Peter Stevens continues his account of the Rock + Roll library and some time with Mick , part one appeared here on Tuesday.

Turn left just inside the door and you’ll find the treasured Grundig ‘music centre’ which belonged to Mick’s father, replete with an Elvis LP cued up on the turntable and a rack of 45’s including The Shadows. This is a wonderful contrast to the now ubiquitous iPod, which would be considered today’s miniscule-by-comparison music centre. In the next alcove an early Akai sampler rubs shoulders with a couple of old Watkins Copycat tape loop echo machines; separated in time by nearly two decades, but both now obsolete.

An original film poster for ‘Zulu’, one of Mick’s all-time favourites is displayed next to a large Union Jack Clash flag, with its lithograph of their [in]famous photograph from Belfast in 1977. Below a travel trunk displays one of Mick’s military style sleeveless stage shirts. The trunk and shirt wouldn’t have looked out of place at Rorke’s Drift. Mick Jones as Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead VC perhaps ?

Whilst setting up some of these photographs, using a tripod to deliberately slow down my own composition, Mick wandered to and fro behind me carrying more valuable memorabilia. Early Clash flyers and gig posters, framed and ready to hang. These were the originals, not cheap mass-produced e-Bay auction items.

I was immediately drawn to three small figurines on one of the shelves. They were very carefully placed and were of Paul Simonon, Joe Strummer and Mick Jones as they appeared in Kate Simon’s iconic first album cover shot on the barrel ramp outside Rehearsal Rehearsals. Mick was given them by Japanese artist/sculptor Nob. Every tiny detail is reproduced. ‘Mick’ was the only one which was painted and this lent a very ethereal, ghostlike look to the silvery figures of both Joe and Paul. He moved ‘Joe’ just slightly, with great care, as I was setting up my photograph.

Walking round with Mick, there are some very amusing juxtapositions and nothing is haphazard or random, although some reviewers from the earlier Chelsea Space exhibition mistakenly believed this to be true and dismissed it as “…an organised mess.”

The more time I spent creating my own compositions through the camera the more it made sense. One room is devoted entirely to magazines….editions of Rolling Stone, Zig Zag, Creem and Sounds adorn the walls. One wall is virtually devoted to Fabulous magazines from the 1960s. Next door is the Rock’n’Roll Public Library cinema. How about a couple of beanbags though Mick ? Another room, devoted to video, has a black leather chair reminiscent of ‘Mastermind’. I could imagine Mick sitting down in front of Magnus Magnusson to answer questions on ‘Zulu’, ‘Mott The Hoople’ or maybe ‘the collected writings of Lester Bangs’ as his ‘specialist chosen subject’…..

It depends on your own personal cultural reference points. Mine are so heavily tied to the music and culture defined by The Clash and that specific period of youth culture, that for me this exhibition is endlessly fascinating. Genuinely culturally eclectic, Mick has amassed so much over the years; some saved from childhood, much I guess was discovered looking through small American stores and dare I say, secondhand shops here too . I also suspect a good deal has been given by fans over the past three decades.

TO BE CONTINUED…….