We started going as a family around 5 years ago, after my wife got free tickets to the rodeo. My initial feeling was that it was going to be a little boring, but gee was I impressed. When you get there the main thing that hits you is the amazing atmosphere. It beats even the atmosphere you get at the superbowl!

We decided to ride our scooters down there, and at the time I had a vespa lx50 which was well worn but well up to the job. I am planning to go the National Finals Rodeo again this year and will probaly buy some NFR Tickets as soon as they go onsale.

If you are thinking about going to the national finals rodeo then you need to ask yourself a couple of questions:

1. Do you like horses?
2. Are you ready for some fun?

If you answer yes to any of these, then you are ready to hit the NF rodeo. The great thing about the NFR being in Las Vegas is the cheap hotels… try booking before you go to save cash.

The Vespa S is the brand new Piaggio Vespa to hit the market. My first emotion is Wow - and the next feelings I feel border on the erotic. The one thing that is noticeable to even the lay man is how small this scooter is. Compared to previous Scooters - the Vespa S is styled to look like the 50 special - which is a very good thing. In comparison with a lot of the latest Vespa incarnations the most obvious difference is the shape of the Headlight. I really like the headlight - it seems more masculine?

The Speedo this machine is very chromey - again a great thing (you can never have to much chrome!)

Ok so we know its sexy! but what about the boring stuff like price?

How about £2,650! That ain’t half bad, for such a pretty machine - I think this baby is going to be on my Christmas list.

What do you guys think? Are you going to be selling your current Vespa to get one of these?

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the famous “Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s The Sex Pistols” album, they are doing one exlusive gig at the Brixton Academy in London, UK. If you want tickets you will need to keep November the 8th free.

This will be the first appearance live since 2002 when they reunited for their “Filthy Lucre” tour which I was lucky enough to go to. London seems to have been the only option for the band which was backed up byJohn Lydon (Johnny Rotten) saying:

“Maybe it’s because we’re all Londoners, but there would be no Sex Pistols without dear old London town. See you all at Brixton with proper feelings and proper people all around. From London Bridge to The Rose And Crown, all of Britain is welcome so come on down.”

See you all at Brixton!

Mods! by Richard Barnes (1979) was another Townshend-sponsored project. It remains a great first-hand observer’s account of the rise and demise of 60s modernism - including plenty of modlike attention to detail and personal stories. The bulk of the book consists of a large number of period photographs, not just nameless faces but also pictures of several then-scenesters who went on to achieve worldwide fame. Pictures and text from Barnes’ book are responsible for much of the information presented at this site. In the same manner, Dick Hebdige and George Marshall have several tomes to their credit dealing with subcultures, with an emphasis on all things Jamaican-influenced. And no collection is complete without Kevin Pearce’s Something Beginning With O, a brilliant, concise, and sharp exploration of the world of pop music and its most relevant characters.

If you fancy buying the book you can pick it up from Amazon here: Mods!

What is your favourite book relating to the mod era?

Here is an excerpt from the Lambretta site: “Lambretta has partnered with legendary band The Who to launch a 60’s inspired clothing range that will also feature lovingly recreated items actually worn by the band at the time of the highly influential and highly stylish mod era – including the original US army fishtail parka, exactly as it appears on the Quadrophenia album cover.”

I think the success of this clothing range will be based on the quality of the product. The clothing range is released in Autumn so I will try and purchase of few items and review them when the time comes.

What do you think? Will all the kids swap their hoddies for parkas?

I greatily appreciate any comments.

Turning commodities into art is but one of the linking concepts between the pop-art movement of the early 60s and modernism. On the U.S. side of the Atlantic, Roy Lichtenstein’s Ben-Day paintings, largely based on pop-culture and comic book themes (and thus frequently also following an action-based paradigm), have arguably become the most famous remnants of the pop-art. His work (and/or derivatives based on his style and themes) have been used quite frequently in the context of mod projects. The explosive rise of comic book output during the so-called Silver Age of the early 60s further accentuates the time-branding effect of his material.

Perhaps there does not exist a direct relationship between Jasper Johns’ target and flag paintings in the 1950s and 60s USA and the mod fixation on these same items (after translation through a UK filter via the RAF and the Union Jack motifs). However, it is difficult to believe that the subversive nature of using national symbols in these new contexts was not a driving force behind both of these tendencies.

In particular, there are a number of stylistic elements associated with the art (and, by double association, manufactured items and pop-art) of the early 60s that are as important to establishing a “visual modernist look” as any piece of clothing or song you care to choose. Specifically there were during this time very specific recurring themes in several visually-related fields, such as typography, composition, and painting.

The same forces that made artistic output largely focus on simple abstract, geometric and figurative directions was a reflection of societal tendencies that generated and affected modernism in many ways. With an enhanced mobility in the population, afforded by public transportation or alternative methods (e.g. scooters), cities such as London in the early 60s were undergoing a change from the static into the kinetic. Road systems on the West End were being remade into fast-moving routes-these were captured on photographic film by the typographer/graphic designer Herbert Spencer in his Mile A Minute Typography.

Robyn Denny’s Austin Reed Mural of 1959, with its polychrome lettering and permutational style foreshadowed the Ready Steady Go! set decorations of two years later. Optical, aggressive art such as Bridget Riley’s interference patterns caused visual stimulation and the impression of motion by means of abstract colour and form.

It has historically been a bad decision to look to or rely on bands for mod inspiration; in the history of music there have only literally been a handful of people who were both true modernists as well as successful musicians (e.g. Weller up until the solo period). Most have fallen into categories such as “I hated it but I wanted to be popular” (e.g. Daltrey, Entwistle), “I went along with it ’cause my mate was into it” (e.g. Foxton), “I was a mod at one point but gave it up after I became successful” (e.g. Marriott, Townshend), “I’ll be moddish for a while but not too seriously” (e.g. Blur), “I have no sense of style but let me try to fake some by posing with a scooter and hanging out with Weller” (e.g. Oasis). Overall it could conceivably be argued that music has, when linked to modernism, done more harm than good due to its mass appeal and commercial underpinnings; however it is also true that, usually before commercial success or popularity sets in, some truly timeless, honest, and high-quality work does get produced. Like all memorable relationships, mod and music quite often don’t get along and let each other down massively, but when they work together the whole thing really does click like nothing else.

In the beginning, the kaleidoscopic world of modern jazz gave them hard bop, West Coast cool, subterranean hip, shades, smoke, drugs, and madness. From jazz, it was a small step to the blues. From the blues, it was a natural progression to soul and R&B, the quintessential mod music. Exploring other new directions, prospectors picked up on records from Jamaica, and danced to bluebeat and ska freshly imported to the best mod clubs. As the movement went overground towards the mid-60s, bands whose members had been mods themselves began to appear, providing a new classic English blend of pop, soul, and blues. In the 70s the revivals took a lot of their inspiration from the British R&B/pop sounds of the early/mid-60s, but also changed the mix to include large doses of punky energy and attitude; in a similar expansion, the original ska sounds of the 60s were given a more British feel as well as an increased tempo.

During the 80s there were brief flickerings of pseudomod scenes, most notably in the United States, largely as a delayed reaction to the British revivals. The late 1980s and early 1990s saw the coming of age of a new generation of British artists who had been strongly influenced not by the original classic mod sounds but via secondhand exposure through the new wave of the late 1970s. In the USA, on the other hand, the more traditional Britpop was complemented by a rising popularity in native 60s US-sounds such as surf and garage. These generally less conservative trends were balanced out by many purists who, going in the opposite direction, looked for inspiration to sounds much closer to the jazzy grooves of the original modernists.