Barney Bubbles – The Adverts
A recent documentary about punk rock band ‘The Adverts’ features TV Smith, the band’s singer/songwriter talking about the sleeve that Barney Bubbles created for them in 1977 (using a photo shot by Phil Franks who sometimes comments on this blog).
TV Smith: “I had no problem with Stiff Records, even when I thought I was being done over. I could see the point of it, for example, the cover of One Chord Wonders. They put Barney Bubbles onto designing the cover, then when we got invited into Stiff to see what he’d done, well, I felt like I’d been stiffed. But, what can you say, it was a brilliant cover. They created an icon out of Gaye and they put The Adverts firmly in punk rock history. There was no question that that cover – which I would definitely not have agreed to – was a massive step forward for the band.”
Cover of The Adverts’ ‘One Chord Wonders’, by Barney Bubbles, photography Phil Franks.
Photo of Barney Bubbles from ‘The Adverts’ documentary.
Watch the whole documentary HERE, fast forward to 11.50 for the Barney Bubbles bit.
(Info provided by Barney Xpurtz R&M)
Rebecca and Mike, 
D.Cheema are discussing. 
Francesco Borseti are discussing. 
D.Cheema 3:40 pm on June 3, 2012 Permalink |
TV Smith did not go into why he had reservations about the cover – despite its brilliance and why he thinks he felt stiffed. Stiff knew what they were doing which was to sell records. I would like to see if there was any comments made at the time. They moved to another record label for their follow up – which was a minor hit.
davidwills 6:13 pm on June 23, 2012 Permalink |
I ‘spect that TV Smith thought, like me, that the cover was a rippoff of the IT newspaper logo that used a coarse half-tone of Theda Bara, the It girl, but which was the inspiration, not the source.
Rebecca and Mike 9:32 pm on June 25, 2012 Permalink |
We spoke to TV Smith a few years ago about this. TV Smith’s reservations stem from the fact that The Adverts were a band of four members (3 male, 1 female), but only one of them (Gaye Advert, the female member) was pictured on the front of the sleeve.