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➢ Choose “View full site” – then in the blue bar atop your mobile page, click the three horizontal lines linking to many blue themed pages with background articles.MORE INTERESTING THAN MOST PEOPLE’S FANTASIES — THE SWINGING EIGHTIES 1978-1984
They didn’t call themselves New Romantics, or the Blitz Kids – but other people did.
“I’d find people at the Blitz who were possible only in my imagination. But they were real” — Stephen Jones, hatmaker, 1983. (Illustration courtesy Iain R Webb, 1983)
“The truth about those Blitz club people was more interesting than most people’s fantasies” — Steve Dagger, pop group manager, 1983PRAISE INDEED!
“See David Johnson’s fabulously detailed website Shapers of the 80s to which I am hugely indebted” – Political historian Dominic Sandbrook, in his book Who Dares Wins, 2019
“The (velvet) goldmine that is Shapers of the 80s” – Verdict of Chris O’Leary, respected author and blogger who analyses Bowie song by song at Pushing Ahead of the Dame
“The rather brilliant Shapers of the 80s website” – Dylan Jones in his Sweet Dreams paperback, 2021
A UNIQUE HISTORY
➢ WELCOME to the Swinging 80s
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❏ Header artwork by Kat Starchild shows Blitz Kids Darla Jane Gilroy, Elise Brazier, Judi Frankland and Steve Strange, with David Bowie at centre in his 1980 video for Ashes to AshesVINCENT ON AIR 2022
✱ Deejay legend Robbie Vincent returned to JazzFM on Sundays 1-3pm in 2021… Catch Robbie’s JazzFM August Bank Holiday 2020 session thanks to AhhhhhSoul with four hours of “nothing but essential rhythms of soul, jazz and funk”.TOLD FOR THE FIRST TIME
◆ Who was who in Spandau’s break-out year of 1980? The Invisible Hand of Shapersofthe80s draws a selective timeline for The unprecedented rise and rise of Spandau Ballet –– Turn to our inside page
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RECENT ADDITIONS
- 1983 ➤ A True romance aboard Spandau’s triumphal Thames riverboat
- 2023 ➤ Join me recalling the heady days of Fleet Street’s newspaper industry
- 2023➤ Kemp Bros keep tongues firmly in their cheeks
- 2023 ➤ 80,000 items of Bowie baggage find final resting place in the Olympic Park
- 2023 ➤ Spitting Image puppeteers steal the live stage show in Birmingham
- 2023 ➤ Don’t let zeros dazzle you in front of Doig’s broody paintings
- 2023 ➤ Fond farewells to the glorious Queen of the Telegraph fashion pages
- 1984 ➤ How SAW pumped up the volume during the Swinging Eighties
- 2023 ➤ Bowie anniversaries: One fan’s teenage love remains undimmed
- ➤ Hottest Shapers during 2022
- 2022 ➤ Reunion with Martin Creed, the artist who might yet make me rich
- ➤ Captured in 1983: the Westwood-McLaren showdown
SEARCH our 800 posts or ZOOM DOWN TO THE ARCHIVE INDEX
UNTOLD BLITZ STORIES
✱ If you thought there was no more to know about the birth of Blitz culture in 1980 then get your hands on a sensational book by an obsessive music fan called David Barrat. It is gripping, original and epic – a spooky tale of coincidence and parallel lives as mind-tingling as a Sherlock Holmes yarn. Titled both New Romantics Who Never Were and The Untold Story of Spandau Ballet! Sample this initial taster here at Shapers of the 80sCHEWING THE FAT
LANDMARK FAREWELLS. . . HIT THE INDEX TAB UP TOP FOR EVERYTHING ELSE
➢ Search for all on Bowie here
at Shapers of the 80s✱ “I’m not a rock star” Bowie often said – No, David, you were a messiah – Obituaries and key videos on the godlike one
✱ Prince Rogers Nelson RIP: ‘A funny cat’ and ‘sole authentic genius’ of the 1980s
✱ 2015 – Original Blitz Kids say farewell to Steve Strange – read exclusive tributes to the King of the PosersArchive — Many publication dates are arbitrary, so click and take pot luck!
RANDOM!
Tag Archives: Anna Brecon
➤ What it’s like working with Martin Kemp
Tagged Anna Brecon, Jane March, Martin Kemp, Stalker, trailer
➤ Martin Kemp’s Stalker set for autumn release
❚ WONDERING WHAT HAD HAPPENED TO Martin Kemp’s debut as a horror movie director? Keen readers of Shapersofthe80s will recall a video interview last summer in which Spandau Ballet bassist Kemp discussed his movie mogul plans for the production company Black & Blue Films. Now Variety reports that the Hammer-style psycho-drama Stalker will be the first release this autumn on B&B’s own DVD label. [Update August 25: Stalker gets two cinema premieres, Oct 7 in Manchester, Oct 15 in London, and goes on general release October 10.]
Kemp’s partner, 30-year-old producer Jonathan Sothcott who was previously head of programming for The Horror Channel, said: “I have always intended to grow Black & Blue into a mini studio.” His indie outfit recently announced a nine-film co-production deal with Soho based post-production company The Mews, and it will include the upcoming horror spoof Strippers Vs Werewolves as well as Stalker. The DVD arm is being launched in the UK with indie distributor 4Digital Media.
Stalker is about a best-selling author, played by TV actress Anna Brecon, who moves into an old dark house to get her creative juices flowing. “People start dying,” says Sothcott and Kemp adds: “All in one house. That’s a good premise for low-budget film.”
Sothcott told Dread Central: “We had an amazing cast — a bona fide Hollywood star in the brilliant Jane March, a versatile leading lady in Anna Brecon, and a really offbeat turn from Billy Murray as a slippery journalist. And Martin directed them all with real skill, drawing out subtle performances of the type you don’t often get in this genre.”

Poster for Stalker: due for October cinema release in the UK. (Publicity photo by Harleymoon Kemp)
➢ View the trailer for Stalker
➢ Update: Behind-the-scenes pictures of Stalker
➢ Update: Interview with Stalker producer Jonathan Sothcott
at aintitcool