Wheels of Time

It’s been a funny old couple of weeks.  Still without a car and plagued by a bout of insomnia, we have had an intense and sometimes stressful time (for reasons which I won’t bore you with here), in some shape or form rooted in the past.  For starters, not having been behind the wheel of a car since the Golf gave out, I have reluctantly had to get used to temporarily being ferried around by others (I’m too scared to drive Reaper, our van, other than on remote open roads) - something I’ve not experienced since 1990!

We have been up against it with our regular Hayburner advert deadline, having put all of our eggs in one basket by asking our first and only customer from Israel if he would be so kind as to send us some sunset photos of his beautiful 1967 Karmann Ghia, featuring his order of Voodoo Street stickers.  Naturally, Murphy’s Law intervened and his first order went astray.  A second parcel was dispatched and we spoke very nicely to Vic at Hayburner, who granted us an extra couple of days to pull it together.  

My dream car

In the nick of time, Shmuel’s photos appeared in our inbox.  

They are pretty stunning, wouldn’t you agree?  

Surf Permit Stickers available at voodoostreet.com

Voodoo Street Logo Script Sticker visible on the rear window

Our latest ad, featuring a dreamy image from this shoot, will appear in the next issue of Hayburner magazine, out in December.

On Wednesday evening, Gaz attended the local hotrod meet, having produced some promotional stickers for the group, which included language that would make your granny’s hair curl.  Unless you are driving a 1950s souped up car, you are relegated to the far end of the car park.  Gaz is just about tolerated in our 70s V8 Rover (he still has to park at the back), due to his interest in these hybrid beasts and enthusiasm for a great engine sound.  Unfortunately, despite an amazing turnout of retro vehicles, in freezing temperatures, this was the only image he managed to capture before the camera battery gave out.  

As part of our preparations for Chepstow, Gaz has been cleaning up the 1920s roadster bicycle, which he’s hoping to use as a promotional prop.  

He’s so in love with this bike, he’s started campaigning for it to be wall mounted inside.  I’m not wholly convinced, particularly as I’m now starting to think it’s haunted.  

With little room left in the workshop, Gaz is currently bringing it into the kitchen whenever it rains.  On each occasion, we’ve independently experienced unexplained knocking on the patio doors.  On one occasion, the fuse box tripped out, plunging us into darkness.

  

Meanwhile, I’ve been educating myself on producing and sending blanket newsletters (something we have long promised to our subscribers), re-thinking our clothing packaging, photographing and updating stock on our website (Blackberry hoodies are now available to buy online so lovers of all things purple, check out our new stock)...

….and working on promotion with the help of some natty editing tools and filters.  Warning:  We may go all psychedelic on yo' asses in the coming weeks.  Our mystery boxes are available now.  More details online if you're interested.  I'm not going to do a Christmas plug in a November blog.  I love Christmas but unless I stuff my ears with cotton wool and put on a blindfold during TV ad breaks, by mid December, I'm already over it.  The only Christmas song I could happily listen to at any time of year is "Fairytale of New York".




Our clothing may be new, but our influences are pretty retro.  My style is also pretty eclectic.  There are days – many days - when I would love to float around in a Kate Bush dress or Woodstock era hippy garb and other days when my style icon is Annie Hall.  

Then there are days like today, when I fully appreciate a more masculine look – a great pair of skinny jeans, teamed with an old Voodoo Street baseball tee and this 70s jacket I spotted in a charity shop for £6.00.  (Please ignore the sleep-deprived bags under my eyes!) 

Last week, we went back to school.  We accepted a request to attend a Q&A session on T-shirt design for a group of DT students tasked with designing a T-shirt inspired by Darwin’s theory of evolution.  

Armed with some clothing and sticker samples, we rocked up.  As we waited for lunch to end, the teacher, Miss Mason warned us: “They will probably come in and stare at you.”  She wasn’t wrong!  We had prepared answers to a range of questions covering everything from market research to the nitty gritty of the design process, but had omitted to prepare any kind of presentation, so my stomach did a little lurch when the teacher simply introduced us and then threw us to wolves/handed us over to the class. 

 I was always very shy at school and any kind of presentation would fill me with fear and unshakeable self-consciousness.  So with a niggling insomnia-induced headache and 45 pairs of eyes scrutinising our every move, we launched into an impromptu potted history of Voodoo Street, somehow without stumbling over our words or interrupting each other.  After passing round some samples, we took questions (and there were many), before leaving a bunch of free stickers for the kids.  

The great thing about kids is that the feedback is instantaneous.  We had a round of applause, a couple of high fives on the way out and some lovely follow-up messages from the teaching staff.  Why on earth I spent my 80s school days worrying so much about standing up in front of my peers is beyond me.  Well, they do say youth is wasted on the young!

Sticking with the 80s, in our downtime, we’ve also started watching the Netflix series “Stranger Things,” which is set in the decade of my childhood.  We're a bit late to the party, but loved the shades of Goonies/Stephen Spielberg evident in the first episode and I’m desperate for an opportunity to binge watch this before being exposed to the inevitable spoilers.  I’m hoping the rest of the series lives up to the first episode. 

We’re also limping through Blade Runner.  I’m embarrassed to say that this film has lain on our shelf for years and I don’t ever recall watching it.  I think I’m put off somewhat by the fact that I have the director’s cut, which removes the uplifting ending.  

Caleb's keen to see it before he catches the sequel, but for numerous reasons, we’ve only had short windows of opportunity to watch…and now I’ve got all sorts of TV vying for my attention; Peaky Blinders, The Apprentice, Detectorists to name a few.  

There’s also a Netflix series covering the relationship between Bette Davis and Joan Crawford starting in December.  We’re suddenly spoilt for choice.  Way better than all those “going-on-a-journey”, “this-is-the-best-thing-that’s-ever-happened-to-me”, formulaic, pantomime reality TV shows.  Not so great for curing insomnia.

E-bollocks! Let's Go Out!

Last week was a bugger.  There is no dressing up this fact.  We endured a number of sleepless nights thanks to those intent on making a fast buck from our artwork on certain well known seller platforms.  Aside from the blatant rip-offs, we had one seller in Israel, who just waded in there with a screenshot of our advert – complete with our name and copyright symbol emblazoned across the image, and advertised it for twice the price! 

An original advert.  Or is it?

I’ve lost count of the number of forms we have submitted, the number of emails sent, to little avail.  The lack of support for those experiencing copyright infringement is staggering.  I’ve become an overnight expert on the subject and have quoted bite sized, easily digested snippets of key legal points to faceless customer services departments.  I’ve reported item numbers, included links for comparisons, reiterated over and over again that a design does not have to be copied in its entirety to breach someone’s copyright, only to wake up to the same standard email requesting yet further clarification, that we’ve submitted the wrong form, or, my personal favourite, one stating that “You cannot copyright an idea.”  

Image, not subject to copyright

I have been forced to explain that a sticker for example, is not simply an idea, but a tangible product and that original graphics and phrases are covered by a copyright the moment they are written or created.  

Kinky Melon HQ

So, finding ourselves swimming against a tide of copyright issues, a day out with these lovely people, Vicky and Jon aka Kinky Melon’s Retro Boutique, was just what we needed.  We headed to Walsall Art Gallery, taking in the Turner Exhibition and getting ever-so-gently reprimanded for touching a piece resembling a bin bag full of rubbish.  Lunch was half a bottle of rose wine and a delicious vegan curry (I appear to have developed a dairy intolerance in my old age.  After all the ice cream and chocolate I’ve consumed in my lifetime, I would expect my body to have embraced it and my blood to be half cream).  Happy and sleepy (me), we walked back to our car, bathed in autumn sunshine.

I don’t know about you, but I wish autumn – the most vibrant season of the year for a nano second – would stick around for longer.  I’m talking about the magically short window of time when trees telepathically agree a plan to shed 90% of their leaves in 2 days.  I’m talking about clear blue skies, weather reporters referring to “unseasonably warm temperatures”, brightly coloured, odd shaped pumpkins (3 of which are sitting on our garden steps, waiting to go under the knife, including a white "Ghost Pumpkin"), windfall fruit and the associated pies, crumbles and experimental cider, Halloween, the first hint of wood smoke in the air, fireworks and gripping TV dramas.  I wish these autumn days would stick around until, say, 21^st May, at which point an extended period of unbroken sunshine will commence, cartoon blue birds will appear and someone will ensure that I am never more than a metre away from a mojito.

Spooky sky

Leaving aside yesterday’s blip, courtesy of Storm Ophelia and a daytime sky straight out of Star Wars, one downside to the elevated temperature is having to try on steampunk costumes.  

Photo courtesy of Shropshire Star:  Ironbridge covered in scaffolding

These outfits appear to comprise endless layers.  Dressing up in full steampunk was the last thing I felt like, but nevertheless found myself doing, on Saturday afternoon in Ironbridge.  Tourists from all over the globe visit this World Heritage Site.  We go for steampunk clothes and charity shop finds.

Today, after another sparring session with Ebay, I went through the seemingly disparate steampunk elements I’ve acquired so far and decided that they can all be worn together after all.  So, top to toe, this is what I’m going with at Chepstow Steampunk Winter Festival:-

The Top Hat.

Who doesn’t have a vintage top hat in their wardrobe?  Mine just needs some temporary embellishments.

The Jacket.

On loan from Kinky Melon, it is 80s, but don’t tell the hardcore steampunk brigade.  I don’t care – it’s cropped, velvet, has crazy shoulders and looks the part. 

The Blouse.

This Ralph Lauren Sport blouse was a steal at £4.50 from a charity shop in the village.  The ruffles were hard to resist and are a key element of the steampunk look.  It was the first item I bought.

The Dress.

With steampunk dresses often commanding prices upwards of £70, I snapped up this £25 number from a vintage store in Ironbridge.

The Tights.

Black and white vertical stripy tights for a fiver - Beetlejuice meets vintage circus.

The Boots.

Still undecided between red velvet and brown granny.

A Pair of Lace Gloves.

Gloves from Hat-Trix

Another £5 bargain from Etsy, which saves me the stress of digging out my cobweb covered sewing machine, shredding a piece of lace, swearing at said machine and crying hysterically, before going online and order a £5 paid from Etsy.

Now all I have to do is steampunk up everyone else in this house.

Where The Wild Things Are

No, this isn’t a blog on Donald Trump or my state of mind when I thought there would be a Marmite shortage.  This is about a little Voodoo Street Indian summer hiatus whilst awaiting the arrival of some new products.

Well aware that October often heralds the start of the English monsoon season, we’ve been making the most of the sunshine and taking to the great outdoors. The surreal sunsets we all experienced a couple of weeks back kicked it off.  Like the rest of the central region, we shared our sunset photos on social media, naively believing that we were the only folks to have captured these fiery skies, which seemed to indicate the imminent arrival of alien visitors.  You be the judge.  Here are a couple of ours. 

The Aliens Are Coming!

Woodland Sunset

Not bad eh?  Until you see this one (below) captured by a certain Mr Salt of Penkridge, allegedly taken at the back of the local tip. 

Penkridge Recycling Centre?

Real or fake?  All we know is that the housing market has spiked in that area in recent weeks!

To avoid switching on the SAD lamp, (big f*!k off lamp which simulates sunlight and wards off the blues associated with seasonal adjustment), we’ve been hotfooting it around the place as much as possible, seeking out pockets of wilderness on our doorstep.  

Yesterday, I decided to throw on a Voodoo Street extended tee to show that girls can wear them too and to give our eyes a rest from screen use, we took off for a walk in one of our favourite places. 

Only 10 minutes by car takes us to this country estate at Enville, which is occupied by the family of the former Earls of Stamford. The family name was Grey, best known through Lady Jane Grey, who was Queen of England for just 10 days in 1553, before being beheaded by Mary Tudor.  There’s a right of way in front of Enville Hall, which leads up onto the hills.

Enville Hall Estate

  

Enville Hall's Cricket Pavillion

Enville Hall Lake

Once on the top, the views are incredible and aside from the occasional passing car, you will not hear a man made sound.

That tree has seen better days.

Pretty sure this isn’t a fashion statement, but can anyone shed any light on why this sheep is wearing a harness?  He did seem to have quite a punk attitude we noticed, aggressively nibbling at other sheep, so maybe he was influenced by Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm McLaren's style from the SEX Boutique days after all.  Or maybe I'm overthinking this.

Sheep Fashion Icon

Punk Chic Sheep

There are other forms of wildlife of course and I encountered a couple at a family member’s 80^th birthday party last weekend…and no, I’m not referring to Gaz.

A conversation with a retired farmer and his wife from Herefordshire, was pretty genteel until talk turned to their farming days.  They told me that they can still see their old farmland from their new bungalow, but that the new owner has planted trees on the land and is no longer using it for farming.  Apparently it’s his intention to grow a forest to leave for future generations.  As honourable as this is, I asked how he was making a living from it.  The answer was not quite what I expected.

“Well, he made a lot of money from magazines,” said Jean.

She could have left it at that, but instead, chose to add, in audible-to-everyone tones and with a raised eyebrow: “PORN mags!”  I had resigned myself to discussions about The Great British Bake Off, turning 80 and the weather we’ve been having, so this took the wind out of my sails!

Finally, in an unusual twist, the octogenarian in question, Jimbo, cut his cake with a ceremonial sword!  Wild thing!

  

We also headed to the Shropshire hills and paid our monthly pilgrimage to the Church Stretton Antiques Market.  I know, I know, this evokes twee images of pottery, mirrors and watercolours, but the Church Stretton Antiques Market does a good line in the bizarre and macabre, which appeals to our dark sense of humour.

For example, mounted Emu feet.  Sorry, but I just can’t take this image to the grave alone.  You have to share in it.

  

£85.00 - Anyone....?

There is also plenty of taxidermy gone wrong, but I’ll spare you from this.

Anyone know which animal this skull may have belonged to?

Horse

Here are some pretty cool and of-the-moment teapots.  I was tempted, but the eye watering prices put paid to that!

Finally, we came across this creepy ancient lift – straight out of a Hitchcock film – named after us.  The view down the lift shaft almost gave me vertigo!

  

From wildlife to wild rides, Gaz has been drawn to this rat style sit up and beg Ford Pop with its original engine but with a Heath Robinson turbo set up.  It's been ruled out of the running now, but looks amazing doesn't it?  

Next up, I will be boring you all about Halloween amongst other things.   In the meantime, stay safe and don’t talk to clowns!

Dungeons and Dragons

Why is it when we have a packed calendar, we get the fear and yet the prospect of free weekends seems exciting but also daunting?  With freedom of choice comes indecision.  How will we fill our time?  Where will we go?  Somehow, passing the time doing anything short of amazing feels like wasted time, when so many weekends have been accounted for. Panic sets in. 

I call it “the comedown.”  Regularly engaging with our supporters/friends galvanises the feeling that we are on the right track with Voodoo Street, but take away that dialogue; the festival vibes and suddenly we feel cut adrift.  Out of touch. 

Processing orders online is anonymous.  As grateful as we are for them, it’s just not the same as engaging with a friendly face. 

T-shirts are T-shirts at the end of the day, or so you might think, but once you have been privy to a man’s 20 minute deliberation about whether the large or extra large tee “hangs” better from his neck, you realise that:

a)      It’s a myth that women are a nightmare to shop with and;

b)      Buying a standard fit T-shirt is obviously a more exact science than either of us ever realised!

So whilst receiving an online clothing order still offers the usual thrill of having been chosen, it’s now also filled with the trepidation of sending it out there and wondering if the neck will be ok! 

Touch wood, we’ve never had any issues with clothing sold online and love it when people take time out to photograph their purchases and tag us in them.  It makes it worthwhile.  Here are a few recent ones.

Photo courtesy of official_jr_skating

Thank god for Instagram and Facebook!  Those who choose to interact with us on social media may not realise it, but they are like co-workers – our own little cyber office.  By day, we’re beavering away in our dungeon, at Voodoo Towers and this contact with the outside world gives us a buzz.  (There’s only so long you can spend chatting to the postman without coming off as creepy J)

Lee Foulkes in his Voodoo Street Urban Army Cap

At this point, we’ve sold one of our stickers to nearly every corner of the globe at some point and have encountered some pretty “out there” surnames.  However, on Friday night a particularly familiar name popped up on an order of stickers.  After a little Internet research, we discovered that it was indeed the son of a certain Cypriot born member of BBC’s Dragon’s Den.  Not necessarily worthy of champagne popping, but definitely a talking point.  Another swiftly followed this order, from one Martin Kemp, although we’re doubtful that it was Spandau Ballet’s bassist.

Photo Courtesy of Steve and Cat Bath

Vespa Love

So, back to our free weekend.  What did we do?  Well, after a week of stock taking, updating our online store, washing rain battered odds and sods and reconciling a mountain of receipts, we were kept busy with family birthday celebrations on Friday. Saturday’s torrential rain and consequent flooding also made us grateful that we weren’t standing in the middle of a field somewhere, although the enforced time indoors did result in the beginnings of a new little project for Voodoo Street.  We also spent a little time on a design that we periodically tinker with.  (Hopefully we’ll be able to share these new bits and pieces with you very soon). We rounded off Saturday with a curry and beers with friends.

Can you buy grey jelly?

In other news, our favourite time of year - Halloween - is fast approaching and already, ghoulish Chinese tat is creeping into our house.  So far, we have some tea light holders, a jelly mould in the shape of a brain and 2 pumpkins.  There will be more.  This year we seriously need to up our game on the pumpkin front.  Both of last year’s gourds were hurriedly carved on Halloween and in all honesty would probably have looked better if we had taken a machete to them blindfolded!

Incidentally, in an update to my last blog, we discovered this sign nailed to a tree in the woods.  Our familiar outlook of tall woodland pines at the end of our garden (a view we fell in love with when we first looked at the house, which looks like a location from a Stephen King novel) is clearly not going to be around for much longer.  It looks as though their days are numbered.  Very sad.

Today marks the fourth sunny day in a row, which makes it hard to focus when I have a day of admin ahead of me.  Warm as it is by day, the temperatures seem to be plummeting at night in these parts and as we all know, the drop in evening autumn temperature marks the arrival of my nemesis – the spider.  I can handle zombies, ghosts and anything else Halloween throws at me, but I find these creatures truly terrifying.  I’m not a fan of insects in general; anything bigger than an aphid increases my heart rate and not in a good way.  We have had some roasters in our house: unnaturally hairy, too many legs, muscles ffs!  Gaz has to carry out a night time “sweep” before I go upstairs.  Maybe I should consider hypnosis.

An accurate artist's impression of a typical spider found in our house with frightening regularity

Anyway, onwards and upwards!  Til next time!