{"id":26927,"date":"2024-08-16T14:55:26","date_gmt":"2024-08-16T13:55:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/?page_id=26927"},"modified":"2024-08-16T14:55:26","modified_gmt":"2024-08-16T13:55:26","slug":"a-night-of-re-search-ballard-public-image-ltd-and-srl","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/new-worlds-annex\/a-night-of-re-search-ballard-public-image-ltd-and-srl\/","title":{"rendered":"A Night of RE\/Search, Ballard, Public Image Ltd. and SRL"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Allan Kausch<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 1984 I attended an out-of-the-ordinary concert in San Francisco with John (\u201cJohnny Rotten\u201d) Lydon\u2019s Public Image Limited on their \u201cThis Is What You Want\u2026This Is What You Get\u201d tour headlining, and various other local bands and organizations exhibiting and performing for the evening\u2019s entertainment. A large yellow poster showing Lydon in white, Pierrot-like pajamas, patterned all over with the PiL logo and mimicking the broad arrows of British prison attire, was sold at the gig and here\u2019s one of the smaller flyers which lists all the exhibitors and bands:<\/p>\n

\"pil.jpg\"<\/p>\n

The venue was at Fort Mason, one of the piers on the northern waterfront of San Francisco Bay, in a cavernous WWII-era warehouse formerly used by the military as an embarkation point to the theatre of war in the Pacific. We arrived early and were greeted by bloody \u201cdriver\u2019s-ed\u201d films like Red Asphalt<\/em><\/a> being projected on the walls and thundering post-punk music from the DJs on duty. The show was in honor of RE\/Search\u2019s latest book, No. 8\/9 about J.G. Ballard, with the emphasis on the theme of Crash<\/em> and recalling, to those in the know, the \u201cCrashed Cars\u201d exhibition in London in 1970, with several crashed cars staged on the dance floor.<\/p>\n

\"ballard-re-search.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Vale, the publisher of RE\/Search was selling merch at a table, so I chatted with him about Ballard for a while and I bought the yellow gig poster, even though it meant hanging onto it throughout the evening. It has since become quite rare. A separate merch booth was selling Public Image memorabilia, and I bought a red T-shirt that says \u201cPiL Rubbish Staff\u201d on the breast.<\/p>\n

Survival Research Laboratories is a group that builds robots and other monstrous machines, then sets them loose in destructive, sometimes dangerous, usually unauthorized shows. Founder Mark Pauline drove one of his creations (photo below) into the wrecked cars inside<\/em> the venue, revving the engine way up, then popping the clutch, burning rubber and smashing into the wrecks. Parts went flying every time he crashed the dragster into the damaged autos, and he activated the hydraulic claw arm to grapple the cars, dragging them about and tearing holes in the doors, trunks, and hoods. The faces in the crowd were lit up at the intensity and innovation of the spectacle.<\/p>\n

\"srl.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\u2022 SRL \u2013 Survival Research Labs<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 Survival Research Laboratories \u2013 Wikipedia<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2022 RE\/Search Publications<\/a><\/p>\n

Eventually the opening bands played their industrial noise sets, then there was a long wait for Public Image to take the stage. The highlight of the set was \u201cPoptones\u201d with the opening line \u201cDrive to the forest in a Japanese car\u2026\u201d in what was otherwise a lackluster performance from Lydon, to a tired crowd. The wrecked cars had stolen the show\u2026<\/p>\n

\"setlist.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Listing (with incorrect date) on SRL\u2019s site:<\/p>\n

\"srl2.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\n

\u2022 This page is part of the New Worlds Annex<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Allan Kausch In 1984 I attended an out-of-the-ordinary concert in San Francisco with John (\u201cJohnny Rotten\u201d) Lydon\u2019s Public Image Limited on their \u201cThis Is What You Want\u2026This Is What You Get\u201d tour headlining, and various other local bands and organizations exhibiting and performing for the evening\u2019s entertainment. A large yellow poster showing Lydon in … Continue reading “A Night of RE\/Search, Ballard, Public Image Ltd. and SRL”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":26900,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-26927","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/Pq7rV-70j","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26927\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/26900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.johncoulthart.com\/feuilleton\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}