‘Betty Beat Continues. Betty Beat is an extra terrestrial 18 year old girl who comes from Planet Kromos. The action is set in the 1967-1968 period, with loads of ‘Swingin’’ London imagery.
There will be many funny characters coming along as Betty lives her adventures on planet Earth!’ I hope you enjoy getting to know Betty Beat.
Max Galli – 2012
‘Betty Beat Continues. Betty Beat is an extra terrestrial 18 year old girl who comes from Planet Kromos. The action is set in the 1967-1968 period, with loads of ‘Swingin’’ London imagery.
There will be many funny characters coming along as Betty lives her adventures on planet Earth!’ I hope you enjoy getting to know Betty Beat.
Max Galli – 2012
Back in 2004 the New Untouchables commissioned especially for the MODSTOCK event ‘Ready! Steady! Sew!’ a documentary by Boyschild Production’s Sean Wilson, Angie Smith (a living vintage fashion scene legend) and Pip! Pip!. The programme focuses on Modernist fashion through the decades including interviews with important mover and shakers from the origianl 60’s scene. Our very own 21st century fashion gurus Caspar, Peter Jackson and Angie Smith take you on this journey spanning four decades and explain how this magical period in fashion changed the shape of society and still influences the high street today. The film was shown only once in public, live to a standing only audience projected from the top of the Pip! Pip! lightshow Scaffold Tower as part of the Fashion Catwalk section of Modstock. 2 vintage scooters were placed at the front of the stage on the catwalk and Soulof65 owner Sean, Mickey from Velvet Illusion, Angie Smith and an assortment of scene based models helped create a really special fashion happening especially for the event. Probably the first Fashion/Pop Art explosion of it’s type since the 1960’s and warmly received by a slightly bemused audience. Quite how Pip! Pip! talked Rob Bailey and the gang into this fun yet stressful happening is still a mystery to this day! All exisiting copies of the film were ‘lost’ so this only adds to the myth. Pip! Pip! recently uncovered seemingly the last copy at the bottom of a box in the attic on VHS video (ask your fathers kids) and a rush to slavage it was then the order of the day once the dust was blown off! Thanks to KEV on the IOW (the ex BBC guy) for helping us clean it up ready for this re-visit for a new generation to enjoy! Three Parts all worth watching and it should really have been on BBC3! Get your popcorn ready!
The YOUTUBE Description Text and Credits below:
Short 3-Part Documentary called READY! STEADY! SEW! that was created and shown ‘live’ to a standing room only audience of Hipsters & Scenesters as part of the MODSTOCK UK EVENT prior to a live catwalk event, via the newuntouchables in London 2004, which saw a Celebration of 40 Years of Modculture in all of its forms and glory! Big Thanks To Angie Smith, Caspar De La Mare, Pip! Pip! Rob Bailey and all those that gave us content and info and agreed to be interviewed! Filmed in and around London on April/May 2004!
DIRECTOR: Sean Wilson (BoyChild)
EDITORS: Sean Wilson & Alex Rupprecht
CAMERA: Alex Rupprecht
PRODUCTION ASSISTANT: Peter Jackson
PRODUCERS & WRITERS: Angie Smith & Sean Wilson
CO PRODUCERS: Barry & Denise @ Pip! Pip!
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Rob Bailey (newuntouchables.com)
SOUNDTRACK: The Gene Drayton Unit
REPORTER: Caspar (A Dandy in Aspic)
ART & GRAPHICS: Pip! Pip!
Based on an Original Concept by Bazden Pip! Pip! as part of Modstock 2004
A joint BOYCHILD PRODUCTION
PART ONE
PART TWO
PART THREE
Dr Robert NUTs Head Honcho and toppermost in demand DJ Prescribes a second in the series of Modernist sonic set of fruity delights, rarities and underground shakers to accompany your Summer days. Have a real good listen and feel free to share it with those you love!
‘Betty Beat Continues. Betty Beat is an extra terrestrial 18 year old girl who comes from Planet Kromos. The action is set in the 1967-1968 period, with loads of ‘Swingin’’ London imagery.
There will be many funny characters coming along as Betty lives her adventures on planet Earth!’ I hope you enjoy getting to know Betty Beat.
Max Galli – 2012
‘Gumbasia’, a 3 minute 34 second short film produced in 1953 and released on September 2, 1955, was the first clay animation produced by Art Clokey, who went on to create the classic series Gumby and Davey and Goliath using the same technique.
Clokey created Gumbasia while studying at the University of Southern California under the direction of Slavko Vorkapić. It was a surreal short of pulsating lumps of clay set to music in a parody of Walt Disney’s Fantasia. Gumbasia was created in a style Vorkapić taught called Kinesthetic Film Principles. Described as “massaging of the eye cells” this technique, based on camera movements and stop-motion editing, is responsible for much of the look and feel later seen in Gumby films. When Clokey showed Gumbasia to film producer Sam Engel in 1955, Engel decided to fund a 15-minute short film that became the first Gumby episode – Gumby Goes to the Moon.” - Wikipedia
For more than 50 years, Art Clokey worked with clay to produce works of art that form a catalog of “firsts” in the medium of film and animation. He made the first music video, Gumbasia, in which colored clay shapes moved and transformed to the expressive jazz rhythms. He was the first to introduce the style and use of clay models of objects, animals and people in television commercials. He was the first to develop clay animation techniques and the first to use them in full-length feature films. He invented trimentional animation based on kinesthetic principles, and it became the signature of his long and productive career. A true original and light-years ahead of his time.
“Clay objects of all sizes, shapes and colors contort and reshape themselves to a jazz music score.” - IMDB
A sort of intro…
I started to write the script of Betty Beat back in 2007, while I was running with my wife our small publishing company Ultrapop. By then, I didn’t have much time for writing, so I had to wait at least a couple of years to get the script completed.
I was in touch with a comics illustrator, who was supposed to carry out the job, but suddenly he appeared not to be interested anymore, so I found another illustrator, this time a girl: same story, hence the decision to illustrate it myself, and here it is!
Betty Beat is an extra terrestrial 18 year old girl who comes from Planet Kromos. The action is set in the 1967-1968 period, with loads of ‘Swingin’’ London imagery. There will be many funny characters coming along as Betty lives her adventures on planet Earth!
This first episode is a story on its own, yet a sort of ‘introduction’ to a much bigger story of about 48 pages. There will be a two-page episode every month.
I hope you enjoy getting to know Betty Beat.
Max Galli – 2011
Top image: ’River Island’ resurrects 1960s fashion chain ‘Chelsea Girl’ with this “vintage” 1960s angel sleeve mini dress.
The concept of wearing vintage clothing in conjunction with modern is a relatively new concept in the history of popular fashion. In fact the term “vintage” has been distorted in recent years to mean anything which has a retro vibe or has had the appearance of age added to it during manufacture. It can also mean reworked clothing; vintage clothing that has been altered significantly beyond the designer’s original concept to create an entirely new garment. But in truth the definition of vintage is a design or object which is 25 years or more in age. For example, you cannot call a new car a vintage car, nor a new wine vintage wine. So why is it acceptable to call new clothing vintage?
Well for me personally it is not acceptable – there is a distinct difference between new and vintage and one has an entirely separate definition from the other. So why am I so passionate that this difference should be not only noted but adhered to? I believe in the old adage “a place for everything and everything in its place” for a start and then there’s the historian in me that requires me to make a mental chronological catalogue of fashion trends – historic; vintage; contemporary.
It appears to me that the term “vintage” has been adopted by many high street retailers in order for them to cash in on the expanding trend of wearing vintage clothing. Many are faithfully reproducing a vintage garment and selling in all sizes in every store. So much has the term “vintage” become distorted that should a public survey be carried out the majority would mostly reply “something that looks old”.
The origins of the vintage clothing trend stretch back to the mid 1960s when young people both in the UK and the USA began accessorising their trendy new boutique clothes with antique clothes and military uniforms bought in antique markets and army surplus stores. There had been strong historic influence in clothing before especially with the Teddy Boys of the 1950s with their Edwardian style jackets (hence the term “Teddy”) but wearing old clothes from past periods was not done to any notable degree before the mid 1960s.
The boutique phenomenom of the 1960s brought about a change in attitude to dressing oneself. The youngsters of the day were not interested in being dictated to by the catwalks nor high street chains who sold either children’s clothes or adult’s clothes and the teen section tended to be a compromise between the two. It was in fact this lack of understanding of the youth market in the high street that led Mary Quant to design, make and sell her own clothes from her boutique Bazaar which she opened in 1955 on London’s King’s Road. However, it was not until the very early 60s that Quant’s designs began to take off and be noticed as a new direction in youth fashion. Doubtless to say that Quant was the pioneer of youth fashions in the 60s but it was boutiques such as BIBA and Granny Takes a Trip, both run by their designer owners/proprietors, who first sold ‘second-hand’ clothing alongside their sharp new designs.
The vintage trend waned by the early 70s with the exception of some small subcultures such as Rockers and Teddy Boys but came into popularity again in the late 70s with the Mod revival. The Mod revival began around 1977 with newly made outfits inspired by original 1960s clothes but also the girls especially found it easy to source original 60s Mod clothing as it was only just being passed on to charity shops. But as the Mod revival became a purist cult its followers adopted the authentic 1960s Mod look and began to wear vintage 60s youth clothing to create an entire look in the same way as the Rockers and Teddy Boys had been doing before them. It was from this point on that the wearing of vintage clothing became mostly and entire historic look for many years because of the popularity of these three subcultures.
In recent years we’ve seen a return to the 1960s attitude of mixing new and old styles together. This trend has been picked up on by high street retailers who have seen a way to cash in on this trend by producing “vintage inspired” collections of their own. The success of “vintage inspired” clothing is down to four main factors: there is no need to search for it through second hand sources; it is available in any size; it is in new condition; it can be bought at any and many outlets. Pure vintage on the other hand needs to be sourced in mainly small independent shops and comes as individual pieces in one size and in varying condition. My preference is always to choose pure vintage first for the individuality it gives to your look.
Away from the high street a strong interest in vintage clothing in its purist form exists and there are some excellent shops to supply the demand. By “purist” it is meant largely unadulterated clothing of an age of 25 years or more. In London, where I have lived, worked and shopped all my life, there are some of the best purist vintage shops to be found. Here are a few of my all-time favourites, all are well-established and reputable vintage clothing dealers:
Rellik – 8 Golborne Road London W10 5NW. www.relliklondon.co.uk Fine vintage clothing and accessories from the 1950s onwards. Has an amazing collection of vintage Vivienne Westwood as well as other notable British designers such as Ossie Clark and other boutique labels.
The Girl Can’t Help It – Alfie’s Antique Market, 13-25 Church Street, London NW8 8DT. www.thegirlcanthelpit.com Amazing, well-established and very well stocked vintage shop specialising in mainly American clothing and accessories from the 1930s-1960s period.
What The Butler Wore – 131 Lower Marsh, London SE1. http://www.whatthebutlerwore.co.uk/ My favourite vintage clothing & accessories boutique. Specialists in 60s and 70s clothing, shoes and accessories for men and women but also stock clothes from earlier periods.
Radio Days – 87 Lower Marsh, London SE1. http://www.radiodaysvintage.co.uk/ Just further up the road from What The Butler Wore this Art Deco style vintage shop stocks mainly 1930s-1950s clothing and accessories as well as magazines, homewares, collectables and memorabilia from the same period.
Retromania – 6 Upper Tachbrook Street London SW1V 1SH. http://faracharityshops.org/site/shopsspecial.html Retromania is a vintage charity shop which is part of the FARA group of charity shops. Impressive clothing selection which covers all periods from Victorian to 1980s. They have a vintage homewares section in the basement for those looking to expand their vintage interest to lifestyle!
Author Recommendations -
The Best Films of the Rock & Roll Era (1955-1975) by Year
1955 - Rebel Without a Cause by Nicholas Ray
1956 - Giant by George Stevens
1957 - Twelve Angry Men by Sidney Lumet
1958 - Cat on a Hot Tin Roof by Richard Brooks
1959 - Sleeping Beauty by Walt Disney
1960 - The Fugitive Kind by Sidney Lumet
1961 - The Hustler by Robert Rossen
1962 - To Kill a Mockingbird by Robert Mulligan
1963 - The Great Escape by John Sturges
1964 - My Fair Lady by George Cukor
1965 - The Cincinnati Kid by Norman Jewison
1966 - The Good, The Bad and the Ugly by Sergio Leone
1967 - Cool Hand Luke by Stuart Rosenberg
1968 - 2001: A Space Odyssey by Stanley Kubrick
1969 - Easy Rider by Dennis Hopper
1970 - Little Big Man by Arthur Penn
1971 - A Clockwork Orange by Stanley Kubrick
1972 - The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean by John Huston
1973 - Papillon by Franklin J. Schaffner
1974 - The Godfather Part II by Francis Ford Coppola
1975 - Monty Python & the Holy Grail by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones
Disagree? Leave a reply with your own favourites… NUTs Author? Make your own recommendations!
To listen to the Beat 10 from Pip! Pip! simply play the video below and all 10 tracks with auto play one after the other in a Beat 10 Audio/Visual Loop! You can turn the sidebar Jukebox off by clicking the player controls in the right hand Column! How frightfully wonderful and Fab! Please enjoy in your own spare time!
