In 2018, freelance model-maker and animator Jim Parkyn recalled his experiences as Aardman Animations’ roving ambassador, which included sculpting characters for Wallace & Gromit, Shaun The Sheep and different productions – with a lot of the work achieved because the workforce listened to prog.
“My first proggy document got here from junior faculty. Moderately than studying a guide, we got Jeff Wayne’s The Battle Of The Worlds on vinyl. It launched me to this sort of musical panorama – and likewise this unbelievable paintings. It received me into studying sci-fi and I grew to become a Star Battles and Physician Who child.
That document adopted me round! There’s a gaggle of men I work with on many of the movies and The Battle Of The Worlds is a soundtrack to the model-making at Aardman. It will be performed time and again on any new format because the years glided by.
One other formative childhood factor is seeing Labyrinth, aged about 10 or 11. It was an accessible route into David Bowie’s music, and a lifetime of inspiration from Jim Henson.
Once I’d left college and moved to Cardiff for my first job, I’d go to Bristol with my buddies for nights out – a mega-city compared. We’d go to a rock pub known as The Hatchet Inn, a Tudor constructing with a large door lined in leather-based and studs. It hosted an odd mixture of rock music downstairs and spank events upstairs. Nevertheless it was the one pub on the town that had Labyrinth on the jukebox and we’d upset the locals by bunging in a great deal of kilos to listen to it.
I’m from Warwick and spent all my childhood there. As quickly as I may get away from the vintage store and retirement properties, I assumed, “I’ll go someplace thrilling.” I hit the intense lights of college at Pontypridd as a substitute! It was one of many few locations within the nation that taught animation.
Learning movie, we watched issues like Blade Runner, and so many soundtracks could be by Tangerine Dream. Melrose is my favorite. I’m at all times drawn again to it. It’s nice to sculpt to, particularly if I’m as much as my eyeballs on deadline. It’s fairly pop for them, and calming too. The very last thing you need for those who’re meticulously sculpting one thing is to have your nerves jangled.
My love of Focus grew from becoming a member of Aardman in 2000. The place is a bizarre melting pot of individuals, late teenagers to late 50s, doing issues from theatre design to stay motion, ceramics, jewelry. As a communal factor, music will both divide a room or convey it collectively. We had a clunky previous vinyl participant and other people would herald odd data.
Felt Mountain continues my document assortment’s theme of storytelling and cinematography
Focus began off as us having a take heed to one thing from somebody’s dad’s assortment. What most individuals discovered amusing, I used to be drawn by. The yodelling was fairly distinctive however the remaining was entrancing, and behind everybody’s backs I began to research the broader world of Focus, and received into Focus 3. A pal of mine discovered they had been taking part in in The Tunnels in Bristol so we went alongside. As a stay expertise, they had been phenomenal.
Goldfrapp’s Felt Mountain got here at a darkish time in my profession. We’d simply been made redundant from a movie known as The Tortoise And The Hare – we misplaced tens of millions of kilos in a cope with DreamWorks that collapsed. On the identical day, I used to be supplied a job on the second Robbie The Reindeer movie. I went from working in an enormous manufacturing unit to being in a workforce of about six. My pal Georgie instructed me about Felt Mountain and it received performed solidly for about three weeks. It continues my document assortment’s theme of storytelling and cinematography. Alison Goldfrapp is mesmeric and her voice is gorgeous.
A few years later I used to be in a lull between tasks and I discovered myself in a Tesco Metro inspecting an advert looking for cheesemakers to run a stall. It appeared a pure development from Wallace & Gromit to cheesemaking. I labored with a One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest ensemble of actors, businessmen and this superb man, Chris, who had labored with Peter Gabriel, then went to Mexico to make music and misplaced his thoughts there. He’d arrange the studio for Goldfrapp and we’d discuss music whereas wrapping cheese.
I’ve quite a bit to thank Ken Bruce [formerly of Radio 2] for. At some point he performed Richard Harris’ MacArthur Park. It was an extremely symphonic and self-indulgent music, and I knew I had to purchase the album, A Tramp Shining. Harris is a good actor however he has this fairly fragile singing voice. The entire document is a large celebration of music, and it’s the place the Pearl & Dean theme that we used to listen to within the cinema got here from.
I’ll take heed to Tales Of Thriller And Creativeness after I’m drawing – working at night time, it’s fairly cool to scare your self a bit
I haven’t delved too deeply into the that means, however the imagery of a person having a strop about leaving his cake within the rain is good. There’s additionally puppetry, bitterness, sexism and wizardry. I drive my spouse mad with it.
A distinct world altogether is John Betjeman’s Banana Blush. Betjeman, Philip Larkin and Roger McGough had been my gateway to poetry after I was a child. This was a punt in a charity store; as quickly as I heard it, I used to be misplaced to the jauntiness of it. I at all times beloved The Wind In The Willows and it’s received that sense about it, plus there’s pantomime darkness.
My love of The Butterfly Ball began with the guide – my spouse and I each gather kids’s books and tales. However we didn’t know till two years in the past that the vinyl existed. We noticed it in a charity store, introduced it residence and we had been fairly stunned by the sound of it – it was superb, grandiose. The 70s and 80s was a good time for youngsters’s storytelling on this means.
I’ve at all times been a large Edgar Allan Poe fan. However by Ken Bruce once more, and seeing one thing on TV about prog, I discovered The Alan Parsons Challenge’s Tales Of Thriller And Creativeness. It’s not an apparent means of approaching Poe however it’s one thing I actually like. I’ll take heed to it after I’m drawing – working in my mill studio at night time, it’s fairly cool to scare your self a bit.
Anna Meredith’s Varmints is a really latest discovery by Frank Skinner’s podcasts. He’s an area hero to me – nobody that attention-grabbing normally comes from West Brom! Nautilus is his walk-up music earlier than he comes on stage. It’s a neoclassical composition of thumping brass and large bass; loopy, orchestral pomp. It hooked me instantly and I’d like to see her stay.
I listened to Bowie all the way in which from Labyrinth to Blackstar. I’ve received a love of ecclesiastical music – I joined the church after I was possibly seven and have become a choir boy. I significantly favored singing psalms, and there are various psalm-like, monk-like qualities right here. It was compelling and jogged my memory of music I’d beloved as a baby.
What’s subsequent on the stereo? A stack of low cost vinyl from the charity store – the soundtrack to the following creation.”
