INTRODUCTION
Books
Like my interest in music and films, I had an eclectic interest in books which became more apparent when I studied A Level English Literature. It exposed me to poets like Sylvia Plath and the writings of Shakespeare. Books like The Bell Jar, Wuthering Heights and The Tempest, with their accompanying York Notes, sat alongside books like The Godfather, The Autobiography of Malcolm X, The Exorcist and the Fighting Fantasy books on my bookshelf.
Cassettes
The first time I listened to the radio was when I put on Mercia Sound Radio one evening in the early 1980s. I enjoyed the calm radio voice and songs from artists like Luther Vandross and the Bee Gees. I began recording songs off the radio onto cassettes, including songs from the Top 40 singles charts, for nearly ten years.
This is a small selection of those cassette recordings.
I used to carry round a Head sports bag with my cassette player inside turning it into a transportable boombox. I played the loudest Hip Hop music for everyone to enjoy, or that was my thinking! I would also listen to music privately on my Sony Walkman. It was, however, the Panasonic SG-J500 an ‘all in one’ record, radio and cassette boombox that played the soundtrack to my teenage years.
VHS Tapes
In the early 1980s, our father would rent Indian and Pakistani films from Raja Videos in Hillfields. By 1984 I started renting English films from a video shop on Far Gosford Street. These would be horror and action films, many on the ‘video nasty’ list, from a member of staff who didn’t care that I was not 18 years old as long as I had money to rent the film. By the late 1980s, I had begun buying my own VHS cassettes and this is a selection of them from that era. Our father bought a Ferguson Videostar Toploader VHS player and recorder in the early 1980s. I always had a VHS tape ready to record South Asian people on the TV. In 1982, Channel 4 launched, and with it came a diverse range of programmes with nuanced representations of South Asian stories. This included a chat show called Eastern Eye. I remember one episode of Eastern Eye featured a bemused Bollywood acting legend Amjad Khan watching a breakdancing competition taking place in the studio.
Adidas Trainers
Hip Hop was not just about the music but also about what you wore. Brands like Kappa, Diadora, Lacoste, Fila, Sergio Tacchini and Adidas were popular amongst me and my friends. Adidas LA Trainers were released in celebration of the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 1984 and were great for body popping and breakdancing.
Sergio Tacchini Top
Sergio Tacchini was a must-have brand, and this top was perfect for breakdancers who needed the right material for back-spins.
Handheld Games Console
Galaxy Invader 1000 Galaxy Invader 1000 was the first handheld games console I owned, and the gameplay was similar to Space Invaders. The design of the console as a spaceship with a yellow cover and flashing lights in the middle also made this super cool.
Tandy TV Scoreboard Video Game Console
Before the ZX Spectrum or Commodore 64 there were TV game consoles. These were connected to the TV to play sports, space and action games. This is a Tandy TV Scoreboard Video Game Console bought in the early 1980s.
Movies and Music
This is a selection of badges, magazines, leaflets, postcards and tickets reflecting my interest in popular culture. Concerts included Michael Jackson, Prince, Madonna, NWA/Eazy-E, Run-DMC, Beastie Boys and De La Soul.
There is also a leaflet of my first major DJ gig at the Moseley Dance Centre in Birmingham in the late 1980s.
Magazines and Comics
I began buying DC and Marvel comics in the late 1970s from a local newsagent on the way to Gosford Park Primary School.
By the 1980s, I started collecting British comics like Scream! and 2000 AD. I also read my sisters’ Look-in, Smash Hits and No.1 magazines.
By the late 1980s I was collecting Sky Magazine, Film Review, Record Mirror, Mixmag, Fangoria as well as Hip Hop Connection, NME and Melody Maker.
Due to my love of theatre acting, I was a member of the Belgrade Youth Theatre and I was collecting The Stage and Television Today newspaper. These and a rare copy of the UK Bhangra newspaper Ghazal & Beat are displayed in this case.
