Some Wear Leather, Some Wear Lace:Postpunk&Goth in 1980s

[Villemorien]

It was a scene that had many names: some original members referred to themselves as punks, others new romantics, new wavers, the bats, or the morbids. ‘Goth’ did not gain lexical currency until the late 1980s. But no matter what term was used, ‘postpunk’ encompasses all the incarnations of the 1980s alternative movement. Some Wear Leather, Some Wear Lace is a visual and oral history of the first decade of the scene. Featuring interviews with both the performers and the audience to capture the community on and off stage, the book places personal snapshots alongside professional photography to reveal a unique range of fashions, bands, and scenes.

Includes interviews with: Opèra de Nuit, Kirlian Camera, Clan of Xymox (Anka and Pieter), Alien Sex Fiend, F.O. System, SPK, A Split Second, Villa 21, Rosie Garland + many clubgoers.

Photography; personal collections & professional photographer








Reviews:

'Wonderful images, some now bordering on nostalgia, merge into a seductive whole, with the text providing an imaginative delving into time and places ... haunting and inspiring … comes closer to a distillation of being cool than any book I have seen' – Mick Mercer, goth and postpunk journalist

'Terrific photographs, a wide range of interviews, and an international perspective on the goth phenomenon make this an original contribution to the field of subcultural studies' – Valerie Steele, author of Gothic: Dark Glamour

'This book is going to look very cool strategically placed on your coffee table. But I will warn you, if your visitors decide to pick it up for a flick through, they'll be far too engrossed for conversation.' – EGL Magazine, Keller

A. Harriman & M. Bontje, Some wear Leather, Some Wear Lace: The Worldwide Compendium of Postpunk and Goth in the 1980’s (Intellect Ltd / University of Chicagco Press, 2014
Price: 24,5 GBP, 35 USD, 30EUR
http://www.postpunkproject.com/

[markfiend]

One for the Christmas list

[rien]

I told my dad about my Amazon wishlist and he surprised me with this book on Nikolo (yes, Austrians don't just give gifts on Christmas, we also give them on December the 6th, because we're just that nice/greedy).

It's really pretty, but shamefully I haven't yet got around to reading it. There is one Sisters-related photo in it of the TSoM logo "hand-painted by Andrew Eldritch" on the back of a jacket.

[Nikolas Vitus Lagartija]

Thanks, @Rien for the quick review. Sounds like you have a very cool Dad !

[rien]

Thanks, @Rien for the quick review. Sounds like you have a very cool Dad !

[Villemorien]

There are actually a couple of photos of a The Sisters of Mercy convention from 1987!
I prefered a part on more 1980s TSoM leather jackets, but there weren't enough quality photos sadly.
My special wish for the book was a section of the Floodland era and especially photos from the Dominion video. They were hard to come by, but we did interview the director of the video. It was cut out of the book because we couldnt complete the section (with photos). I summarised it in a short blogpost:

Dominion: the ultimate combination between rock-opera, gothic and glamour

The Dominion music video is still my favorite video all time and for Some Wear Leather, Some Wear Lace I did serious effort to find promotional photos made in Jordan. For a book you need the HQ and original photos, so it requires tracing those back. Story goes that the result of the promotional shoot were given to the record company and were never seen back. Neither I got my hands on HQs of the behind-the-scenesphotos. With the stressing deadline for the manuscript, it became an impossible task to include (unseen) ‘Dominion’ photos in Some Wear Leather, Some Wear Lace. But.. who I did get to speak to was the director of the Dominion video: David Hogan!

Not the espionage-theme (FIY: Andrew was not looking for the holy grail!), the irony of wearing white by the then band-members Patricia Morrison and Andrew Eldritch, and the overly seriousness of the video make it so memorable, but especially the location, the City of Petra in Jordan was the best choice. If shooting the This Corrosion video would go well, the record company would give The Sisters of Mercy a green light for Jordan. David Hogan, a well-known music video director was willing to do the not-so-awful job.

The filming was during the first Persian Gulf war and the King of Jordan turned out to be very helpful to the the American director and his crew. For instance, they could borrow a military helicopter! A large part of the video was smoothly filmed with help of this huge chopper. However, not everything went well: Andrew is scared of horses, the first day it was snowing in the dessert(!), and the camels were a pain to work with! Hogan almost had to cut all the camels out the scenes. The animals definitely didn’t appreciate the cameras and never wanted to do what Hogan planned. One of the Bedouin men suggested they should dress up the camera with cloaks, so it looked like a person. It was a hit.

The local people were polite and helped cast & crew, says Hogan: Several of the elder Bedouins even had experience working in front of the camera on Lawrence of Arabia. But that only the men could be on camera was something Hogan didn’t know: “In their society it’s impolite to say no, which is a blessing and curse, when it comes to production. Everything they promised was delivered, but when I requested three women in traditional clothing (covered in burqas) my bodyguard told me yes, when the answer was absolutely no. Photographing Arab women is strictly prohibited!�

Smoking joints in Petra, horse racing with Bedouins during sunrise in the dessert - Hogan has good memories filming here. Also, Patricia considers Petra as her favorite �The Sisters of Mercy�-memory. And for me? For me it is a great memory too: it was the first Sisters of Mercy song that I heard - the combination of a bombastic song and the impressive video made me an instant fan.
http://nowthisisgothic.tumblr.com/post/96361350572

Anyway, the book is full of dark (post)punk and wave fans from all kinds of countries. Without the internet and maybe not even 1 or maybe a few foreign trips to foreign gigs and scenes, I think most of the 80s club-goers had few ideas of what the sister-scenes out there were like. The book tries to show the differences and similarities between worldwide 'dark' scenes from about 1980 to ca. 1990.

[Nikolas Vitus Lagartija]

Thanks for the extra details, @Villemorien. As you say, almost all aspects of fan-dom were more difficult in the pre-Internet era when we were reliant on a disinterested media for information.

[Villemorien]

That's what I concluded from the book's research
In the Netherlands (where I come from) darker new wave and goth was ignored for years. Clan of Xymox (in my eyes musically one of the better and interesting acts) was completely ignored! Luckily they got an 4ad deal!

Especially for the eastern-europeans it was hard to get access to the western music and media:

F.O.System is clearly influenced by Postpunk bands from the '80s. Which ones for example? How did you know of these bands? (magazines, vinyls, tapes, musicvideo, fanzines?)
Amongst others, New Model Army, Siouxie and the Banshees, Christian Death, The Cult, Killing Joke, Sisters of Mercy, The m*****n influenced us. We got to know these bands by tapes and music magazines sent by friends, mostly. Even in those times, one or two small underground shops carried some of these releases under the counter.

Also, on promotion photos I see the bandmembers wearing pointy boots and bandshirts of postpunk bands - where did you get those back then? (was this before or after the fall of Sovjet Russia?)
This happened before the fall of the Soviet Union and before the wall came down, and those clothes and accessories were not available here then. Once a year, we were allowed to travel to the West and we could buy these items for ourselves and our friends. Even those spendings were limited, as we were only allowed to bring a certain amout (50 USD per person those days) of Western items to the country.

[Nikolas Vitus Lagartija]

Good to see this project getting the spotlight it deserves, even from the very respected Village Voice http://www.villagevoice.com/music/andi- ... um-7289965

[Quiff Boy]

Just been pointed at a pic of my old band on the SWL,SWL tumblr

https://nowthisisgothic.tumblr.com/post/14917550374

it's actually a really interesting photo archive, and i recognise quite a few photos (and people) on there