ON THE STREET GUIDE - 1989

I've already raided this magazine for its content on quite a few previous posts, and so this is me just getting round to putting the front cover up on view now.

From 1989 - it's "On The Street" - a local what's-on guide given away free.

Jock Ferguson was the main contributor at the time, with some assistance from P.Ireland, D.Ireland & Paul Clementsmith, the publication being designed and produced by The Graphix Studio in West Port.

It was stuffed with theatre reviews, gig reviews, cinema listings, humour, events, the usual kind of thing you'd expect in a local entertainments mag - and of course, lots of adverts.

Many thanx to Jock.

VIEW DOWN LOGIE STREET

I don't have the exact year this scene was captured but this is what the view down Logie Street was like around the late 60s-early 70s, a lot of which has since disappeared.

The car in shot is a Ford Escort which were introduced in 1968 so the picture wouldn't be any earlier than that.

The Astoria Theatre can be seen in the middle of the photo but it's difficult to make out if it is still open for business or closed down. According to the Tele supplement I posted up 2 days ago, the Astoria shut its doors in 1971.

Ach well, at least the Logie Bar is still in the same spot today, so that's something that hasn't changed!

Photo from Gordon C.

THE PLAZA - HILLTOWN - 80'S

The Plaza up the Hilltown was not a picture house I went to very often, once or twice in the late 60's/early 70's and that was about it.

In fact it had a rather patchy life after that, with it closing down in 1972, reopening in 1975 for around a year or so and closing down again - then like a lot of cinema buildings it changed over to being a bingo hall in the 80's before eventually closing for good in the 90's, leading ultimately to it's demolition.

This shot of the Plaza building was taken sometime in the 80's.

Photo by The Bear.

DUNDEE CINEMAS FEATURE - 1989

This page here is from a Tele dated May 1989 and is a feature about the history of Dundee's cinemas.

It coincided with the 10th Anniversary of the Steps Film Theatre who put on an exhibition to mark the occasion.

There are over 40 cinemas listed in the index panel, complete with addresses and dates, and there are also plenty of facts & figures in the main feature itself, some of which are quite amusing.

You don't need to be a serious film buff to enjoy the article, so if you fancy a wee read I've scanned it in large sized.

Just give it a click to bring it up.

JIM WILKIE - LONG GONE - 1979

I put a piece about Jim Wilkie up on Retro in June 2009 along with a sample track from his album, which was an upbeat dancey pop song, and I said I would put up another of his songs later which was more downtempo, as a contrast. Well now is the moment.
This number from 1979 called "Long Gone" is a nostalgic song, referring to places from his childhood which have disappeared, such as the Broadway Picture House in Arthurstone Terrace, corner shop grocers and St Andrews train station. He's also not too happy with what came after them!
Some of you slightly older ones may recognise the intro...the Saturday Morning Club tune which was sung by kids in cinema's.

ROCKY HORROR PICTURE SHOW - 1988

This ad for The Rocky Horror Picture Show was in Dundee's Street Life mag.
The late showings took place at the Cannon in the Seagate in November 1988.
There was a large turnout for this charity event, and as well as the main feature film, there was live cabaret on stage. The added attraction was the appearance of the shows creator, the entertaining and all-round good guy, Richard O'Brien.
Somewhere in the crowd there would have been the winning ticket holders of the Street Life competition too!
And a good time was had by all.
Click image to enlarge.

FILMS ON SCREEN - APRIL 1970

This instantly recognisable layout comes from the what's on section in the Courier. The one here dating from April 1970.
The choice of Dundee cinemas to pick from are - ABC - GAUMONT - ODEON - PLAZA - RITZ - ROYALTY - TIVOLI - VICTORIA and the REGAL in the Ferry.
Quite funny to see that all the films have family rated U & A certificates, except for the Tiv, who typically is showing X's..!!
Despite the Royalty being located at my end of town, I don't think I was ever at this picture house. No memory of that one at all.
Click image to enlarge.

FILMS ON SCREEN - OCTOBER 1988

Not so many cinemas in town by the time we reach the late 80's, but here's what films were on offer in October 1988, published in Dundee's what's on guide, Street Life.
If I only had to pick one movie, I think I'd opt for "A Fish Called Wanda".
Picture houses mentioned are - STEPS - CANNON 1 & 2 - VICTORIA.
Click image to read large version.

AT THE MOVIES IN 1981

From the pages of Cranked Up comes this round-up of 1981's best movies, written by their critic, Fabian Bell.
I remember going to quite a few of the ones mentioned, but for some reason I never went to see the winner, Raging Bull.
One of the films I noticed in the write-up but not in the top 10 was "Clash Of The Titans". I just thought I'd remind you that this featured the brilliant stop-motion animation of Ray Harryhausen. This actually turned out to be his final piece of work, and although this type of film was a bit played out by the 80's, RH's contribution in the Titans was still pretty amazing.
Click image to enlarge.

GAUMONT QUEUE - 1973

The film causing all the commotion at the Gaumont was "Snow White & The Seven Dwarfs".

These pictures were taken on the 5th April 1973, so the movie would have been on it's umpteenth re-release by then.

I too saw this classic animation at the Gaumont, but that was in the mid 60's. For some reason, I always remember Dopey's drum solo sequence!

I also have a hazy memory of singing a rude version of "Hi Ho Hi Ho" in the school playground, but can't recall how it went now. Probably just as well!

If you want to have a closer look at the faces in the crowd to see if ye ken anybody, just click onto the images to enlarge.

Photos by DC Thomson.

STEPS FILMS - APRIL 1989

A little glimpse at what was showing at the Steps in April 1989.

Not much in the way of family films, but looking through the list it reminded me that I bought the COLORS soundtrack on vinyl back then. I had a look to see if I still had the album in my collection and I do, so I plucked it out to get a reminder of the content. If there are any old b-boys & fly-girls out there, then here's the tracklist lowdown...

ICE T "Colors" - DECADENT DUB TEAM "Six Guns" - SALT 'N' PEPA "Let The Rhythm Run" - BIG DADDY KANE "Raw" - ERIC B & RAKIM "Paid In Full" - KOOL G RAP "Butcher Shop" - 7A3 "Mad Mad World" - ROXANNE SHANTE "Go On Girl" - MC SHAN "A Mind Is a Terrible Thing To Waste" - RICK JAMES "Everywhere I Go".

Some classic old school hip hop in there... and this was around the time the word "Yo" started to infiltrate our language.

Yo...I'm outta here!!

THE VIC - VICTORIA ROAD

Call it the Victoria, Vicky, Vic or flea-pit, but as picture house's go, it was quite low down in the pecking order of cinema's to visit.

It couldn't really compete with the blockbusters the ABC and Odeon screened regularly and so would often show movies that were on their 2nd or 3rd outing. Having said that, I did go there quite a lot in the 60's & 70's.

I have 2 not so good memories of the Vic...

Once, on a visit as a schoolkid in the 60's, me & my wee brother came back from a show with our heads covered in lice! Yep, the flea-pit tag struck with a vengeance that day. We had to use "special shampoo" and a nit comb for a few days afterwards!!

The other Vic nightmare was in the early 80's, when during a film, a huge chunk of plaster came crashing down off the ceiling. Luckily it landed around an empty area of seats beside the aisle rather than on someones noggin, but I clearly remember saying after the show - "That's the last time I'll be in this place" - and indeed it was.

Amazingly though, the Vic was the 2nd longest running cinema in Scotland, so I can only assume it's heyday was pre 60's.

The place was closed/condemned at the end of the 80's.

THE TIVOLI - BONNYBANK ROAD

This ad for the Tivoli dates from the late 60's.
It was a place I never went to, so don't know much about it other than the thing everyone knows, it was the place to go see X-rated blue movies!
In fact I didn't even realise it was licensed until I saw this ad. If I had known you could get a pint, I may have visited it out of curiosity!
Below is a very short clip of film, also from the late 60's, showing the Tivoli's position in Bonnybank Road.
The cinema closed down around the mid/late 70's, and lay empty for a while before it changed into a snooker hall.

DEUCHAR'S HORROR STORY - 1964

 

Billy MacKenzie mentioned there was a plan at one stage for him to star in a horror movie.

It didn't happen though, but local trumpeter Jimmy Deuchar did manage to appear in one many years before.
In 1964, there was a UK film called "Dr Terror's House Of Horrors".
Although it was a bit of a low budget romp, they managed to get Peter Cushing & Christopher Lee to star in it.
Doug McClure, Roy Castle and DJ Alan Freeman were also onboard.
As part of the movie soundtrack, they got Tubby Hayes to supply a couple of tracks, and Jimmy was in the Tubby Hayes Quintet at the time.
The Quintet had an acting role, as they were the band for a character called Biff Bailey, a trumpeter, but the music is by Tubby's Quintet and Jimmy does appear in the film as a consequence.
Incidentally, in the film, Jimmy plays an instrument called a Mellophonium, which is a big fancy trumpet.

STAR WARS QUEUE - 1978

Bet most of you remember this...queuing to see Star Wars. This photo was taken in February 1978 on the day it burst onto screen at the Odeon for the first time. It was on a Sunday that it made it's debut in Dundee, and the queue having began at 9:00am, ended up along the length of Cowgate and all the way down to the bottom of St Andrew's Street, as in the photo. Not only that but the doors didn't open until 4:00pm and because of the size of the crowd the Odeon had to bring in an extra cashier to help out.
I remember going to see it a few days later, and although I enjoyed it I'll never forget my mates comment as we were leaving the building with everyone raving about it. Looking rather bemused, he quipped "It was a bit far fetched!".
If you think you may be in with a shout of spotting yourself in the picture - click on the image to view the large version.
Photo by DC Thomson.Tints by GG.

GENESIS IN DUNDEE - 1977 & 1980

2 tickets - same band - same place - different dates.
Starting with the 13th January 1977 gig...
When the tickets went on sale for this show around November '76, a photo of the queue at the Caird Hall made it into the local papers. Fans started to form the queue around 9.00pm the night before, and the image of them with their sleeping bags, flasks and good humour was used along with the story of this rare sight.
The concert sold out within a couple of hours next morning.
This was the Genesis "Wind & Wuthering" tour, and like most prog rock bands in the 70's, the light show became part of the act, so there were plenty of lasers, strobes, dry ice and so on.
The photos were taken at this '77 gig, right from the front of the stage.
There is a recording of this show doing the rounds too....unofficially like!
The movie ad under the photos dates back to March that year and is from an old Evening Telegraph I have. This was another time I saw Genesis in Dundee in 1977, as the ABC were showing a double film feature on this occasion - "White Rock", which had a soundtrack by Rick Wakeman, and to accompany it, "Genesis In Concert".
I had to be alert to catch it mind you, as it was on for only one day!
On 24th April 1980, 29 years ago today, the band were here again, this time on their "Duke" tour and introduced 2 new band members, Daryl Stuermer who replaced Steve Hackett on guitar, and Roland....the drum machine! The new Genesis sound by this time was more lightweight as they ditched the idea of the 10 minute track in favour of the 3 minute pop-rock tune. As a result, they featured in the singles charts rather a lot in the 80's. On stage though, they still managed to squeeze in the occasional old classic from their back catalogue.
I remember Phil Collins name-dropped "Keiller's" during the intro to one of their songs! 

Photos by Alan Weston

THE STEPS THEATRE - 1979

This is the same top of the Wellgate Steps area in the previous photo only in it's brand new transformation into the Wellgate Centre, Library and Steps Theatre. The image taken in 1979.

I used to go to the Steps Theatre quite a lot in the late 70's/early 80's for it's cinema. They used to show quite a lot of obscure French films, art house movies and underground stuff in general. The most commercial they got would probably be Woody Allen pictures.

Mind you, as a consequence of putting on such arty stuff the place would be pretty empty a lot of the time. All you'd see was rows and rows of bright green seats and hardly any audience! In fact the only one time I remember it being packed to capacity was when they showed a 2 hour Loony Tunes cartoon extravaganza. Bugs, Daffy, Droopy and the rest of them. Now that WAS entertaining!

The graphic is their well known ident which they used in their adverts. 

THE ODEON - COWGATE





This spot in Cowgate is where the Gaumont used to be, prior to it becoming the Odeon in the mid 70's.

Not much of a change to the interior of the cinema I recall but there was a bit of superficial tweaking to the outside with the addition of tiles to the entrance area.

The above photos were taken in September 1978 and the film was "Revenge of the Pink Panther", a movie I remember seeing at the time.

It looks as if the policeman is giving directions to Inspector Clouseau!

The Odeon closed down in 1981 then the building re-opened in 1983 as a bingo hall.

Photos by DC Thomson.

THE GAUMONT - COWGATE

One of the things I liked about going to the Gaumont was the bus stopped right outside the foyer. You can see the bus stop in the picture...dead handy when it rained.
I'm sure this was the cinema we used to go to in the 1960's on Saturday mornings for the kids club. They would show movies made by the Childrens Film Foundation, run weekly episodes of Flash Gordon, chuck in some cartoons and so on. It did get a bit rowdy at times, probably because there were no parents around, so there would be a lot of booing at the baddies, cheering at the goodies and singing along to the tunes....oh yeah, not forgetting the peanut fights!
Typical 60's films I saw there were The Beatles movies, James Bond, Disney and such like, then in the 70's it was blockbusters such as Star Wars.
The Gaumont then became the Odeon in 1974.
Photo by DC Thomson. Tints by GG

THE ODEON - STRATHMARTINE ROAD

The Odeon was a picture house I used to go to occasionally rather than regularly. Main reason being it was at the other end of town to where I lived and it needed 2 buses to reach it. It was probably the plushiest of Dundee's cinemas though, from what I can remember of the 1960s/70s period.
A part of the build up to the main movie features were of course the Pearl & Dean adverts on screen, and here below are a couple of original P&D ads from the late 60s/early 70s era to transport you back in time!