Dead Or Alive: Here’s Looking At You

Dead Or Alive: Here’s Looking At You

Moonboy Ltd Publishing

Available Now

A limited edition photo book of 1,000 individually numbered copies of stunning images by Paul Cox from his photographic work with Dead o Alive, 1984-1990.

Pete Burns was nothing short of a work of art. His body and his face were his canvas, on which he created some of the most striking images in modern culture. The fact that he did this in 70s/80s Liverpool, where he was more likely to run into a bunch of Stanley knife-wielding scallies rather than an ID photographer, it just adds to the cool of his legend.

Everyone who was even peripherally involved in Liverpool’s alternative scene has Pete Burns stories of their own; his wit and his looks were the stuff of local legend long before he took his rightful place at number one in the charts. Incidentally, it was always assumed that he would do this at some point; he was a star long before he was a star.

Just one of my own Pete Burns stories involves me sending my mum to Probe Records to pick up an album for me. For those who don’t know, Probe was Liverpool’s coolest record shop, but the staff there were famously rude to customers, often refusing to sell something if they didn’t like it and ridiculing people for their bad taste. Pete Burns was the main culprit here; his vicious tongue could send punters scurrying from the store in tears without him really trying. He later became quite notorious for his barbs and insults, both for the relentlessness and the intensity of them. My mum walked up the steps into this punk’s den and walked to the counter, obviously an older woman out of place and out of her comfort zone. Pete Burns served her. Thankfully, he recognised what was going on and was really kind to her, taking time to chat and joke with her, making her smile.

When she came home, she was full of praise for this “lovely” man who made her feel safe and maybe even a bit special. She always has a soft spot for him after that and, years later, would phone me when he was on Top of the Pops and tell me again how lovely he was and how much she loved the way he looked.

The image is what people first noticed about Pete Burns. There is another story that when Pete Wylie suggested getting Burns in to sing in short lived Liverpool band The Mystery Girls, bandmate Julian Cope asked if he could sing. Wylie’s response was “Of course he can sing – look at him!”

But although he could sing, with a wonderfully baritone, full of barely controlled power and an excellent vibrato, it is easy to get the impression that all this took second place to image in Burns’ priorities.

He was willing to push himself to the limits of his own health and beyond in order to bring his body in line with the image he had in his own mind and, as a result, became one of the most visually striking artists of his generation.

The latest book on Pete Burns is Here’s Looking At You, which draws together some of the images Pete Burn sin a series of promotional photo shoots by Paul Cox, capturing Burns in all his peacock glory. The book is printed on high-quality, high-gloss paper and, as you can feel when you pick it up, is a substantially weighty tome.

There is a touching forward from Lynne Burns, Pete’s wife and soulmate, that details key points of Pete Burns’ story, including early trips to London to see Vivienne Westwood in Sex and his first meeting with photographer Paul Cox.

The first photographs are from the Sophisticated Boom Boom era and show Burns as a star in the ascendant. His charisma pours out of the page, even next to the chiselled good looks of drummer Steve Coy; Burns’ star quality leaps out of the photos at you.

The photographs are accompanied by stories and quotes to add context to the photo shoots and to guide us through Pete’s image journey in a more personal manner.

Given that many think Pete Burns went too far with his image towards the end of his young life, there is no sense of that in Here’s Looking At You, despite the chronological order of the photographs. What we see is perhaps a progression in glamour, as Pete moves through many different looks and styles.

We see Pete Burns modelling rock chic, bolero boldness and high camp sexiness. There are photographs of him with his family, his band and his wife. There are even photos of him with Morrissey, from an odd friendship that was thankfully documented on film.

This book is not just for lovers of Pete Burns, it is for lovers of style, for those with an interest in just how far people could go in trying to make themselves match their ideal self image.

Pete Burns may be remembered for a savage tongue and a bitchy put down, but he will also be remembered for his brave beauty, his incredible willingness to present himself to the world as he believed he should. It bears repeating that he was a work of art, perhaps more than any other person of his age; he took this into the mainstream and to the top of the charts.

He lived and looked on his own terms, and with an incredible amount of style. A star before he knew it and an icon long after that.

Here’s Looking At You is a document of an incredible soul.

Buy Here’s Looking At You here

Words by Banjo, you can find his Louder Than War archive here

All photos by Paul Cox, kindly provided by the PR