The Burning Up Times - Strangled.co.uk

Burning Up Times Issue 3
He snapped The Stranglers in the 1970s and directed big budget videos for the likes of Wham,
Madness and Culture Club in the ‘80s. Gary Kent caught up with photographer Chris Gabrin in
the run-up to a recent Stranglers’ photo session…
Lights, camera, action!
Chris Gabrin’s
CV reads like
pop music’s
Who’s Who. In fact,
there aren’t many pop
artists from the 70s and
80s who escaped his
camera lens. But his
early roots date back to The Stranglers
and the Roundhouse days where he stage
managed. He also took the photos for Grip
and Peaches record sleeves.
To me, it seemed an obvious move
to get Chris involved, following a recent
sabbatical looking after his daughter, in
the Stranglers’ Roundhouse anniversary
event in November 2007. So I called
manager Sil – and last week, after a 30
year hiatus, Chris and the band were
reunited for a photo session at Islington’s
Holborn Studio. [http://www.holbornstudios.co.uk/index_2.html]
He also told
me he was looking forward to seeing the
band play on November 4.
Originally from Leicester, early years
are spent in ‘50s Argentina. In the ‘60s
at Bournemouth Art College, he gets
a vacation job working for a known
photographer.
After discovering a derelict loft space
in a run-down part of King’s Cross, Chris
invests his time and money setting up his
own studio and Hugh regularly drops in to
smoke hash and listen to music. It was in
1976 Chris fi rst meets The Stranglers.
What happened?
I needed some cash for setting up the
studio. So I started doing bits and pieces
– roadying for bands, that sort of thing. I
met John Curd, promoter who ran Straight
Music, who ran the Roundhouse, among
other London venues. I became his stage
manager at the Roundhouse. It was the
best venue – not just in London, I mean
the whole of the country. The stage was
amazing. In the week, they used to have,
not fringe theatre but, modern theatre, I
should say. So you’d get there and fi nd all
the seats and the lights were all different,
depending on what the director had
wanted. So it was a complete surprise
when you got there to set up. I just
couldn’t believe it when it closed down
– all because one little old lady complained
constantly about the noise. Of course, this
was in the days of the old GLC, run by
Ken Livingstone, Thatcher was in power.
They gave me a decibel meter to hold at
the side of the mixing desk to monitor the
sound levels. Funnily enough, the highest
peaks were when the crowd cheered or
applauded. On Sundays, we’d regularly get
1,500 people in there.
And The Stranglers played there…
Back in the old ice cream van days! I
really liked The Stranglers – so did John.
They had a really good, tight sound. You
see, a lot of bands from that early Punk
era were not at all together – they were
mostly unprofessional a lot of the time.
Not The Stranglers. I remember really
getting into Dave’s Hammond sound, as
I liked The Doors too. I liked hearing his
other keyboards too, but especially the
Hammond. I then discovered Hugh and I
shared an interest in Art House cinema.
I kept bumping into him at The Electric
in Portobello Road and The Scala, Kings
Cross. So after meeting in a working
environment, we became friends in an
artistic environment. Then I told him
about what other things I was doing – with
photography.
The ‘Grip’ photo session come about
from that?
I liked working with friends, people I
knew. In those days I probably made a
loss, most of the time. Especially when
Stiff Records took off, I did all of their
photographs because I knew Jake Riviera
and Dave Robinson; it was favours for
mates, really. So Hugh asked and I said
yes. I knew Dai, the manager through
Brinsley Schwarz as well. They came down
to the studio early 1977.
How did the session go?
I found it very easy to work with them.
Because we’d met and worked together
before at the gigs, we had a mutual trust
which there has to be in the studio. In
turn, they were relaxed with someone they
knew behind the camera.
On the back of the record, there are four
individual shots of the band. Were there
any other photographs from that session
we could see?
I’m not sure. In fact, I can’t remember if
we shot it in colour as well…
The sleeve shots are in black and white.
Yes – but in those days we sometimes did
a colour set too. Newspapers only used
black and white back then, but sometimes
a set of colour was done as well. The
record company gets the transparencies
and they chose which ones to use and
throw away the rest. I hold on to the
negatives, so I may still have those – and I
will have a look, but I can’t say how good
the resolution will be. I may still have a
contact sheet. (He’s right – see the next
page).
What camera did you use?
I had two – a Nikon 35mm and a
Hasselbad 120.
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