London Road 1981, by Jeff Young, Martin Heslop and Alan Dunn, commissioned by Nathan Jones for
Electronic Voice Phenomena
at St. Georges Hall in Liverpool,
May 2013.
London Road 1981, by Jeff Young, Martin Heslop and Alan Dunn, commissioned by Nathan Jones for
Electronic Voice Phenomena |
Wednesday 15 May 2013, London Road 1981 is presented as a four-headphone work before, during and after the EVP, as our remix of Sea Breezes backdrops the bar area. Audio files available for download: Sea Breezes (London Road mix) (4'23")
Young, Heslop & Dunn present excerpts from lost cassette recordings found in the vicinity of the enigmatic RAY + JULIE sculpture on London Road during the excavation of the Odeon Cinema opposite. London Road 1981 seeks to reignite a specific place through characters, namely two nineteen year olds listening to Roxy Music tapes in the shadow of St Georges Hall in the early 1980s, to remind us of how quickly times change.
London Road 1981 is a discreet minimal-duration soundwork for headphone listening stations in the quieter parts of St Georges Hall that look along London Road. Parts of London Road 1981 sound like they may have been recorded by contact microphones attached to RAY + JULIE. Heslop's remix of Roxy Music's Sea Breezes, to textual instructions issued by Dunn & Young, plays back through St Georges Hall during the event. The female voice in London Road 1981 is Emma French.
RAY + JULIE inspire billboards, poetry and the artwork by Andrew Smith and host Biennial artworks as well as New Order appearing in shoe adverts. |
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RAY + JULIE appear around 1995 and gradually acquire a mythical status, culminating in their inclusion in Britain's Top Ten Secret Sculptures in The Guardian in 2009 alongside Moore, Hepworth, Goldsworthy and Cragg. The two chairs are rumoured to have been inspired by and named after RAY + JULIE graffiti that once adorned the back wall, but this has since been erased. Upon hearing the story, a LIPA student went out one night in 1997 and filmed herself re-spraying RAY + JULIE's names behind the chairs.
John Peel's Festive Fifty 1981 features Siouxsie & The Banshees, The Sex Pistols, The Specials, Anti-Pasti, New Order, Magazine, Bauhaus, Altered Images, The Fall, Echo & The Bunnymen, Killing Joke, Dead Kennedys, Pigbag, Laurie Anderson, The Ruts, The Fall, Scritti Politti, The Understones, Public Image, Theatre of Hate, The Jam, The Clash, Birthday Party, The Damned, The Cure and is topped by Joy Division's Atmosphere. |
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