Stand Up Now / 3 Before 8 are two limited edition vinyl records produced for Thames Delta, Focal Point Gallery, Southend-on-Sea, 16 April - 30 June 2012
3 Before 8 Record Launch: 30 June 2012 8pm-9pm
The Railway Hotel, Clifftown Road, Southend-on-Sea, Essex SS1 1AJ
Published by Focal Point Gallery:
Stand Up Now (#38) ISBN 978-1-907185-10-6
3 Before 8 (#39) ISNB 978-1-907185-11-3
The contexts for Stand Up Now / 3 Before 8 was Northern Soul music and philosophy, the 45rpm vinyl record and the protest song.
STAND UP NOW
a-side
Stand Up Now
Vocals: Johnny Boy
Lyrics: Ross Birrell, Frank Wilson, Gerrard Winstanley
Produced by Russ Winstanley
Recorded in Wigan, 26 May 2011
b-side
Cornel West, ‘Organise and Mobilise’
Extract from The Faith of the Faithless: a conversation with Simon Critchley, Brooklyn Academy of Music, 7.2.12.
Stand Up Now is a protest song against tuition fees and coalition cuts, and is a revised version of the classic Northern Soul track, 'Do I Love You? (Indeed I do) by Frank Wilson. The title and chorus of the new version, Stand Up Now, is inspired by the Diggers Song by Gerrard Winstanley, born in Wigan in 1609. The Winstanley name is synonymous with Wigan and dates back to the 13th Century. The Winstanley Colliery was the pit which supplied coal to Wigan Pier, made famous by George Orwell in the 1930s. The founder and host of the Northern Soul 'allnighters' at the legendary Wigan Casino club (1973-81) was DJ Russ Winstanley, currently of BBC Radio Lancashire.
The last record ever played at the Wigan Casino allnighters - chosen entirely at random by Russ Winstanley - was Frank Wilson's Do I Love You (Indeed I Do). Wilson's classic song is referenced in both the music and lyrics of Stand Up Now.
Stand Up Now was conceived in response to Living Today, Mackintosh Museum, The Glasgow School of Art, 14 January- 5 March 2011 which included a video in the 'Envoy' series, 'The Road to Wigan Pier', an installation consisting of Russ Winstanley's original record decks from the Wigan Casino and a narrative text on Orwell and contemporary Wigan by David Harding. An opening event feature a live set by DJ Russ Winstanley.
Cornel West is a renowned American philosopher and civil rights activist who has written and spoken widely on black identity, culture and the importance of song.
3 BEFORE 8
side a - Simon Critchley - Long After Tonight Is All Over
John Cussans - Time Will Pass You By (Like It Used To Be)
side aa - Jonathan Dronsfield - I’m On My Way
Haroon Mirza - Time Will Pass You By (Endless Groove)
The ‘Three Before Eight’ were three last tracks played before 8am at Northern Soul allnighters: Jimmy Radcliffe - Long After Tonight Is All Over, Dean Parrish - I’m On My Way, and Tobi Legend - Time Will Pass You By.
Keeping the original song titles, this Three Before Eight record brings together new works by contemporary artists and philosophers with a common interest in music and its potential, through the agency of the dancefloor, to produce what Simon Critchley calls an ‘association of free human beings’.
An association between philosophy and soul music is anticipated in Hegel’s belief that music is 'the art of the soul and is directly addressed to the soul’. In Three Before Eight, the owl of Northern Soul has become the figure of Hegel’s owl of Minerva which ‘spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk’.
Three Before Eight, a philo-phonic record, was conceived by Ross Birrell and developed in association with Jonathan Dronsfield (University of Reading).
