Celebrating the Revival with Jeanie Jean
Interview by Yeliz Zaifoglu | 18.04.24
From Goths, Punks, Emo, New Romantics and Skinheads, Jeanie Jean continues to capture a plethora of subcultures, bands and lively crowds. In the last 7 years, her Polaroid and DSLR seeked out the secretly thriving subcultures across the UK and created the riot that is Not Dead: Volume 1. We talk to her about everything from her recent photo essay to growing up as a budding Goth in Bexley.
What was your experience growing up in Kent and navigating your way through subcultures yourself as a young person?
So I grew up in Bexley but I've always been attracted to the wild hustle and bustle of London. We used to go up there a lot when we were teenagers. And even when we were kids, London has been a very huge part of my life. And yeah, attachment to it. Do I want to live in London? Absolutely not.
Music was always a big part of my family. I feel so blessed to thank my parents, my aunties and uncles, even my grandparents for just that, their different tastes in music and comedy and whatnot. But there was always just something playing in the living room. And one of the first sounds I remember hearing when I was...I must have been about three or four years old. My dad was always interested in the latest gadgets and everything and he's got this new CD Dolby surround system that was a massive thing in the early 90s. I was in the kitchen playing doing what normal toddlers do. And in the living room, I could hear this music and my first thought was why is there a train in the house? Then there's my dad doing these jerky like movements and everything . It was 'Guns of Navarone' by the Skatalites i think but that was my introduction to Ska music.
With my mum, I think we all knew that she really wanted to have children. But I knew that she had this amazing musical life when she was young. And at that point, she was in full on mum mode, you know, we were her first priority.So we're coming out of Sainsbury's, we've gone to the car, the radio was on and this guitar sound is very high pitch. It was a Sex Pistols Pretty Vacant. My mum's facial expression just switched. She's just cranked up the volume and she's become a screaming teenager again, she said this “this is history. This is one of the most important pieces of music you'll hear in your lifetime.” And that was my introduction to the Sex Pistols.
In terms of subculture, it was a very strange one because I was always attracted to the goth culture. During my time, it kind of drifted into more cyber goth/emo culture, I don't think I became an emo till about Year 10/11. So before that, I was kind of a Chav. I was kind of sort of following the crowd. I had a bit of a sad moment, I remember with a group of friends because before I became a Goth, I was brought up as a psychedelic Mod by my dad. I remember playing a Jefferson Airplane, Greatest Hits, and it was Somebody to Love. And I remember one of my friends took it out and frisbeed the CD across the room. So I kind of went 'oh erm, okay' and put Dizzee Rascal instead. It was kind of that point where I just kind of had to listen to what everyone else was listening to just so I wasn't picked on or anything like that. By the time I was sixteen I really started embracing Goth and Emo culture more and I was listening to a lot of My Chemical Romance, I started going to gigs with my mum and my friends. She was a massive Muse fan.
The best gig I had with her was when we saw Muse at Wembley, the lineup was Biffy Clyro, My Chemical Romance and then Muse came on. Absolutely, absolutely loved it. I was going to gigs like from a very, from a very young age anyway. (Back in the day) I went to the Smash Hits concert in the docklands. It was incredible, no regrets whatsoever. They probably had one or two rock bands, Steps, S Club 7 , Westlife and all that. Oh, yeah. Shaggy came on as well. Then there was this new band called Wheatus who came on. And I got to see live very close of Wheatus doing Teenage Dirtbag. And they completely destroyed the set. They didn't just destroy it. They decimated it! It was like that iconic clash moment where the guitar smash drum kits being kicked and all that. Yeah, I sort of tend to drift from subculture to subculture, because I was just discovering new things.
She's just cranked up the volume and she's become a teenager again, my mum said this “this is history. This is one of the most important pieces of music you'll hear in your lifetime.” And that was my introduction to the Sex Pistols.
So you’re very influenced by mixing between loads of subcultures then I guess, with Not Dead that definitely translates because you don't just stick to one subculture which is really lovely. It's almost like this little Encyclopaedia of subcultures in a way.
That's really a lovely way of putting it. It was originally intended to be a book predominantly based on the punk culture of today. But then, as I was probably halfway into volume one, I decided I didn't just want to capture punks. And I wanted to capture Goths as well. I definitely wanted to go and photograph some skinheads and all that. Not Dead was the first conceived during the pandemic, where I just needed something to do. And it was to help me get through the grieving process, because unfortunately, I had actually lost my mother and my grandmother during the first lockdown. Even though it's something very heartbreaking that happened, it does play a huge role in what and how I ended up where I am today. Because yeah, I think I was just at that point where maybe I was kind of getting lost with my identity as a photographer. I was doing a mixture of everything and it was like “Okay, what do I actually want to do?” I remember just dabbling a bit with punk bands and all that but I remember enjoying it so much and you know, 2014 to 2016 I was catching a lot of bands and I kind of thought okay, I love doing that. Let's see if I could, you know, make something of it and all that. But it wasn't until about the late summer of 2020 where I knew that's what I really wanted to.
During the project and going around to those different places. Was there a particular group or community that stood out to you in a way?
It's funny because there's still a lot of places I haven't covered yet. I adore Manchester and spend a fair bit of time up there. Salford hands down is one of my favourite places, this very surreal concrete jungle, I was surrounded by brutalist underpasses and architecture. There were some really poor parts of the North I went to and I was surrounded by brutalist underpasses and architecture. There were some really poor parts of the North I went to and there were moments where I was in complete shock. Certain areas that had been neglected by the Council and the Government, almost forgotten areas. It just really made me really angry. At the same time, there was this beautiful community. With Manchester in particular, it's this hub, where everyone kind of has each other's backs and of course, there's good and bad everywhere, but everyone just helped each other out.
How did you find the whole process of making Not Dead? Were there any really memorable moments?
So there's actually two moments, just the first one is in the book, which was in the cafe with the newspaper being read by my friend. When we shot this it was when London was still practically empty. Very, very strange time to be in London. And I don't think we'll ever get to see London like that for a very long time. But the really the reason that this is such an important moment is because whilst we're all trying to be careful Partygate was happening. We're getting weird looks just for being outside and everything whilst they were absolutely munted in Downing Street.
The other is a photo that actually really had a change on my life. I like to call curious cows, I call it because the cows were all away like on the other side of the field. I'm not joking. We could barely see them at one point. We were all in Leeds and I just thought it'd be nice rather than capturing punks in cities or surrounded by concrete buildings, to actually go near their hometown where it's more of the countryside. I've done a bit of a scout beforehand, because I stayed up there for a couple of days. And we saw that we were driving on there was this beautiful mediaeval wall, and I'm obsessed with medieval history and there was Keelan and I and another person with us called Leah. I got Keelan to stand behind the wall, look completely neutral, or just look like why the hell are you taking my picture? And this group of cows just came over from the other side. They were so cute. Even snapping away they just didn't blink or anything like that. But I didn't realise how inquisitive cows were. We got to pet them and everything. I really haven't touched beef since That changed me a little bit, it's a photo I'm very proud of. It's one of those sort-of rare moments. You can capture someone in a city, in a concrete jungle and everything. But that's the right moment like that. That very rarely happens.
Do you think being in like the digital age and being so surrounded by social media impacts the longevity of subcultures?
I would say that social media and the digital age has more or less kind of evolved subculture. It’s kind of helped morphing into another kind of subcategory and everything. For example, I think during the pandemic, people were more on Tik Tok and things like that, and it may have helped probably implement some people to revive old subcultures like Northern Soul and the new Romantic Movement. Personally, social media, I think it really has been quite a help with music gigs and the support of independent music venues and whatnot. With subculture, it's a tricky one. I kind of feel that it's revived and evolved. Punk in particular, I think has become really prominent in the LGBTQ+ community, it's evolved into like, you know, queer core, queer punk, and everything. And that's, and that's great. I think it's absolutely fine to take something original and keep the originality but evolving it into evolving it into something else. Something else, something quite new.
Don't get me wrong. There's a lot of negative things I can say about social media, particularly with mental healthand all that. There are times where I just want to just put down my tablet and go outside and do some gardening and forget about the entire world. But I think in terms of the arts and finding out what's happening, it has been a catalyst that might be the correct word for discovery artists and everything. I've had students from Gloucestershire contact me asking for advice and a band has just contacted me about taking photos. It would have been extremely difficult for them to find me or for me to find them if social media wasn't present.
If you could put one object into the Museum of Youth Culture, what would it be? And why?
I'm gonna say three things because it's one from each different person. But if I could and if he'd let me, a copy of my dad's first QPR membership football card as that's our football team. And from my mum, I just found it very adorable when I saw that from her, David Essex membership card. She loved to be a punk and all that I did see she liked a bit of the Bay City Rollers, David Essex and of course The Osmonds! I think she got that through Jackie magazine, which was a big Teen Magazine at the time. Oh, and for myself, I would probably like to put in my fishnet wristbands from my Emo, Myspace era. I've got there's the pink, there's the yellow, there's a lot of black as well. I couldn't really go out of the house without them.
Contact Jeanie Jean directly for Not Dead: Volume 1.
@jeaniejeanphotos
jeaniejeanphotos.com
