17 May 2017
Films made on Factory Records money (Part 2)
Welcome to the second and final part of Cerysmatic Factory's exclusive interview between Brian Nicholson and Malcolm Whitehead of Ikon, the video wing of Factory Records. Some of the mysteries of The Video Circus, the FACTUS 5 compilation and the undone ACR compilation Below The Canal are explained:
BN: Whose idea was the Video Circus?
MW: Because Tony used to travel between Manchester and Liverpool quite a lot for Granada he knew the art crowd in Liverpool. The woman who was in charge of the Bluecoat at the time asked him if he wanted to do something. Ian had died by then and we had all the Apollo stuff. I was working in Tony's basement at Old Broadway by then. He comes down and says he'd been talking to the Bluecoat about our set-up and they said do you want to put something on with video. We hired 8 or 10 Unicol stands from Holiday Brothers (local AV Hire company) and acquired some large TVs, not monitors, they all worked off RF. So I suggested we put them in a circle with the screens facing inwards. Tony liked that and he ran with the idea and sorted it all out. He had this great poster made, but it wasn't Saville. Can't remember who it was. It was spilt into three sections. For the first part we had Section 25 – New Horizon; ACR - Back to the Start; New Order – Ceremony and No Escape from the Cabs. Then we had the Apollo stuff from Joy Division and finally Facus 5.
BN: Who created Facus 5 (Videoshow' titled 'From Manchester to New York Direct')?
MW: It was Tony's video. Facus 5 was already done before Ikon started properly. Tony hired the equipment to do it including the camera and Umatic portapak for the ACR videos shot near Winter Hill at Rivington Pike.
BN: What was the Video Circus (FAC 46) like?
MW: Fucking fantastic. Me and Tony get there on the day and Oz the sound guy is there and he'd put dirty big fuck off speakers in-between the monitors. So it was – a couple of monitors then a speaker – it ended up looking like Stonehenge! So we all think it looks good and Oz says "I've got a ropelight in the back of the van." So he connected that to the top of the monitors and made it look like a fairground or a circus. Anyhow we go off for a bite to eat and then a drink. I was saying – nobody will turn up. It'll be a disaster. We go back to have a run through before it opens and there are crowds up the street and outside the building. We manage to get in and check things out. I stand on a stage that is over looking the set-up when the punters are in and I nearly had a little cry. It really was that good.
BN: How did people view it?
MW: Well it was incredibly loud for a start. The live Apollo footage sounded like you were at the gig. People wandered into the circle, watched a bit and came out. They all took turns. It was all very orderly.
BN: I always thought you toured it?
MW: We did but not as the Video Circus but as A Factory Video.
BN: Was it the same content?
MW: For a while yes. We showed it all over the place. I can't remember every show.
BN: How was it shown?
MW: It was different at every place. At Nottingham University Paul Smith (Doublevision/Blast First) put it on and it was fabulous. He had TVs all round the pillars in the SU.
BN: Is that when you first met Paul?
MW: Yes. Then we went to Northampton with Bauhaus at a youth club. For that show we used a video projector hired from Holiday Brothers. We did it at Heaven in London and the only other one I can remember is Newcastle with ACR. But we continued showing stuff all through the 80s at the Cornerhouse, ICA and Riverside and I seem to remember you doing one in Blackburn.
BN: That was a nightmare Happy Mondays, Ikon video and an NF stage invasion.
BN: Finally what ever happened to the planned ACR release (FACT 38 Below The Canal)?
MW: We had enough stuff to put on it but the workload at Ikon was incredible. I was working 12 – 14 hours a day and it was just one of those things that kept being put back. We had all the videos that Tony had shot, the Back to the Start video, footage shot at Heaven, the Tribeca film by Michael Shamberg and the gig footage from the Hacienda which was meant to be on there. The band had shot some Super 8 footage of a US tour and I also remember there being a Betamax tape from the States which we couldn't get transferred. Jeremy had also made his own stuff.
Huge thanks to Brian and Malcolm.
--
See also: Part 1 The Factory Flick and Too Young To Know, Too Wild To Care
See also FACT 38, FACT 46 and FACTUS 4 at factoryrecords.org.
BN: Whose idea was the Video Circus?
MW: Because Tony used to travel between Manchester and Liverpool quite a lot for Granada he knew the art crowd in Liverpool. The woman who was in charge of the Bluecoat at the time asked him if he wanted to do something. Ian had died by then and we had all the Apollo stuff. I was working in Tony's basement at Old Broadway by then. He comes down and says he'd been talking to the Bluecoat about our set-up and they said do you want to put something on with video. We hired 8 or 10 Unicol stands from Holiday Brothers (local AV Hire company) and acquired some large TVs, not monitors, they all worked off RF. So I suggested we put them in a circle with the screens facing inwards. Tony liked that and he ran with the idea and sorted it all out. He had this great poster made, but it wasn't Saville. Can't remember who it was. It was spilt into three sections. For the first part we had Section 25 – New Horizon; ACR - Back to the Start; New Order – Ceremony and No Escape from the Cabs. Then we had the Apollo stuff from Joy Division and finally Facus 5.
BN: Who created Facus 5 (Videoshow' titled 'From Manchester to New York Direct')?
MW: It was Tony's video. Facus 5 was already done before Ikon started properly. Tony hired the equipment to do it including the camera and Umatic portapak for the ACR videos shot near Winter Hill at Rivington Pike.
BN: What was the Video Circus (FAC 46) like?
MW: Fucking fantastic. Me and Tony get there on the day and Oz the sound guy is there and he'd put dirty big fuck off speakers in-between the monitors. So it was – a couple of monitors then a speaker – it ended up looking like Stonehenge! So we all think it looks good and Oz says "I've got a ropelight in the back of the van." So he connected that to the top of the monitors and made it look like a fairground or a circus. Anyhow we go off for a bite to eat and then a drink. I was saying – nobody will turn up. It'll be a disaster. We go back to have a run through before it opens and there are crowds up the street and outside the building. We manage to get in and check things out. I stand on a stage that is over looking the set-up when the punters are in and I nearly had a little cry. It really was that good.
BN: How did people view it?
MW: Well it was incredibly loud for a start. The live Apollo footage sounded like you were at the gig. People wandered into the circle, watched a bit and came out. They all took turns. It was all very orderly.
BN: I always thought you toured it?
MW: We did but not as the Video Circus but as A Factory Video.
BN: Was it the same content?
MW: For a while yes. We showed it all over the place. I can't remember every show.
BN: How was it shown?
MW: It was different at every place. At Nottingham University Paul Smith (Doublevision/Blast First) put it on and it was fabulous. He had TVs all round the pillars in the SU.
BN: Is that when you first met Paul?
MW: Yes. Then we went to Northampton with Bauhaus at a youth club. For that show we used a video projector hired from Holiday Brothers. We did it at Heaven in London and the only other one I can remember is Newcastle with ACR. But we continued showing stuff all through the 80s at the Cornerhouse, ICA and Riverside and I seem to remember you doing one in Blackburn.
BN: That was a nightmare Happy Mondays, Ikon video and an NF stage invasion.
BN: Finally what ever happened to the planned ACR release (FACT 38 Below The Canal)?
MW: We had enough stuff to put on it but the workload at Ikon was incredible. I was working 12 – 14 hours a day and it was just one of those things that kept being put back. We had all the videos that Tony had shot, the Back to the Start video, footage shot at Heaven, the Tribeca film by Michael Shamberg and the gig footage from the Hacienda which was meant to be on there. The band had shot some Super 8 footage of a US tour and I also remember there being a Betamax tape from the States which we couldn't get transferred. Jeremy had also made his own stuff.
Huge thanks to Brian and Malcolm.
--
See also: Part 1 The Factory Flick and Too Young To Know, Too Wild To Care
See also FACT 38, FACT 46 and FACTUS 4 at factoryrecords.org.
Labels: A_Certain_Ratio, Brian_Nicholson, Films_made_on_FAC_money, Ikon, interview, Malcolm_Whitehead, New_Order, Section_25, video
15 May 2017
Films made on Factory Records money (Part 1)
The official info sheet for FAC 9 describes it as the matrix number for films made on Factory Records money. However, according to Ikon man Brian Nicholson, that is not strictly true because he knows for a fact that Ikon's Malcolm Whitehead paid for one of the short films shown at that event in 1979 at the Scala Cinema in London. In this exclusive two-part interview for Cerysmatic Factory which is finally seeing the light of day, Brian talks to Malcolm about The Factory Flick and Too Young To Know Too Wild To Care:
BRIAN NICHOLSON: How did the Scala Cinema show come about?
MALCOLM WHITEHEAD: I was still working full time at the airport and finishing off the Joy Division film. One of the downsides of working in isolation was that there was a tendency to discard things or not finish things. Tony had seen it, was impressed, as he had not realised that you could shoot sound on Super 8. One day he contacted me and said that he wanted to show the film at the Scala cinema in London (the original Scala on Charlotte Street not the one at King's Cross). I was making excuses, saying it wouldn't stand up to projection in a cinema. But I relented and so it forced me to finish the film. The event at the Scala was promoted by Stephen Woolley. It featured Don Lett's Super 8 Rankin or The Punk Rock Movie (can't remember which, though some of the footage from The Punk Rock Movie came from Rankin) and Charlie Salem's film The Factory Flick. When Tony and me eventually got there he realises that we've got to play a wildtrack for Charlie's film as it had no soundtrack. So me and Tony had to rush out and buy a copy of Unknown Pleasures to play as the soundtrack.
BN: What about the ACR and Ludus films?
MW: I just remember the Don Letts film, Charlie's film and my Joy Division film. They showed it 3 times during the day.
BN: Was Fac 9 just The Factory Flick?
MW: No Fac 9 was the event, the stuff Factory showed.
BN: Who else was there from Factory?
MW: There was just me and Tony. Paul Morley turned up later with his chums, I remember because his mates were taking the piss out of him when Rob Gretton mentioned his name in my film. Whether anyone else came later I'm not sure as I had to leave during the last showing to get the train back to Manchester as I was at work the next morning.
BN: What did you think when you saw it on the big screen?
MW: Absolutely gobsmacked. It was the first time I'd shown a film in public and to a packed house (though the first house wasn't that packed because it was too early in the day). The dark bits didn't look great. It was projected from the projection booth.
The main thing I learned on the day was Don Letts was a bit arsey. I was talking to the usher, who was a nice girl, he comes in, she asks him for his pass and he plays holy fuck "Don't you realise who I am?" all that sort of shite. "These are my films." And I gave him the Whitehead stare and he starts backing down. I said, "I don't know who you are, why should she? You've no need to talk to her like that."
Later on in the bar the girl came and asked for my autograph in front of him. I said why do you want my autograph? She said "You might be famous later on" and gave him a stare! So that was good, the first autograph I'd signed – the first of about four in my life! The first screening in a cinema and then when Tony and me went to the bar there was the first ever encounter with a Space Invaders machine. We both thought – what the hell is this? Me and Tony started playing like a right pair of Mary-Ellens. Not hitting anything for about the first 6 turns. Then Tony embarrassed me by buying, because it had just come out and it was cool, a Space Invaders T-shirt that they sold behind the bar! After that I came away from the machine and shortly afterwards I caught the next train home.
BN: Was your film shown at The Factory?
MW: No, the only other place it was projected in public was with Mark Reeder in Berlin. I can't believe that I actually sent the film, the original Super 8 film! It came back OK though.
BN: According to the Factory Shareholders Analysis from around that time we were to expect an "all speaking film by Mr Whitehead". What was this film?
MW: I had a couple of ideas. Tony mentioned Too Young to Know, Too Wild to Care to me but I'd also mentioned to him about doing a film of the Peterloo Massacre, set in the present day. Shot guerrilla style at the scene of the massacre in St Peter's Square and near the Midland Hotel, with the Hell's Angels as the Cheshire Yeomanry. I'd sorted a few bikers out and we were going to do it early one summer morning when the police had gone for a brew. I wanted to do it on the site. I was going to cross cut that with some rural shots near Dunham Hall. I shot some Super 8 test footage of the rural stuff but in the end it came to nothing. So, then it was going to be Too Young to Care.
BN: Did you see a script of TYTK?
MW: Yes, I saw a script but Tony wanted Ian to be in it but he wouldn't. Liz (Naylor) asked me to try and persuade him but he wasn't having any of it.
See also: Part 2: The Video Circus, FACTUS 5 and Below The Canal
--
See also FAC 9, FAC 20 at factoryrecords.org.
BRIAN NICHOLSON: How did the Scala Cinema show come about?
MALCOLM WHITEHEAD: I was still working full time at the airport and finishing off the Joy Division film. One of the downsides of working in isolation was that there was a tendency to discard things or not finish things. Tony had seen it, was impressed, as he had not realised that you could shoot sound on Super 8. One day he contacted me and said that he wanted to show the film at the Scala cinema in London (the original Scala on Charlotte Street not the one at King's Cross). I was making excuses, saying it wouldn't stand up to projection in a cinema. But I relented and so it forced me to finish the film. The event at the Scala was promoted by Stephen Woolley. It featured Don Lett's Super 8 Rankin or The Punk Rock Movie (can't remember which, though some of the footage from The Punk Rock Movie came from Rankin) and Charlie Salem's film The Factory Flick. When Tony and me eventually got there he realises that we've got to play a wildtrack for Charlie's film as it had no soundtrack. So me and Tony had to rush out and buy a copy of Unknown Pleasures to play as the soundtrack.
BN: What about the ACR and Ludus films?
MW: I just remember the Don Letts film, Charlie's film and my Joy Division film. They showed it 3 times during the day.
BN: Was Fac 9 just The Factory Flick?
MW: No Fac 9 was the event, the stuff Factory showed.
BN: Who else was there from Factory?
MW: There was just me and Tony. Paul Morley turned up later with his chums, I remember because his mates were taking the piss out of him when Rob Gretton mentioned his name in my film. Whether anyone else came later I'm not sure as I had to leave during the last showing to get the train back to Manchester as I was at work the next morning.
BN: What did you think when you saw it on the big screen?
MW: Absolutely gobsmacked. It was the first time I'd shown a film in public and to a packed house (though the first house wasn't that packed because it was too early in the day). The dark bits didn't look great. It was projected from the projection booth.
The main thing I learned on the day was Don Letts was a bit arsey. I was talking to the usher, who was a nice girl, he comes in, she asks him for his pass and he plays holy fuck "Don't you realise who I am?" all that sort of shite. "These are my films." And I gave him the Whitehead stare and he starts backing down. I said, "I don't know who you are, why should she? You've no need to talk to her like that."
Later on in the bar the girl came and asked for my autograph in front of him. I said why do you want my autograph? She said "You might be famous later on" and gave him a stare! So that was good, the first autograph I'd signed – the first of about four in my life! The first screening in a cinema and then when Tony and me went to the bar there was the first ever encounter with a Space Invaders machine. We both thought – what the hell is this? Me and Tony started playing like a right pair of Mary-Ellens. Not hitting anything for about the first 6 turns. Then Tony embarrassed me by buying, because it had just come out and it was cool, a Space Invaders T-shirt that they sold behind the bar! After that I came away from the machine and shortly afterwards I caught the next train home.
BN: Was your film shown at The Factory?
MW: No, the only other place it was projected in public was with Mark Reeder in Berlin. I can't believe that I actually sent the film, the original Super 8 film! It came back OK though.
BN: According to the Factory Shareholders Analysis from around that time we were to expect an "all speaking film by Mr Whitehead". What was this film?
MW: I had a couple of ideas. Tony mentioned Too Young to Know, Too Wild to Care to me but I'd also mentioned to him about doing a film of the Peterloo Massacre, set in the present day. Shot guerrilla style at the scene of the massacre in St Peter's Square and near the Midland Hotel, with the Hell's Angels as the Cheshire Yeomanry. I'd sorted a few bikers out and we were going to do it early one summer morning when the police had gone for a brew. I wanted to do it on the site. I was going to cross cut that with some rural shots near Dunham Hall. I shot some Super 8 test footage of the rural stuff but in the end it came to nothing. So, then it was going to be Too Young to Care.
BN: Did you see a script of TYTK?
MW: Yes, I saw a script but Tony wanted Ian to be in it but he wouldn't. Liz (Naylor) asked me to try and persuade him but he wasn't having any of it.
See also: Part 2: The Video Circus, FACTUS 5 and Below The Canal
--
See also FAC 9, FAC 20 at factoryrecords.org.
Labels: A_Certain_Ratio, Brian_Nicholson, Charles_Salem, Films_made_on_FAC_money, Happy_Mondays, Ikon, Joy_Division, Malcolm_Whitehead, New_Order, Section_25, Tony_Wilson
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