Known as the Bard of Hackney, Frank Bangay has been performing poetry and song for over 40 years on the London poetry scene. He writes about his two passions: music and gardening for various publications including The Big Untidy.

'SPLITTING IN TWO: Mad Pride and Punk Rock Oblivion' by Robert Dellar

21 August 2014

Blog

In this book Robert Dellar traces his life journey from his childhood in a working class area of Watford, through Sussex University and the London squatting community, to what he calls the ‘murky waters of mental health’. Of special importance is the pioneering work Robert did in Hackney Hospital, setting up a patients’ council and advocacy department. At the time of the hospital’s closure in the mid-90s, Robert organised some lively gigs, which he describes here in...

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Kevin Coyne's Case History album includes several songs about the mental health system

18 October 2013

Blog

Kevin Coyne’s first solo album, Case History, was recorded in 1972, shortly after Nobody Dies In Dreamland. Last year, it was re-released by Turpentine Records.   Shortly after its release its label, John Peel’s Dandelion, folded and Case History became very hard to find. I only heard the record in the early 1980s, when it was issued as a box set with the two Siren albums. The label that issued the records in the early 1980s was called Butt records whose logo was an ashtray...

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