Star date: 17th July 2016

FROM JOHN COOPER CLARKE TO ROCK AGAINST RACISM AND THE DRONES

RE:ASSEMBLE: 40th Summer Exhibition Pre & Post Punk Music Ephemera 1975-80
Until end of July 9am-5pm free
Havas Lynx, 52 Princess Street, Manchester

For the only reminder of the 40th anniversary of punk in Manchester, Salford and beyond, there's an incredible exhibition of posters, badges, records and photos on two floors in the auditorium of the Havas Lynx building in Manchester.

Here, Glenn Jones, of Salford punk band The Drones, who helped put the exhibition together with top graphic artist Trevor Johnson and `music archaeologist' Chris Hewitt, provides a guide and inspiration.

Full details here...

"We wouldn't be put down, and even if you couldn't get the best job in the world you would express yourself in some other way to make your mark...It was what my mother would call `Just being awkward'..." Glenn Jones

They were years when Salford and Manchester were just gloomy...pubs kicking people out at 10pm, black buildings and `bullet grey skies', as John Cooper Clarke once described the place. And the dole. The miserable era of pre and post Thatcher...

...But the underbelly of this shit hole came alive in June 1976 – the start of punk, do-it-yourself culture and everything that followed. Literally everything. From the Hacienda and Madchester, to the stale corporate, sterilized zones we have now. Punk kickstarted everything.

"Rather than our older brothers and cousins who were hippy-ish, there was more of a can-do attitude about our age group" recalls Glenn Jones, twice a member of the Salford/Manchester punk band, The Drones "We wouldn't be put down, and even if you couldn't get the best job in the world you would express yourself in some other way to make your mark.

"I think it's remarkable that you can point to someone in every industry that was influenced by punk" he adds "It was what my mother would call `Just being awkward'... We grew up being awkward, and if you don't accept things you can make more of a mark. The generation that was written off have all become the big achievers."

Glenn, who himself made his mark in the graphic design industry, is guiding us around this incredible exhibition -  RE:ASSEMBLE: 40th Summer Exhibition Manchester & the North West Pre & Post Punk Music Ephemera 1975-80, to give it its full title.

Set in the auditorium and corridors of the marketing agency Havas Lynx on Princess Street in Manchester, where Salford graphics guru Trevor Johnson is creative head and joint curator of the exhibition, it features a stunning and rare collection of posters, records, badges and fanzines collected by Chris Hewitt, described  by Mark Radcliffe as `a music archaeologist'.

"He keeps stuff" says Glenn "He's fascinated with North West music, specifically Manchester, Salford and places like Rochdale, and is interested in telling about all the connections, rather than just one party line in terms of what happened here. Without him a lot of the stuff would have been forgotten.

"The reason we did this is that no-one else in has done it as far as we've seen, or even acknowledged the forty year anniversary" he adds "We did ourselves a disservice by not showing how broad a church punk and alternative music actually was – it wasn't all about two or three bands signed to a trendy label that had a nightclub. There was miles more to it than that."

The posters alone show the broad church in stark black typefaces, where Steel Pulse, China Street and The Buzzcocks came together in Alexandra Park for the Northern Carnival Against Nazis in 1977. And the 1978 Festival For Racial Equality, featured John Cooper Clarke, Exodus, Mike Harding, and Peggy Seeger and Ewan MacColl at the Free Trade Hall.

There was also the Deeply Vale Festival near Bury in '77 where, as Glenn says, "you could stand in a field next to a hippy, biker, punk and skinhead and watch a mixture of bands...you were in your tribe but it wasn't tribal".

The exhibition has info boards linking everything, from venues like The Russell Club – which became The Factory – to the Electric Circus, to The Ranch and Rafters, to the Elizabethan Room in Belle Vue and pubs like The Duke of Wellington in Swinton which hosted the Salford Jets.

The late, great promoter, Alan Wise, has his own info board as one of the `key architects' of the Manchester scene... `Alan didn't care about the music he just liked a happening, preferably where there was a bit of creative chaos and the group didn't get paid...So when it came to decide about the club or the record label, Tony [Wilson] chose the label (Factory) and Alan the club...'

There's the venues, the promoters and the illegal flyposters from Music Force, like Tosh Ryan and Martin Hannett, who later started Rabid Records, and the artists who did the graphics for the illicit posters - like Steve Hardstaff, who jumped from stunning, intricate Led Zep posters to doing artwork for alternative North West bands.

"This shows the relationship between bands and entrepreneurs, and still doesn't cover everything" says Glenn "This is a flavour of what was going on, and it's great if people came to look at it, Google some of these names and find out what they did."

There's no need to find out about The Drones, as they've recently re-droned and have already started gigging again, re-vamping the classic punk album Further Temptations on a re-vamped Rabid Records...

The Drones split up in 1978 but continued with original brothers, singer/guitarist M.J. Drone (Mike Howells), and drummer Peter `Perfect' Howell. Glenn joined in 1979 but had to leave just as the band were about to embark on a tour with Sham '69 as he'd started a new job.

"The Drones got together again in the 90s but Mike sadly died in 2013 and his brother was very ill, so we agreed to do a surprise gig for his birthday party, with two original members, myself and another mate" he recalls "It went down very well, so we thought we'd do a few gigs for the 40th anniversary of The Drones, and Chris Hewitt got us some gigs."

At the beginning of July, the band, all now from Salford, played with Ed Banger and the Nosebleeds and Andy T at The Deaf Institute, as part of the 40th Summer Exhibition, and are now scheduled to do a tour with Sham '69 and other gigs,  playing tracks from the original album which will be recorded and released as Further Temptations Live around Christmas.

Meanwhile, to get a flavour of what happened before the Hacienda in these parts, this exhibition is essential...

"The grown-ups went into it to try and make some money out of it but a whole generation of musicians, graphic designers and broadcasters all came out of that" Glenn explains "If you know anything about punk it will jog your memory, and if you don't know anything about punk it will give you a different viewpoint on the history of recent Manchester and Salford music."

RE:ASSEMBLE: 40th Summer Exhibition Manchester & the North West Pre and Post Punk Music Ephemera 1975-80

Until end of July 9am-5pm free
Havas Lynx, 52 Princess Street, Manchester M1 6JX