I have just got back from appearing on daybreak after a 5 am start (ouch!)
I've been trying my best to keep you up to date with whatever information I can regarding the riots and trying to help myself by going into town and onto the high streets and sweeping.
It came to my attention that maybe there are some distorted views across the globe of what has been happening from a couple of opinions expressed on twitter that kind of broke my heart. Just want to state though that this is in no way a confrontational blog.
I heard them branded as "exciting"early this morning. I can verify that for most of the people that were not out rioting, it was absolutely not an exciting experience. It was depressing, sickening, worrying, it made us afraid, sad and angry. The looting was not an attack on big corporations and chain stores, it was mindless and violent. Yes people were breaking into those big companies stores but in the same breath destroying independent business and burning down peoples homes, not even worrying about the fact that people were still inside. People were beaten up and mugged, clothes stolen from their bodies. 3 people in birmingham were killed last night. There were working class people out in the streets destroying the homes and lives of other working class people. And different groups of working class people defending that the next night. There are clearly political issues underlying, there is clearly a massive number of people that are excluded from society, the questions I feel need to be addressed are "why and how are they excluded?" "why do they seemingly have no conscience or sympathy towards other human beings?"and "what can we do to change that?" We simply cannot ignore what has happened and although it is a positive thing to bring about change I just can't deal with the riots being praised and labelled exciting.
What is exciting to me and what really felt amazing yesterday was how many people were out in the streets yesterday, all day and night, people literally sweeping the streets, taking the broken glass out of windows, glueing wood to broken doors, talking to strangers, from all different types of class/race/gender and backgrounds. The atmosphere was positive and protective. And last night, communities and vigilante groups and shop keepers stayed out in crowds to defend their neighbourhoods.
Please research into your opinions before you condone this, many people have been hurt and will continue to suffer because of what has happened. Yes we must listen, I want to hear ideas of what we can do to prevent this from ever happening again, I want to help, I want to get into my community and local schools and see what we can actually physically do day by day to help this change. And I will protest against government policies and injustices that exclude anyone from society, but I do not want to physically hurt an innocent person, burn a building down or destroy someone's livelihood in the process.
Bethnal Green on my high street this morning at about 10.00 am
My local Tesco
Clapham Junction still on fire
People out in their hundreds to clean up the mess in their communities
Everyone cheering when the fire went out
Got my broom & Bin liners - essential "Broom Army" kit and hearts on cheeks for John & Yoko peace and love vibes
Alex Wheeler with his GAYSHA dustpan and brush
Marks and Spencers and lots of other shops giving out free food and drink to helpers, including big chain stores and independent local shops
Restoring faith in humanity
Damage & Repair
As Sam Duckworth said, this is only the beginning, there are questions to be answered, there is upset and so much anger in our cities. Please keep updated and stay safe. xxxxxx <3 <3 <3
I've been waking up these days super late, which up until the last 6 months has been my usual habits for the last 24 years (Actually take off maybe 7 from those cause I used to be able to wake up at like 6 every morning to eat breadsticks and watch cartoons with my sisters when I was a very small person)
Anyway I've been doing a load of festivals in Europe which has been coooool but it has meant like 5 in the morning starts for early flights and then late nights after shows which if you can add up my friends equals no sleep! Therefore I have been waking up like a human sized slab of stone has hit me every morning this week and doing nothing else but listening to music, hanging out with fluffy and going to my rehearsal room (that looks like wayne's world and has a dog called peach) to write.
(Wrote that yesterday, then got distracted by stroking fluffy and then I was late to meet a friend so had to rush out of bed)
Anyway same kind of vibes apart from with new news. Yesterday I did an interview with the amazing Rebekah Roy for The Industry. And I was kind of scared because the fashion world has really scared me in the past, being a feminist and someone who promotes a healthy body image and tries to challenge the mainstream ideals of what 'beauty' is (i.e everyone that is nice is beautiful) for girls and boys of the world, I've found it hard to know where I fit in in the fashion planet, I mean I love clothes and my version of "fashion" ...
but the business scares me! Anyway I have discovered it's just like any industry, you find your own pockets and world within it if you want, people that you think are cool, stuff that you like, and you just enjoy that. Then you challenge what you disagree with about it if you think it's necessary and might change the world for the better or help someone.
It's cool being interviewed by a friend, you get to speak about things that you care about and I remember getting hot in the open q&a section because I was talking so passionately about something!
After that I went to watch DUD, TURBOGUEIST AND SHUGA (EMMA CHITTY'S NEW PROJECT) for a "swamp session" night. You can buy the e.p here (I ordered the e.p last night, paid. wrote my name, email and address on some card that was at the table that said 'order record here' and then Jon took it home as a poster to put on his wall so I may have to order it again.)
Emma was fucking amazing and if you can see one of her shows then please do, she is fucking awesome. The woman hasn't even been playing bass for very long and she fucking owns the instrument, her voice/lyrics/songs will blow ya mind! Haven't felt so inspired/excited by new music since Brigitte Aphrodite 2 years ago. Nice to get that feeling again.
So I miss going to school, I miss all my friends in all the schools. Not as in me being at actual school, good god I do not want to go back there, I mean doing the after school clubs! The cool rock n roll chicks that make music. When I worked at nandos they had t-shirts with cool slogans on like 'hot chicks' or something, whilst working there I spent most of my day staring into space (the high street in harrow) putting nata cakes in the microwave and eating them and sitting in the walk in fridge to cool down. I really love walk in fridges, they still impress me for some reason, it's because of tomb raider, I used to stay in the training house and lock geeves in the big freezer and avoid playing the actual game because the tiger would always kill me or I would drown? I hope to one day have giant walk in fridge.
Here's 2 things
1 the new lynx advert, are they actually selling women now? giving them away as a prize? is this some kind of sex trading deodorant company?
2 is watching an episode of sex in the city recently (?why?) I was confused when Carrie Bradshaw compared the war between married couples and singles (war?) to THE WAR IN NORTHERN IRELAND! Fucking hell, who wrote that line in the script? and who didn't edit it out?
I will leave you with the moldy peaches in a moment, but first I just want to try and encourage whoever I can to stop using the word UGLY when talking about someones looks. I only use it when talking about a person if someone has an ugly personality or has done something really ugly. Like for example last night I was walking home and there was this seriously drunk dude trying to get cash out of the cash machine at like 3 am. I was waiting behind him because it's the only cash point in the area and he kept telling me to go away, I could see that he was trying to get out £200 and his card kept getting rejected, he was so drunk that when his card came out of the machine that's when he would start pressing the buttons and telling me there was something wrong with it. I tried to help and he kept telling me angrily to fuck off (and he was built like some kind of steroid injecting rugby player) I really needed to get cash so I didn't and then when he finally realised he didn't have £200 in his account and he gave up he offered to hold my chips while I got cash out (and when I say offered I mean shouted at me) I don't know why he thought I wouldn't be able to hold them myself while I got cash out. I said no thank you and he told me to go fuck myself. That dude was U-G-L-Y-!
Help Supercute make music videos and record their album! watch this Kickstarter and donate anything that you can to help these cuties make art.
Things they need to pay for!
In other supercute news, Siobhan and Jay Malhotra the cutest Husband & Wife that ever lived, have started their own etsy shop called Knitnhealthy They are selling extremely wonderful things like this...
I have one of these donut brooches and can vouch that they look rather splendid pinned onto the collar of an oversized 2 tone denim jacket.
Moustache purses, genius.
My mum uses this doggy lavender (microwaveable) rice pack on her sore hip.
And my current favourite, which whoops sorry I already bought (ask her to make more!)
