippy'
"I also saw him at the Royal Festival Hall supporting Humble Pie (Stevie Marriot RIP). Playing his 12-string guitar. I saw him do his mime act at the Tuns once. Very good. When he changed his image from a folky and dropped the 12 string for an electric guitar I was there squatted front row on the floor in front of his new band, which I remember were called 'Hedge', but years later I found out it was called 'Hype'. Mick Ronson (RIP) and Tony Visconti. There was a mixed reception from the 70-100 people there. I think some were sad to see the folk image gone for flashy clothes and electric instruments of a rock band. I liked it but knew he had outgrown us. I knew he would soon stop going into the Wimpy Bar (hamburger joint) down the road from the pub (still there) and say to us "Come on lads, going down the Arts Lab then?""
© Steve 'Hippy' - 8th September 2001
