My interview with Rod Ellmore talked about how the close partnership between photographers and vendors in the ’70s and ’80s helped build some great careers, but it wasn’t all positive.

One disadvantage was that marketing gimmicks picked up at seminars organised by the vendors propagated like viruses! Like this one – the notorious “couple in the brandy glass”.

Pam brought us a picture (left) from her brother Martin’s 80s wedding to Simone (thanks for sharing!). And I found proof that tacky ideas live on in Photoshop.

Now you know I’m a snob – but not as much as I used to be:

• There’s nothing wrong with tack, just unoriginal tack (yes, I loved The Wedding Singer)
• Unfortunately, tackiness hides real quality, at least from people like me.

For example in the seventies I was listening to Neil Young, The Band, Dylan, Van Morrison, Joni Mitchell et al. Also Linda Ronstadt (but only because she sang Warren Zevon songs). Never Abba! It took Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Muriel’s Wedding and now Mamma Mia to prove their songs have great bones. And when you go back and look they actually played it pretty straight, at least in this clip. They just didn’t look like my heroes:

It’s easy to laugh at older bad taste, but the newer stuff isn’t as easy to spot.

Cheers, Ian

People who like this post would also like: