Holly Johnson: Can't take Liverpool out of the boy

Oct 10 2008 By Liverpool Daily Post

HOLLY Johnson is back where he belongs. Best known as the flamboyant frontman of Eighties enfant terribles of pop Frankie Goes to Hollywood, he has forged a successful second career as an artist and some of his work can now be seen as part of the Fellow Travellers exhibition, showing at the Novas centre as part of the Independents Biennial.

Their work is on show alongside a group of exhibitions put together in partnership with Homotopia and the Scandinavian festival NICE08, including work by Tom of Finland – a clear influence on the Frankie days – and Sadie Lee’s And He Was a She, portraits of the transsexual performer and friend of Warhol Holly Woodlawn.

That the two Hollys have come together in the same space is a coincidence, but the name is not.

"When I was about 14 I saw Andy Warhol’s Trash (in which Woodlawn starred) in a cinema on London Road," Johnson says.

"It was a bit of a flasher mac men’s cinema so I don’t know how I got in at age 14. But I think I went on about it a bit too much, and people started calling me Holly!"

He has been associated with Fellow Travellers, a collective of gay artists, for a several years after working with curator James Lawler on other projects.

Although Johnson has not lived in Liverpool for 25 years, the three works on show reflect his roots strongly.

There is a cute etching of two blue and red Liver Birds using watercolour and gold leaf; a painting called The Embrace of Two Egyptian Manicurists, based on real mummies who were found in a tomb in Egypt rubbing noses together; and two portraits that really showed the artist what he had been missing at home.

He explains: "The two smaller paintings are two of the drag club performers I had met in Liverpool on my last visit up to see the John Moores exhibition in 2006, called Cherry Lane and Courtesan.

"They reminded me so much of the flamboyant generation I was part of when I went to Eric’s.

"I saw the first Biennial in 1999 and I found visiting Liverpool just so inspiring. I thought John Moores’ idea was a great one, such a great thing for local artists and artists have moved back to Liverpool to be near that energy."

Eric’s comes into the conversation apropos of nothing, but due to the success of Mark Davies Markham’s new musical play of the same name – on until tomorrow at the Everyman – it has been hard to escape reference to the influential, dingy 1970s basement club where a great deal of the city’s lasting talents of the era first came to public attention – Johnson, Ian McCulloch and Julian Cope among them.

Johnson recently saw the show, in which a character is based on his younger self as a member of Big in Japan.

"There was an aspect of it that was like an LSD flashback," he said.

"Seeing all those characters that were so recognisable like Pete Burns and Pete Wylie, the audience loved it and it seemed to hold a real resonance.

"Eric’s was the first sort of accessible music venue where you could form a band.

"It was nice to hear some of those songs that you don’t really hear on the radio, particularly Rescue and The Cutter (by Echo and the Bunnymen) – they’re still good songs, like cult classics of pop."

Speaking of which, it is not as if Johnson has not been responsible for some of his own pop classics in his time.

In fact, this month marks the 25th anniversary of the release of Relax, one of the biggest selling, and most controversial, singles ever.

"It was a bit of a phenomenon," he says.

"But it took its time and hung around the lower echelons of the charts, and wasn’t a hit until January 1984, then there was the ban.

"What does it mean to me? It means I’m old! Crikey.

"That was such a long time ago, but it seems to have gone past in the blink of an eye.

"Who would have thought it would live that long – it’s amazing people still remember it at all.

"Fortunately, it still sounds good, and modern, which is the most surprising thing.

"It was the first single release of the band and it went to number one, so of course it’s important.

"It introduced the band to a global audience and eventually became a hit in the US and sold millions and millions of copies.

"It also started a trend of multiple remixes – before Relax and Two Tribes you’d get perhaps one on a 12", but with Frankie Goes to Hollywood there were several different versions. Now it’s commonplace, but in those days it just didn’t happen.

"It was another universe in terms of the music industry – singles are loss leaders now, they’re just an advert for a forthcoming tour. It’s a whole different world."

Johnson was in town last week filming Newsnight Review. When asked what draws him back up to Merseyside, he says fondly: "Well, you can take the boy out of Liverpool but you can’t take Liverpool out of the boy, can you?

"It’s a big influence on me, I’ve still got family there.

"The Liver Bird etching was done more to commemorate the 800th anniversary last year, because somehow that was more important than being European Capital of Culture, in a sense.

"Capital of Culture is something that is bestowed upon a city from the outside, where the 800th anniversary is something – well, it’s a mark of survival."

Fellow Travellers is on at Novas Contemporary Urban Centre on Greenland Street until November 30.