Malcolm McLaren The Baltic Newcastle 13 November 2009
I was seeped in rock music throughout the early days of punk, and caught all of the major punk gigs in the North East: The Pistols, The Clash, the Damned, the Jam, Vibrators, 999, Siouxsie, Ramones, Television, Iggy, Buzzcocks, and too many others to mention. So when I saw that Malcolm McLaren was coming to the Baltic Art gallery to present his new film and talk about his work I couldn’t resist getting tickets to go along and hear what he had to say. I was hoping for some insights into those great days which are fasting becoming fading memories. So Laura, David and I went to this event last Friday to hear what Malcolm had to say.
The evening had been sold out for some time and was held in the exhibition space in the Baltic, which holds around 300 people (I would guess). The main part of the evening was the first showing of Malcolm’s new film: Paris. Paris is in 21 sections; each section is a collage of old French commercials overlaid with McLaren speaking, singing and other music. After the film Malcolm was interviewed and then he took questions from the audience.
I usually enjoy most things that I go to and always look for the positives in a performance; and almost always find some. On Friday I am afraid I didn’t really see anything positive. The film seemed to go on forever and I’m afraid I either didn’t get it at all; or it really isn’t very good at all. Similarly, I didn’t enjoy the discussions with Malcolm, which focussed on his contributions to art over the years. I had been hoping for more insights into his role in the Sex Pistols and the emergence of Punk. Still it was interesting to see him, but not an experience I would wish to repeat.
The Baltic : http://www.balticmill.com/
ticket / flyer for the event
No comments:
Post a Comment