1980s Archives - Brockley SE4

Featured local business - Clubtek

Forest

SE23

Hill

I was already a regular visitor to Clubtek’s DJ shop when it was in Penge, but now they're even handier in Stanstead Road, just a few doors down from Shannon’s Garden Centre - another old favourite. It’s by no means just for DJs and bands...

Stealing Good Times from Bad – 80s casual fashions in Tower Bridge Road

Feb

2025

In the Face magazine, July 1984, Robert Elms wrote an article 'Good Times'. A follow up to his 1982 article 'Hard Times', it highlighted a shift in street fashion away from dressing down to dressing up and focused on shops in the Bermondsey/Tower Bridge Road in particular. Here's a few extracts:'Down the Old Kent Road ...

Music Monday: Peckham Blancmange

Feb

2025

Synth duo Blancmange had a string of early 1980s hits, starting with Living on the Ceiling in 1982. Singer Neil Arthur hailed from Lancashire but at the peak of their success he was living in 'London SE15 in a huge Georgian house. It's not mine I share it with four other people'. (don't know where ...

Women in Revolt at Tate Britain

Apr

2024

'Women in Revolt! Art and Activism in the UK 1970-1990' at Tate Britain features a huge amount of archive material from different 1970s/80s feminist currents alongside the art works which taken together give a strong sense of the visual culture and politics of the period. Lots of South London content included, here's a few I spotted:'Shrew ...

Women’s Day for Disarmament 1983

Jul

2021

'Women's Day for Disarmament' took place on May 24 1983, with hundreds of events across Britain. This was the period of the Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp against cruise missiles and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament was at its height.In South London events included a temporary peace camp on Clapham Common near to the South ...

Elvis Costello at Deptford Albany with Squeeze

Feb

2018

In August 1980, Jools Holland played his last gig as keyboardist with Squeeze at The Albany in Deptford. In fact they played three nights at the venue (12,13,14 August), a deliberate return to their roots at a time when they were riding high commercially and selling out much bigger venues than this one, which Danny Baker ...

SE London Women Against Rape – Lewisham demo, 1980

Aug

2017

I found this browsing at the interesting digital archive of feminist magazine, Spare Rib. The July 1980 issues records a 300 strong march through Lewisham on May 10 1980, called by South East London Women Against Rape - a group set up 'by Lewisham women after some of them had become involved in helping a ...

The Anarchist Festival in Lewisham Odeon that never was – 1986

Oct

2016

Lewisham Odeon opened as the Gaumont Palace cinema in 1932, and was renamed the Odeon in 1962. As mentioned here before it was the scene of many iconic gigs before it closed in 1981, being finally demolished in 1991 to make way for a road widening scheme in the town centre.In 1986, the Odeon was ...

Tony Benn, Allan Boesak & Squeeze commemorate Peasants Revolt on Blackheath 1981

Jul

2016

A picture posted as part of the ongoing argument within the Labour Party has prompted me to dig up an episode in local history - the commemoration of the 600th anniversary of the 1381 Peasants Revolt, held on Blackheath in 1981. Jolyon Green published a crowd scene on twitter with the caption 'Huge crowd in Lewisham ...

Rave at the Crypt – St Paul’s Deptford 1988-1991

Feb

2016

As mentioned here before, the crypt of St Pauls Church in Deptford was extensively used for gigs and parties in the 1980s and 1990s. From the great phatmedia rave flyer archive, here's a couple more to prompt your memories. Mary's House in November 1988 promised '100% pure house sounds' with 'DJ Merran and Graham Meacham'Insanity Promotions' ...

Music Monday: Anarcho punk 1984 in New Cross & Old Kent Road

Jan

2016

'Not Just Bits of Paper', edited by Tony Bull and Mickey Penguin is 'A series of recollections, memories, imagined dreams perhaps from the collective memories of those who lived through the punk and anarcho-punk years' of the 1980s (available from Situation Books). It includes lots of flyers and other 'ephemera' and I noticed these two ...