A Cock and Balls Story by John Cooper

A Cock and Balls Story
by John Cooper

The In The City Music Media Awards ran for 3 glorious years towards the beginning of the nineties. Scream City explains this issue's seventies porno cover by way of the story of "The Knobs and the Fat Cats".

Central Station Design were commissioned to produce a special award and their 'Fruit Cock and Balls' was the only type of award issued. Each individual award had its own inscription along the length of the banana. Special award certificates were also produced.

But why a banana and two apples? Central Station's Matt Carroll explains...

"This was the first time we had been commissioned to produce a three-dimensional sculpture. We wanted to produce a still life in the traditional sense, but with not quite the same meaning - so we set about finding the biggest cock and balls our money could find/buy (which we found in a fruit and veg shop). It was like a big fuck off to the biggest bunch of cunts in the world i.e. the Fat Cats and accountants that then, and now run the music business.

The idea being that when it was standing up right it was like a big fuck off sign.

The sculpture was made years before Sarah Lucas's Fruit innuendos.

It was cast in solid aluminium at a foundary in Buxton and then hand letter stamped .

The awards was referred to at the original In The City awards (at Manchester Town Hall) by presenter Mark Lamarr as 'The Knobs'."

Select magazine once won Publication of the Year and Push is the proud owner of this particular one awarded to the late lamented Muzik magazine.

"Muzik was an innovative dance music magazine that was only a few issues old when it "won" the In The City award. Push recalls that he thought it was in recognition for it being "a pioneering title - the first UK magazine devoted to dance music and its creators (as opposed to club culture mags like Mixmag).

It was initially developed by myself and Ben Turner when we were at Melody Maker. We started work on the project at the beginning of 1994 and the first issue of the magazine was published in May 1995. I was the editor and Ben was the assistant editor (a position later to be held by Rob Da Bank). I left in September 1998, after 40 issues.

The magazine continued to run until 2003, when it was closed just one issue short of its 100th edition."

Then a decision was taken by Phil Saxe that In The City shouldn't be about awards and they were scrapped.

Thanks to Richard Bellia for Cock and Balls cover photography which was then manipulated by Central Station's Matt Carroll, Peter Walsh @ peterjwalsh.com, Push and Anthony H Wilson.

[2019 note: Push went from Melody Maker to Muzik to Electronic Sound magazine which, in 2019, ran an extensive edition all about the 40th anniversary of Factory Records.]