Tuesday 11 November 2008

The Story of "The Rise Of Irish Sea Power"

















A few months ago (june - july ish), a friend of mine informed me of a competition that was "on." One of my (and my close friends) favourite bands, British Sea Power, had started a competition that required fans to design and produce a flag (or decorate a tent, but fuck that). I said i would give it a bash if he got the material for me, thinking nothing really of it...I had never entered a competition like that before.

So i got the material and set off, taking inspiration from their first album entitled "The Decline of British Sea Power" (see picture). I came up with the idea to make an "Irish Sea Power" flag. Please note the stereotypical irish symbols in comparison to the leaves that they have on the album cover...can you guess all my symbols?

After the sketching and planning, I did it in a day...having taped the material crudely to the wall in our living room and getting paint all over the show. All the typography on it was hand drawn and painted by moi and it was a nightmare to get the spacing and scale right.

My friends and I took it to Latitude festival, where they and other bands that I admire were playing. We got a shout out from the band as they were playing on stage...."that flag is fucking amazing, at least a 9 out of 10." That was good for the soul and made me feel better about putting the hours into making it...just for your information it was duck tape and bamboo poles that held it up. I was very paranoid about it getting damaged by the rain too, what a loser!

A few weeks later and i got a text from a friend saying that the band had been talking about the flag and wondered why we hadnt entered it, it was a day before the closing of the competition! So after shitting my kacks and realising we forgot to enter it, I promtly entered the flag (some photos of it) into the competition.

Now we find out where this story is goin...about a week later I got an email from the bands label (Rough Trade) and they told me I had won first place! Wahey! So i picked my prize - (miscellaneous British Sea Power goodies).

Im getting the prize soon i believe and I will probably post stupid pictures of myself with the prizes.

In september the band embarked on their ireland and uk tour, and my friend is a massive fan, he went on about 10 dates of the tour and then stayed with me in carlisle for a bit (he's nothing better to do). He of course, brought the flag along the way and it got in many photos and he even got in mojo magazine!

But tragedy struck in the Glasgow leg of the tour. During the gig, a group of people ( i think a group) stole the flag from my friend...and since then its been nowhere to be seen. There is talk of another flag but i'm not sure.

If you dont already know them you should check out British Sea Power, they have fantastic artwork and theyre songs are about fantastic stuff too...il not go into too much detail, just check them out (theyre from Kendal originally!)

This was a lengthy post and im really sorry, but its because ive wanted to share this info for a while and its just kinda built up. Ta x

Please watch these if you have the time...the second one is my friend crowd surfing with noble from British Sea Power and our flag on stage at "end of the road festival"!







3 comments:

Victor said...

That is awesome mate, congratulations on winning!

Andrew.Lang said...

that sucks on the flag getting stolen but i'm sure your mate said it was the show after Glasgow not Glasgow where it was nicked. But if it was nicked in glasgow what you expect...

FIA said...

OMG! That's awesome. How are you anyway? Miss you all geeks in Carlisle. I will visit in the spring I think :)