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By tale catcher
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The Story of Camden
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Nino Macaroni
Niall McInerney aka NinoMacaroni is an Irish photographer who has lived
in Camden since the 1960's. Things were very different then, he tells
me, especially it seems the lay-out of the place.
It's got so bad, it can't get any worse, it's got to get better. The
men down there, that whole squalor - you know. You seen 'Blade runner'?
It just reminded me of that. I come out of Camden Town Station, it's
wet and cold and dark - you know - I mean it's just terrible. But I
suppose some people like that kind of atmosphere.
When I first arrived here there were grocery shops and fish shops, two
fish shops, but the first thing to change was THE ROUNDHOUSE. They
started having events and things there.
Arthur Brown played there, I remember. He had a hit with 'Fire' and my
friend made him this sort of helmet which he wore for a show. They
strapped him up in this parachute harness and he was swung over the
barricade of The Roundhouse with his head on fire, playing the guitar
while we all shouted "Arthur Brown, Arthur Brown". Hendrix also played
there. I don't remember it really, I was probably under a cloud of
hashich. Before that though, it was just an empty shed. It was built by
Stevenson at the time they put the railways together to accommodate a
steam engine. Can you imagine, a huge steam engine? They had a gigantic
turn-table which they put the train on if they wanted it to go in
another direction.
A few years ago apparently, they got loot from various charities to
make it a Black Arts Centre, but they scarpered with the money to
Jamaica. Hundreds of thousands of pounds, all gone. So it sat there for
another six years and then became various theatres. They had a fashion
show there once.
Opposite that is MARINE ICES. Now that hasn't changed. That was there
when I arrived. There's one old guy still working in there. He
remembers me. I can't recall his name. He's a very nice black fellow
and I was up there recently and he's still there.
Then the next thing that happened was DINGWALLS. There was a kind of
warehouse with and a canal-keeper. It was industrial. And then they got
Dingwalls and put a night-club up there.
And then things started happening round there and you started having
the market.
Nowadays the High Street's been taken over by the Turkish Mafioso and
it's all drugs money and they can afford to pay huge amounts for these
shops. I don't know if it's true or not, but I was told that 90\\\% of
those shops are owned by two brothers. They all do the same things -
they all sell leather and shoes. They must make huge amounts of money
from all the people that come up over the weekend. You know on a
Saturday they close the tube. You have to get on at Mornington
Crescent.
Funnily enough, they've improved that end. GREATER LONDON HOUSE was
built like that in the 30's but in the 60's they thought it was too
much money so they pulled all the ornamental bits off and squared up
the columns. Then an architect found the plans and put it back just the
way it was. It now houses the smartest cab office in London. You know
in most cab offices there's a smelly old carpet and a broken down
settee and an old tart sitting behind the desk. Well they integrated
their office into the building and now they have a mahogany widow with
fabulous tiles around it.
There was a taxidermist round the corner which was there until quite
recently.
They made pianos up in Chalk Farm. People made things then. There were
a lot of hardware stores. You could buy anything, bits of string,
beeswax. I mean, you ask someone for beeswax now and they'll call the
police on you, think you're a nutter. Although you'd have to be a
nutter I suppose, looking for beeswax.
The ELECTRIC BALLROOM's been around for a while. For years it was a
paddy's place they went to to find a nice girl - did their digging and
went there for a night out. One night a week though, they'd have a rave
there, everyone was on acid and stuff. They'd project all these kind of
blobs on the wall. Sometimes the guys would get the days wrong and
wander into this place and they thought they'd taken the bus to planet
zog.
There's the GREEK ORTHODOX CHURCH on Camden Street, that belonged to
the Church of England but as nobody was going, they rented it out to
the Greek Orthodox Church. But they wouldn't give it back and the case
went to the House of Lords and they won it. They said, well you know,
nobody goes to the Church of England anymore, they don't use the
church, but we're packed here every Sunday so they actually won the
case.
Ted and Willy Walters
Ted and Willy Walters live in a terraced house just near the station
and gave this interview in their brilliantly decorated kitchen. A pink
flamingo hung on the wall behind them as Willy's clothes mannequins
stood proudly by the sofa. Ted is an interior designer and work
includes 'Seditionaries', Malcome McLaren and Vivian Westwood's
Pioneering shop on the King's Road. Ted wore a small knitted hat as we
all drank very large measures of vodka with a dash of tonic. Willy has
very beautiful auburn hair which combines with her red lip-stick to
give her a glamorous yet approachable look.
T: There was a Greek Communist Club
W: Oh Yeah, where the men used to play dominoes
T: Yes, the old boys played dominoes and young fifteen year old girls
used to do lascivious dancing.
W: I never remember anything so exciting.
T: But that guy Aristos married a dancer didn't he?
W: No!
T: Have I made that up?
W: Yes darling, you've completely fantasised that.
T: Lucky he got shot.
W: I can always remember this woman in the shop - she'd made a cake and
used oil, not butter to bind it and whenever anyone went in there she
offered them a slice. I asked her why it was and she said her son was
having an operation back in Cyprus and it was a good will thing - a
gift. I thought that was a really nice custom but I suppose with all
the supermarkets it doesn't happen anymore.
It used to be a hippy haven, there was that Compendium Bookshop - a
radical political bookshop but now it's corporate hippy, you go to
Sainsbury's on a Saturday night and it's like going to Fabric, it's
frightening. You can't go and buy your haemorrhoid ointment at Boots
without meeting someone significant who might seriously affect your job
prospects. But we're not going anywhere.
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