You may remember that we were less than impressed with Adewale Akkinouye-Agbaje’s phony skinhead flick Farming that was briefly seen on British screens last year. What’s more, the director refused to answer any questions we subsequently tried to ask him.
But hey, that’s no big deal – we found a more reliable interview subject with Dave Strickson, ex-guitarist and main songwriter of Tilbury Oi band Angela Rippon’s Bum. His distinct advantage: back then, Dave really was a Tilbury Skin.
That is also the reason why Dave began to investigate into Adewale’s life after watching the movie. You’ll be surprised to read what he managed to find out. Matt Crombieboy was all ears. Continue reading
As with Defiant Pose (1991), Red London (1994) and Tainted Love (2005) before it, Stewart Home raided his record collection for this novel’s title, epitomised by mean and moody rocker Kip Tyler’s smouldering classic single. ‘She’s My Witch’ has been covered by several artists since its 1959 release, most notably in a Cramps style by the Panther Burns (1987), woozy garage rockers the Fuzztones (1992) and most recently psychobillies The Radiacs (2010). I mention these only as Home’s own musical tastes and live forays, particularly to Dalston’s Garageland, get frequent mentions and largely fuel the online relationship which unfolds between the novel’s two protagonists, Vespa-riding personal trainer (and former skinhead) Martin Cooper and video editor Maria Remedios, a former dominatrix more likely to be found in bars with Hells Angels and skinheads than behind an editing suite in her native Spain (in one Facebook message she rues how the latter are now all “just fat middle-aged men”). This in itself opens up the time and place of the novel, East London in the post-financial crisis, pre-Brexit era (understandably as this is published on John King’s London Books imprint, the jacket text goes in heavy on this) where personal wellness and the creative industries meet, mutually reinforcing. As London riots then prepares to stage a few weeks of global sport, Martin and Maria get further acquainted on social media and commence the exchange of favoured YouTube clips of garage rock and proto-punk and the odd cult film trailer.
Creases Like Knives 