Post by Jai Guru Deva on Oct 1, 2004 1:33:56 GMT -5
This is a weird story... [img src="http://galeon.hispavista.com/akostuff/img/Dunno2[1].gif"]
It say's the Roundhouse where the IT newspaper launch took place was dimly lit. Paul McCartney was dressed as an arab and Marianne Faithfull showed up wearing a risque nun's habit. (A costume party of sort, I guess.) Pink Floyd and Soft Machine played psychodelic tunes, and then strangest of all--Yoko Ono did some kind of odd performance piece...
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International Times Launch (October 1966)
The launch of the underground newspaper took place at the Roundhouse, with Pink Floyd in attendance. McCartney attended as well. Strangely, Miles has missed this date in his diary. Incidentally, this event shows conclusively that McCartney had returned to London after meeting with Lennon and Epstein in Paris on September 19.
On 15 October [1966] the new underground newspaper the International Times or simply 'It', as it came to be known, was launched on a cold night with a huge event at the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm, London. Miles: 'We did fliers for the IT launch to publicise it, printed on letterpress, with the actual IT girl on it, Clara Bow. We printed thousands and gave them away or mailed them to people.' Using Hoppy's address book, Miles and Hoppy sent out invitations that circulated among the hip coteries of the emerging underground.
Peter Jenner said 'Paul McCartney was, dressed as an arab in a hood. It was very dark. The total power supply in the Roundhouse at that time was about as much as there was in the average kitchen, probably much less. So the Floyd frequently put all the lights out; we frequently blew the power. If you saw the place in daylight you would have been horrified. It was dank, really cold and wet and filthy and horrible but the excitement at that gig was enormous. It was like
'Wow! This is our place.' There was this great feeling; it was a classic gig, a terrific gig, and there was the Floyd and there was the Soft Machine.'
The Soft Machine played their first gig as a quartet, going on at 9 PM. They had borrowed a motorcycle, parked it onstage and fitted it with contact mikes on the cylinder head, and its short bursts of noises as it was revved echoes throughout the Roundhouse at intervals through their performance of their psychedelic-laced jazz improvisations. Halfway through their set, all the lights were shut off, and in the darkness came the amplified voice of a Japanese woman. It was Yoko Ono, staging a Fluxus-style Happening.
"Touch the person next to you....." she said, and the startled audience responded, reaching in the dark for the person next to them. A flurry of embarrassed giggles and then the lights came back on and the Soft Machine continued their set. Ono, who had been active the German/American experimental arts movement Fluxus in the early 1960's, was a familiar figure in the nascent Underground.
On November 9th, just a few weeks away, she would meet John Lennon at Miles and John Dunbar's Indica Art Gallery. Lennon had come down to see her Unfinished Objects and Paintings show.
"Yoko One came around to Cromwell Road," says painter Duggie Fields, "she wanted me be in her Bottoms movie which I found uninteresting. Now I wish I'd gone and talked to Yoko when she came to Cromwell, even had my bottom filmed, because she was a very interesting woman."
Keith Rowe of AMM says, "We had a very good relationship with Yoko. She used to stay at Cornelius Cardew's flat, and the AMM played at the opening of her exhibition. We knew her quite well."
Further reading...
www.furious.com/perfect/sydbarrett.html
It say's the Roundhouse where the IT newspaper launch took place was dimly lit. Paul McCartney was dressed as an arab and Marianne Faithfull showed up wearing a risque nun's habit. (A costume party of sort, I guess.) Pink Floyd and Soft Machine played psychodelic tunes, and then strangest of all--Yoko Ono did some kind of odd performance piece...
------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Times Launch (October 1966)
The launch of the underground newspaper took place at the Roundhouse, with Pink Floyd in attendance. McCartney attended as well. Strangely, Miles has missed this date in his diary. Incidentally, this event shows conclusively that McCartney had returned to London after meeting with Lennon and Epstein in Paris on September 19.
On 15 October [1966] the new underground newspaper the International Times or simply 'It', as it came to be known, was launched on a cold night with a huge event at the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm, London. Miles: 'We did fliers for the IT launch to publicise it, printed on letterpress, with the actual IT girl on it, Clara Bow. We printed thousands and gave them away or mailed them to people.' Using Hoppy's address book, Miles and Hoppy sent out invitations that circulated among the hip coteries of the emerging underground.
Peter Jenner said 'Paul McCartney was, dressed as an arab in a hood. It was very dark. The total power supply in the Roundhouse at that time was about as much as there was in the average kitchen, probably much less. So the Floyd frequently put all the lights out; we frequently blew the power. If you saw the place in daylight you would have been horrified. It was dank, really cold and wet and filthy and horrible but the excitement at that gig was enormous. It was like
'Wow! This is our place.' There was this great feeling; it was a classic gig, a terrific gig, and there was the Floyd and there was the Soft Machine.'
The Soft Machine played their first gig as a quartet, going on at 9 PM. They had borrowed a motorcycle, parked it onstage and fitted it with contact mikes on the cylinder head, and its short bursts of noises as it was revved echoes throughout the Roundhouse at intervals through their performance of their psychedelic-laced jazz improvisations. Halfway through their set, all the lights were shut off, and in the darkness came the amplified voice of a Japanese woman. It was Yoko Ono, staging a Fluxus-style Happening.
"Touch the person next to you....." she said, and the startled audience responded, reaching in the dark for the person next to them. A flurry of embarrassed giggles and then the lights came back on and the Soft Machine continued their set. Ono, who had been active the German/American experimental arts movement Fluxus in the early 1960's, was a familiar figure in the nascent Underground.
On November 9th, just a few weeks away, she would meet John Lennon at Miles and John Dunbar's Indica Art Gallery. Lennon had come down to see her Unfinished Objects and Paintings show.
"Yoko One came around to Cromwell Road," says painter Duggie Fields, "she wanted me be in her Bottoms movie which I found uninteresting. Now I wish I'd gone and talked to Yoko when she came to Cromwell, even had my bottom filmed, because she was a very interesting woman."
Keith Rowe of AMM says, "We had a very good relationship with Yoko. She used to stay at Cornelius Cardew's flat, and the AMM played at the opening of her exhibition. We knew her quite well."
Further reading...
www.furious.com/perfect/sydbarrett.html
