Category: Uncategorized

MOBO AWARDS NOMINATION PARTY


JASMINE WITH BEST HIP HOP NOMINEE PROFESSOR GREEN.

The MOBO Nominations party was reinvented this year. Usually an evening affair full of dressed up ladies, uber amounts of alcohol, silver platters full of canapés and a free for all party that runs for hours, this year the brand reinvented itself with a nominations reveal akin to the MTV and Brits brands, with an early morning champagne fest breakfast at world renowned jazz music venue Ronnie Scott’s on Tuesday morning. Paparazzi, print press, TV news crews, bloggers and music talent were lined up outside on the Soho pavement an hour ahead of doors opening, such was the buzz that the awards were returning this year to its London hometown roots.

Although it was a breakfast affair, there were no teas or coffees to keep our bleary media eyes alert, it was still black music glitz with hundreds of glasses of champagne lined up along the bar, with mini Danish pastries on hand too.

Music acts, tastemakers and media bigwigs in the house included Professor Green, Krept & Konan, Angel, Meridian Dan, Ella Eyre, Melvin Odoom, Michelle Matherson, Jonathan Shalit and more. After XTra Factors Sarah Jane Crawford welcomed us all and handed over to MOBO CEO Kanya King, we were fully awake as international actor and heartthrob Idris Elba bounded onto stage straight from the airport, to pick up his award- a new award invented just this year- for most inspirational person. Idris, dressed in a sharp suit had the paps frantically snapping away and suddenly the A List factor in the venue went sky high!

JASMINE WITH HIGHEST NOMINEES (4!)- KREPT & KONAN!

Lion-maned beauty Ella Eyre sang for us and proved why she’s a worthy nominee this year.

JASMINE WITH BEST NEWCOMER NOMINEE ELLA EYRE.

Taking place at Wembey Arena on October 22nd this is the MOBO 19th year anniversary, and to celebrate the brand has spread its musical tentacles, and expanded to new areas. It’s moving its focus beyond just music and encouraging the next generation of creative talent, regardless of field. This will engage young people who aspire to work in film, TV, dance, theatre and visual arts. They’re calling this the MOBO Movement and will partner with established organisations to make youth dreams happen.

ANGEL SPEAKS TO LONDON360 ABOUT WHY HE’S HAPPY ITS BACK IN LONDON!

This years show moves from its previous BBC home, across to rival ITV, and this naturally means that with ad breaks that the televised part of the show will be much shorter, with certain categories having to be announced before transmission time, and not all categories being televised. ITV2 will transmit the live two-hour show with main channel ITV running hour-long highlights. It will be interesting to see which categories are dropped for TV.

PROFESSOR GREEN TALKS TO LONDON360 ABOUT WHY HE’S DELIGHTED ITS BACK ON HIS HOME TURF!

Once upon a time many, many years ago, MOBO were criticised for awarding the American talent with too many awards. Today this has swung totally the other way and in 2014 the highest nominees are British acts singer Sam smith and hip-hop duo Krept & Konan. Both Sam and Krept & Konan have been nominated for four awards each, with Ghetts, Tinie Tempeh, Meridian Dan and FUSE ODG all receiving three awards each.

JASMINE WITH MOBO CEO KANYA KING.

To the die-hard underground scenes delight, we have a new category this year for MOBO Best Grime, which included a host of popular names like Big Narstie, Ghetts, JME, Lethal Bizzle, Meridian Dan, Novelist, Skepta, Sox, Stormzy and Wiley. Within minutes of the launch announcement, MOBO Awards was trending on twitter with an eruption of tweets from the UK music industry on their delight at being recognised for their hard work. Even Ed Sheeran tweeted ‘‘if there’s one thing you do today you should vote for Big Narstie in the mobos coz him winning would make me happy’’. Wiley tweeted ‘’ I will support the mobo awards 4 life’’

IDRIS ELBA DELIGHTED TO PICK UP HIS MOBO AWARD FOR ”MOST INSPIRATIONAL”.

Best international act included the expected names like Beyonce, Drake, Iggy Azalea. J Cole, Nicki Minaj, Pharrell and more. The most important thing though is to realise that whether its nearly two decades old or not, there is still a real need for this brand that gives a voice and platform to British black music acts that would have no other mainstream music awards giving it a platform. Urban music has highs and lows in the British music charts. One year we’re taking over the whole chart placing’s, and the next we’re blanked like the proverbial black sheep of the music industry family. Kudos to all those that continue to fight for its existence and mainstream broadcasters like ITV that understand that the black music pound and audience demographic is not to be ignored.

======================================
O JAYS LIVE AT INDIGO O2.

So the living R&B singing legends that are the O Jays had the Indigo o2 dancing and singing their spats and socks off this week as they played London for the first time in years. All three gents are well past their boy band days but still managed to bring the fancy slides and shuffles dance routines in their crisp white suits and shoes. Accompanied by a full band of familiar musicians and part time London hires whom they teasingly referred to as their ‘’Justin beibers’’ they had the middle-aged ladies in the audience screaming. Lead vocalist Edde levert had the male audience members kicking back relieved that their ladies were going to be in the mood for some loving that night as he smooth talked them all with none of his lover man spiel diminished. A great show with plenty of holding hands and singing along to classic its like ‘’love train’’ and ‘’backstabbers’’.

==================================
RAPPERS DELIGHT- HIPHOP COOKBOOK

Next I had a cook off in my kitchen after being sent RAPPERS DELIGHT- THE COOKBOOK, which had incredible recipes inspired by your favourite Hip Hop artists of today and yesteryear. Split into three categories of Starters, Mains and Desserts, the book includes a wide range of delights such as Wu-Tang Clam Chowder, Public Enemiso Soup, Run DM Sea Bass and Busta Key Lime Pie. Even legends like Public Enemeys Chuck D endorsed it saying ‘’ “There are all aspects of Hip Hop, but the best of it has unique blending of ingredients, detailed preparation as well as great taste.

Rappers Delight connects like great food, makes too much sense. Each of the recipes is accompanied by a bespoke piece of artwork, created by one of thirty of the best upcoming illustrators. Rapper’s Delight celebrates the many humorous parallels between food and Hip Hop, making it a must-have for anyone with a love for cooking, music or illustration, or indeed all three. The book was put together by foodie, hip-ho and news lovers- Joseph Inniss, Palth Miller and Peter Stadden.
========================

Asian Achievers Awards
ALL PICS COURTESY-PR Mediapix

JASMINE WITH WINNER NAUGHTY BOY.

The Asian achievers awards took place at the opulent Grosvenor house hotel in park lane. The Asian Achievers Awards celebrates individuals who have inspired communities and achieved outstanding accomplishments in their respective fields.

FATBOYZ DANCE TROUPE PERFORMED.

Not to be confused with its slightly glitzier celeb packed awards of a similar name- the Asian awards. The Asian achievers awards is much more serious and business and entrepreneurial skewed.

This year the Rt Hon Phillip Hammond MP, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs made one of the first welcoming speeches (after he had been flower garlanded by the Asian organisers). He said

‘’There is much to celebrate in the contribution of British Asians made to our national life- be it in sports, in culture, in academia, in public service and in community life. But perhaps most strikingly and most dramatically in business and the professions where the British Asian community hunches well above its weight and produces some outstanding successes. Generating wealth is an essential prerequisite delivering all the means that we want in our society. Tonight we celebrate the entrepreneurship for which the British Asian community is rightly renowned. As the foreign secretary, I recognise promoting Britain’s prosperity for trade and investment as a core activity. So the British foreign office will be relentless in helping businesses, breaking through markets and pushing trade and investment. I invite all British businesses to make full use of all our services. Our services of trade and investment are at your disposal in our shared endeavour to create value for Britain. And as Asia continues to rise, I am confident that many of you will be leading the way using your unique networks to help Britain in just that. Specifically, we are planning expansion of our representation in India as we push through big difference in British trade as India’s vast market opens up for business and investment. We celebrate tonight in arts, sports, business and professions that were fulfilled by hard work, utter commitment and single minded determination. They will often be achieved in the face of setbacks, challenges and adversities. They are hard earned and well deserved. The awards that will be presented tonight are fitting recognition of these achievements. I congratulate the award winners and all the nominees. You are an example to your community and to the whole of our nation. Ladies and gentlemen, the PM has asked me specifically to add his congratulations to all of you. In fact, you, as a community with your great contribution add to our national life. So may you all go from strength to strength, building bigger and better achievements in the future. But before you do, before you go back to the hard work for which you rightly renowned, just take a few hours this evening to relax, to enjoy yourselves and celebrate the achievements that you already have under your belt’’.

CHERIE BLAIR LOVES THE ASIAN COMMUNITY!

Next Tony’s wifey Cherie Blair QC, CBE made a Speech thanking us all for making her charity the charity of the night. She said

‘’I am so delighted to be here, on this evening to such an important event for the UK and for the Asian community. I would like to congratulate all the nominees, and of course all the winners. I am particularly excited this year, as the charity you’re assisting is my own charity. Thank you in advance for supporting our work.Of course you all know that once upon a time, I lived in 10 downing street and while I was there I had the opportunity to travel, sometimes with and without my husband around the world, and I met some incredible women, from many different communities. So many of them struggled, they struggled with their status, struggled with their businesses, and I felt that with the right help they could contribute so much more. My foundation’s mission is to provide with entrepreneurs in developing and emerging market with the skills, the technology, the networks and access capital they need to become successful small and growing business owners, enabling them to contribute to their families, to their economy, and to have a stronger voice in the society. Since we began in 2008, we have already reached over a 100,000 women entrepreneurs in more than 70 countries. One of the very first countries that we started in was India. A country that I know very well. So much so that I often say that I qualify as an NRI. It’s in India that we have some of our most successful and award winning projects like in Gujarat, using our mobile phone project. Tonight we are raising funds for a new project that we want to start in Maharashtra, in collaboration with Mann Deshi foundation. We want to provide a 1000 rural woman entrepreneurs with business incubation, access to loans and business growth opportunities, that will have impact not only on the women themselves but also on their families and their communities. With our support these women owned businesses will be able to make enough profit to contribute to their family’s future. Please give generously because tonight we are supporting entrepreneurship, so let’s help these women entrepreneurs to make a difference in their lives and the lives of their great nation, India’’

CHERIE BLAIR- ANOTHER NON ASIAN ALWAYS HAPPY TO DRESS IN ASIAN WEAR TO RAISE CASH FOR THEIR CHARITY! LOL

. People did give generously and our actioneer for the night- that former criminal convict Jeffrey archer helped hustle £100,000 from diners. Pretty impressive!

Winners included Hanif Kureshi CBE for Media, Arts and Culture; Mahmud Kamani, co-founder of boohoo.com for Business Person of the Year; and Wasim Khan MBE, the first British-Pakistani to play professional cricket in England, for Achievement in Community Service. Picking up the Editor’s Award for Rising Star, was ground-breaking music producer, Naughty Boy, aka Shahid Khan, who shot to fame and critical acclaim last year with his hit single, ‘La La La’.

NAUGHTY BOY MAKES A HEARTFELT ACCEPTANCE SPEECH.

Naughty boy told the LONDON360 camera crew that he sells his talent first and then his identity- he doesn’t make a big deal about being Indian. He added

“To receive this level of recognition from my peers of fellow Asians is such a privilege. I’m proud of being a British Pakistani and I’m proud to represent the Asian community. I grew up immersed in Bollywood movies, where music, songs and extravagant dance sequences dominate, and that has really influenced the way I produce music today. “Although I’ve worked hard, I’ve been so lucky to have such amazing support from my incredible family and friends. Making music is all I’ve ever wanted to do, and if I can do that while being a positive influence in my community, then that is just the icing on the cake for me.” Shahid Khan was hand-selected by Founder and Chairman of The Asian Achievers Awards, CB Patel for his remarkable achievement in music. The self-made producer began his meteoric rise to fame in 2005 after he was awarded a grant of £5,000 from The Princes Trust. Later that year he also appeared on Channel 4’s hit game show Deal Or No Deal, presented by Noel Edmonds, winning £44,000, which enabled him to purchase equipment and begin recording music. The 29-year-old has since worked with internationally acclaimed artistes like Emeli Sandé, Chipmunk, Tinie Tempah, Katy Perry and most recently with Zayn Malik of One Direction. He now runs his own production company, Naughty Boy Recordings, and his 2013 smash hit, ‘La La La’, featuring Sam Smith was a global summer sensation, with over 386 million views on YouTube, to date. Mr. CB Patel, Publisher/Editor, ABPL Group says: “I am delighted to be awarding Shahid Khan with my Editor’s Award for Rising Star. He had a dream and worked hard to achieve that goal. Today, he is a respected star in the music industry, working with some of the biggest names of our generation, and he is an outstanding role model for every young person who has a dream.”

HOW DO YOU GET AWAY WITH A POLE DANCER PERFORMING AT THE ASIAN ACHEIVEMENT AWARDS? POP HER INTO A TUTU AND LET HER FLY!

Also honoured was the late Flight Lieutenant Rakesh Chauhan, whose parents collected the Editor’s Award for Bravery and Patriotism. Fl Lt Chauhan tragically lost his life in Afghanistan during a routine flight and was honoured for his service to his country. His father, 61-year old Kishor Chauhan, received the honour and said: “It’s with great pride that I accept this award. It’s a very difficult thing to accept and I’m proud of Rakesh and what he achieved in his short life. That is why I agreed to accept this recognition.” The young pilot died alongside fellow Intelligence Corps non-commissioned officer Lance Corporal Oliver Thomas, Captain Thomas Clarke, Warrant Officer Class 2 Spencer Faulkner and Corporal James Walters from the Army Air Corps. The funeral service for the 29-year old drew in more than 1000 mourners in Leicester, who lined the streets to pay their final respects.

LONDON360 REPORTER USMAN BUTT SPEAKS TO WINNER OF WOMAN OF THE YEAR- PRIYA LAKHANI.

Priya Lakhani,told London360

”I think it’s incredibly important. It’s one of those community’s, I think, where we have generations of women before us, who have had a very typical role. That’s generally been in the house, you know, making sure everyone is fed and raising the children. I think that now that women are more equal, its important to celebrate that, so that the younger children and the younger generation can look up and say, hey I can do that, It’s already happening”.

Since launching 14 years ago, The Asian Achievers Awards has helped raise millions of pounds for charity

Full list of ASIAN ACHIEVERS AWARDS 2014 WINNERS

1. Business Person Of The Year – Mahmud Kamani
Co-Founder boo.hoo.com

2. Entrepreneur Of The Year – Dr. Richie Nanda
Executive Chairman, The Shield Group, the UK’s largest independent Total Security Solutions provider

3. Sports Personality Of The Year – Dilawer Singh MBE
Sports Council for Glasgow Elected Director

4. Uniformed And Civil Services – Nazir Afzal OBE
Chief Crown Prosecutor for the North West

5. Media, Arts And Culture – Hanif Kureishi CBE
Playwright, screenwriter, filmmaker and novelist. In 2008, The Times included Kureishi in their list of “The 50 greatest British writers since 1945”

6. Woman Of The Year – Priya Lakhani OBE
Ethnic food entrepreneur, founder of Masala Masala, an Indian stir-in sauce

7. Achievement In Community Service – Wasim Gulzar Khan MBE
Chief Executive, The Cricket Foundation and CEO, Chance to Shine.

8. Professional Of The Year – Prof Sir Tejinder Singh Virdee, FRS
Experimental physicist and Professor of Physics at Imperial College London and one of the ‘founding fathers’ of CMS

9. Editor’s Award for Rising Star – Shahid Khan, aka Naughty Boy
Music producer, acclaimed for his global summertime hit single ‘La La La’, featuring Sam Smith and A-list collaborations

10. Editor’s Award for Bravery & Patriotism – The Late Fl Lt Rakesh Chauhan
29-year-old RAF Officer who died in Afghanistan when his helicopter (Lynx) crashed during a routine flight.

JASMINE WITH ACTRESS LIZ HURLEY ON SET OF ”THE ROYALS”.

Liz Hurley at Three Mills Studios

The London360 team and I made the pilgrimage across London to the Three Mills Studios, to visit the gorgeous Elizabeth Hurley, on the set of her new TV drama series ‘’The Royals’’.It was a secret mission so alas that’s all I can tell you about it lol.
=====================================

PRIVATE DINING ROOM AT HOUSE OF LORDS.

Dinner House of Lords

21 guests were invited to a very intimate VIP dinner at the House Of Lords, where I was sat around a table of TV and medias biggest movers and leaders. Lode Michael grade hosted the dinner and in attendance were HOST: The Lord Grade of Yarmouth CBE, Media Trust CEO Caroline Diehl MBE, Peter Ainsworth – UK Chair, the Big Lottery Fund – MT’s largest Funder. Former Conservative politician 1992-2010.,James Caan – Dragons Den, Adam Crozier – ITV Chief Executive ,David Farnsworth – Chief Grants Officer at The City Bridge Trust, Charlene White – ITN news presenter , Eddie Nestor BBC Radio, Sophie Turner Laing – just departed Sky as Managing Director.

HOUSE OF LORDS CROCKERY DESIGN.

The food and service in the private dining room were- as you you’d expect- impeccable. We were treated to Pea & mint soup – served with pea shoots and sea salt croutons, Salmon – Oven-baked, served with grilled asparagus, tender stem broccoli, sautéed new potatoes and a tomato & caper beurre noisette (gluten free), Posset – Lime & blackberry posset, served with lemon & poppy seed shortbread biscuit.
==========================================================

Strictly Come Laughing at Hackney Empire

EX CAST MEMBERS FROM EIGHTIES TV SHOW-DESMONDS ONSTAGE TO RAISE MONEY FOR STRICTLY COME LAUGHING.

An annual comedy show, where all the comedians and entertainers give their services for the night for free to raise money for the village of Tafo in Ghana. This is the final year after having raised over £100,000 over years and changing the living conditions and quality of life for villagers in Tafo. Faces on the night came from Eastenders, Casualty, Holby City, Stepken K Amos, Richard Blackwood, Kevin J, Eddie Kadi and my fave comic Slim amongst others! A night full of fun and raucous laughter.
RTS Conference
=================================

RTS CONFERENCE.

The Royal Television Society’s London Conference 2014-Power, Politics and the Media is a day that always brings out the bona fide leaders and rules of the UK TV industry. The heads of every broadcaster as well as independent TV company directors and execs are fully tanned and glowing fresh off their one month of vacations on their yachts and in full suited swag mode. The gents in their crispest most expensive shirt suit getup and the ladies in their knee length business frocks or elegant feminine suits. (This crowd wouldn’t be seen dead in a pair of vulgar, tacky red-soled Louboutins.

After breakfast coffees, teas and mini croissants, the programme for the Conference (which was full of power players) was opened by president of the Royal Television Society Sir Peter Bazalgette, who hosted a conversation with media mogul- Chase Carey, President and Chief Operating Officer, 21st Century Fox. it was a rare chance to hear directly from one of the most powerful men in world media, Peter Bazalgette spoke to him about building his American business and bidding for more British companies.
Carey said he looks for ”unique content and brands that stand out, we’re investors in good content so that we can create more content, so yes, you can expect us to invest more in British content. The content created right here in the uk clearly appeals to a global marketplace. We aren’t just investing in the uk, we are an enormous investor in creating content in India too amongst other countries too’’.

Session Two had me gripped. It was titled The Future You Don’t Want To Face and chaired by Channel 4 news host Krishnan Guru-Murthy. On the panel were broadcasting’s futurists who spoke about how television on demand is challenging the industry’s incumbent leaders. These High profile disruptors were: Matt Brittin, President, Northern and Central Europe Operations, Google, Karla Geci, Head of International Media, Facebook and Kevin Sutcliffe, Head of News Programming EU, VICE News. They discussed whether television is losing power as a medium, if channels are becoming an unwarranted middleman between programmes and viewers, and who the financial winners and losers are in the world of video on demand.

Clearly the online world is affecting the ay we engage with media. A lot of us acquire news via twitter and brands like vice. Indeed, the BBC has just hired 10 YouTubers to get their radio listeners demographic to under 30. Winners will be those that embrace all the new technology, losers will be those that stick to one platform and channel.

The one thing all this panel agreed on was the difference their brands have with mainstream TV companies ‘’many organisatons are paying a lot of staff to not do very much, which successful digital brands have tiny teams delivering bigger and better’’. Vice’ Kevin Sutcliffe made me laugh when he noted

‘’the BBC mentioned they now had some Vice style programing’’- I said stick to what you do best’’. I.e. stay in your lane!

Amongst the other sessions was Tomorrow The World- After five years in the doldrums, deal-making is back in fashion. Are we, as it seems, on the verge of another re-shaping of the world media order? And, if so, what does this mean for the competitiveness of UK companies and the prospects of the next generation of creative entrepreneurs? ITV Studios Manging Drector Kevin Lygo was particularly hilarious with his legendary comedy timing.

Of course with the Scottish indy referendum debate raging ahead we had to have a debate titled ‘’Kingdom Not United’’. Scotland votes on the 18th of September whether to become an independent country or not. Although the debate has played out on TV as usual social media and digital engagement now loom much larger in the toolbox of political campaigning. The same will apply in the forthcoming 2015 UK general election. In a session looking at what really influences voters, Laura Kuenssberg is joined by three players who are the heart of this debate.

Head Of Sky News John Ryley makes a dig at ITV News sometimes “ducking out of important news stories”

The next session that had me all fired up was ‘’Have I Got News For You?’’ Chaired by Stewart Purvis CBE, Professor of Television Journalism, City University. The topic covered was ‘The BBC believes it is going to be an extremely difficult undertaking cutting 400 jobs without affecting quality. Do its competitors feel the same kind of threat of cutbacks or are the BBC’s problems an opportunity for them? Leaders of the three main providers talk about the sustainability of TV news in the fully digital age. Speakers included the great John Hardie, Chief Executive, ITN, the equally legendary John Ryley, Head of Sky News, BSkyB and the incredible force that is Fran Unsworth, Deputy Director of News & Current Affairs, BBC. Apparently 25-34 year olds are the fastest group leaving on air news viewing.

”Have I got news for you” panel.Chief Exec ITN John Hardie makes great points about sustaining TV news in a Digital age

Later in the afternoon there was a Keynote speech by Secretary of State – The Rt Hon Sajid Javid MP,Department for Culture, Media & Sport, where In his first major appearance as Secretary of State, the Rt Hon Sajid Javid MP outlined the government’s plans for the television industry.

=================================================

Stylist ”LIFE LESSONS”evening.

Next it was off to stylist magazine’s regular evening gathering. Yet another women empowering women social gathering. After a quick glass of wine in the opulent bar of the Ham Yard Hotel, we were treated to three speakers giving us their life lesson about what every woman should know.

LEYLA HUSSEIN SPEAKS.

Up first was FGM victim, and survivor Leyla Hussein, now an FGM campaigner. She stated that she wanted to be just a mum that didn’t want her daughter to be ashamed of her virgina and be subjected to FGM. She’s ‎Had to have regular therapy to understand, deal with and repair the relationship with her mother who had to endure FGM twice. Leyla said

‘’I realised she was also a victim. We now celebrate the fact that her granddaughter – my daughter- isn’t cut’’.

‎Next up was my old MTV compadre – presenter June Sarpong, who spoke about her early upbringing in Walthamstow e17. Wondering through the local Market as a young girl. Acknowledging her multicultural community ‘’my School was like looking at a poster of United Nations kids. We had Indian Jewish, Indian, Chinese, everything. It was a Good grounding for my media career being surrounded by different people and being able to talk to anybody’’. She expanded on her Ghanaian background. The fact that her Mother is 67 and on her 3rd marriage but revealed that her mum hadn’t wanted to have her 3rd one yet cos her daughter June still hasn’t had her first!

‎June ended with the well known quote by Marianne Williamson.

‘’ Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world.’’

June advised us females to Google Anne Marie slaughter – an American who talks about fertility. June added that she feels the government needs to give young people emotional intelligence. ‘’I personally think that after 16 they should have tantric sex lessons. Boys in Kerala India have tantric sex lessons’’. Anyone fancy a trip to Kerala?

The 3rd and final speaker was presenter of location location location. The amazingly powerful and engaging Kirsty allsop who brought up the issue of women and fertility again after getting a lot of flack for it in the press in recent months. .

‘’What have I learnt that every woman should be aware of? Having the guts to tell men that you can’t have healthy babies for as long as them. “Be honest with each other…friends/partners/daughters*/sons….we can have careers at any age….but not make healthy babies. For now, we haven’t opened the fertility window wider. It’s easier and less of a heartache to have kids when our bodies allow us to when we’re younger. Nature is not a feminist! “Getting to the young girls is a very new thing for me. People tell me I don’t need to talk about it but clearly I do. I don’t want to make people feel judged. All young men and women should know. In the UK we are the oldest women to give birth in the world! Society has shifted massively in one generation. I set a date by which I’d have a baby and two male friends had even agreed to be my babydaddy. But luckily I then met my partner”

Kirsty also talked about women’s relationships with one another ‘’‎Women need to be much less tough on other women. In careers, A woman who has kids is a multi-tasker with better skills. They don’t come in to work going “I went to a great festival this weekend and am hung-over” Equality for all women is something we must always keep fighting for!
‎
Now I’m excited about getting my two-step on, at the legends that are the O Jays gig, and then to end the week- the Asian Achievers Awards- LIFE! LIVE IT!

If you’re a music fan then you know the O’Jays. Part of the star studded Motown line up of yesteryear, a band that’s made numerous hits and are still standing. This week they play in London for the first time in over 20 years.

Having recently celebrated their 50th Anniversary, The O’Jays are living legends…American treasures. The term “living legend” is often overused and abused, but with The O’Jays, well, there’s little argument that the honorable tag truly applies. With their place in modern music secure, The O’Jays could have cruise-controlled to that comfy hammock on a sandy beach, umbrella-decorated drinks in hand. Why?
(1) An ocean-wide body of work that spawned 24 US Top Ten smashes and 59 total charted songs.
(2) Incredibly energetic and dynamic live shows.
(3) Mad respect for their Olympian vocals. And …
(4) their social and political impact on generations and nations. But doing things slowly is not Eddie Levert, Sr., Walter Williams, Sr. and Eric Nolan Grant’s modus operandi. After 50+ years making such international hits as Back Stabbers, Darlin’ Darlin’ Baby, Love Train, I Love Music, Use Ta Be My Girl and Have You Had Your Love Today, The O’Jays are light years away from easing up on the gas. And like fine wine, The O’Jays just get better with time.

Through the years, they were blessed to have had the late great choreographer Cholly Adkins around. Adkins taught them the importance of showmanship and how to execute their steps while still delivering their songs. So if you think boy bands like Boyz To Men, Take That , Damage, and Westlife started the harmony R&B genre that juxtaposed smooth lyrics with unison choreography think again.

When working at MTV for over a decade, I would accompany black music stars like Snoop Dogg, P Diddy, Jay Z, Beyonce, Mariah and more across global tours in buses, trains, planes and jets. The O’Jays were always a staple part of their I Pod playlists. I was lucky enough to sit down with O’Jays lead man Eddie Levert this weekend to talk about so much. Here are snippets of our chat where we go in on all things R&B, Beyonce, and Ferguson.

JD
Singers from your generation still have an incredible strong live performing voice. Performing so many decades after you first began- what is that like? As many dance routines? What’s different?

EL: The energy level goes down a bit with age, but the fire never dies. We give the audience a performance that lives up to how it used to be back when we started out.

JD
In one of my previous jobs, I often went on tour with music stars. Acts like Snoop and Puffy play your music all the time and even include it in part of their show- (LOVE TRAIN, to finish their joint tour)- are you aware and what are your thoughts on the younger generation representing black music today?

EL: I respect all music. I think these young guys are geniuses with how they take the old stuff and spin it to a modern audience. I think that the younger generation representing black music today is extremely talented.

JD
R&B used to be such a big popular genre with numerous stars…in recent years – especially in the UK- the number of chart stars making great R&B music has really declined. What are your thoughts on this and who from the new generation do you like?

EL:

We all emulate someone to become who we are as an artist. When we emulate someone and do something unique with it to set ourselves apart, we become the candy of the day. Destiny’s Child became the candy of the day because that the “it” factor. The “it” factor for Destiny’s Child was Beyonce.

JD
A decade ago, you co-starred in the movie The Fighting Temptations, which starred Cuba Gooding Jr. and Beyoncé Knowles. Beyonce is ruling the music world globally right now- what has she brought to the image of young black powerful women?

EL: Beyonce showed that she is creatively powerful. She doesn’t let the world dictate her personal life. She’s lasted in this business because she has morals and values.

JD
A couple of decades ago, black music stars would unite speak up and protest about injustices in the black community. Not too long ago, Harry Belafonte called out Jay Z and his generation for letting the side down. Recently , not many black stars have spoken about #FERGUSON, what are your thoughts on that? If you were still in your 20’s would you have taken a stand? What’s the difference between the climate now and back then?

EL:

In this business, you have to be of sound mind and pick your battles. When you become the opinion and the messenger, they make you sound like the oppressor. I applaud all of the people who have stood up for what’s right with regards to the Ferguson incident. I myself stepped up during the Trayvon Martin incident.

JD
What are your favourite memories of performing for British audiences in the UK?

EL: One of my favorite memories of performing in London was when we were doing “You Are My Sunshine” and an audience member yelled out to me, “Preach that song!’’

‎
The O Jays are performing at the O2 Indigo this week- September 18 and 19th
Tickets available from: www.kililive.com

JARREN DALMEDA RADA GRADUATE.

JARREN DALMEDA GRADUATES FROM RADA.

After a number of shoots for various stories this week I made sure I made up for it on Thursday night with a triple whammy of fun. I started the night off at the RADA Theatre in central London with a huge group of friends (music managers, PR heads, marketing dons, photographers, film directors and TV presenters), who had gathered to view the final RADA graduates performance this year. Our homeboy Jarren Dalmeda, who has already had careers in youth work, tour DJ to A List celebrities (Kelly Rowland, Beyonce etc) and celebrity DJ in his own right, had finished his MA in drama and finally on the first rung of his acting career ladder.
He and his class has scripted a play called The Raft of the Madusa and the show was epic, gripping and so intense I was in despair at the storyline, so engrossed in the acting were we all. Jarren is proof that it’s never too late to start afresh in any field, and that hard work most certainly leads to future success. Congratulations Jarren!

VIVIENNE WESTWOOD PARTY

DAME VIV AND ALL THE A LISTERS AT THE PARTY.
PHOTO CREDIT *** OFFtheGRID – Dame Vivienne Westwood’s Trillion Fund is Finding Infinity ***

Straight after the RADA performance we raced over to SNAP Studios warehouse rooftop in Islington where design icon Vivienne Westwood had invited me to a solar music rooftop party called OFFtheGRID . Dame Vivienne Westwood arrived on her bicycle and hosted the party for her crowd-sourcing platform Trillion Fund in partnership with Ross Harding of Finding Infinity to support the “renewable energy revolution”. Headline support came from EcoPlanetBamboo.

VIP guests at the solar powered party included Jamie Hince, Pam Hogg, Ella Eyre, Nicola Roberts, KT Tunstell, Lilah Parsons, Alexandra Burke and loads of very ultra fashionable design key influencers and celebs in pretty frocks, ankle boots, quiffs and skinny jeans.

ALL OVER THE PARTY WERE GREAT ARTY IDEAS AND SET UPS FOCUSED ON SUSTAINABLE SOLAR ENERGY FOR THE FUTURE.

Guests were treated to DJ sets from Jamie Hince (the Kills), Viva L’Amour, Pandora’s Jukebox and Paula Goldstein De Principe while enjoying an organic food and cocktail menu curated by private chefs and cookbook authors HEMSLEY & HEMSLEY and sponsored by Nyetimber English Sparkling Wine and Absolut Elyx premium vodka the world’s most energy efficient distillery. The event was taken off the grid and the Snap Studios rooftop displayed a Giant Robot designed solar sculpture sponsored by EcoPlanetBamboo and Laax Resorts.

The ambition for Vivienne Westwood’s Trillion Fund is to accelerate the global switch from fossil fuels to clean energy by contributing towards the $1 trillion a year investment the UN says is necessary to keep the world below the 2 degrees warming threshold. Finding Infinity, found by renegade engineer Ross Harding, is on a mission to transition the world from the finite to infinite resources using fun, creativity and style.

You can always tell a bourgeois function readers. The food is always frightfully fancy. We were treated to mouth watering Canapés: Chicken tamarind almond butter lettuce wraps, Cucumber maki crab rolls, Stilton and mushroom quinoa arancini balls served with mint and parsley oil, Hansen & Lyderson smoked salmon. Individual bowls of food:Beef ragu with courgetti , Cauliflower tabbouleh with lamb meatballs, Red lentil squash coconut curry , Courgette and pea quinoa risotto, Puy lentil, and beetroot and apple salad. Sweet canapés included Mini BB Brownies, Fig and goats cheese trifle and Salted apricot caramels.We drank Hemsley Collins (honey, lemon and Absolut Elyx vodka fizz), Blueberry and English Lavender, Pomegranate and Ginger Fizz , Absolut Elyx Vodka Tonic with cucumber. Told you didn’t I? Fancy.

Links
Trillion Fund – https://www.trillionfund.com
Finding Infinity – http://www.findinginfinity.com
Vivienne Westwood – https://www.viviennewestwood.com

Instagram: @trillionfund @finding_infinity @viviennewestwoodofficial

Twitter: @TrillionFund @FindingInfinity @FollowWestwood
Facebook:
www.facebook.com/TrillionFund
www.facebool.com/wearefindinginfinity
www.facebook.com/VivienneWestwoodOfficial

Hashtags: #findingit #trillionfund #findinginfinity #OFFtheGRID

RITA ORA #UNSTOPPABLE LAUNCH PARTY

From east London we raced back across to west London to the old Subterania nightclub now called MODE for Rita Ora’s party to launch her adidas sportswear range #unstoppable. Rita was in the house dancing on the balcony to the tunes provided by DJ Manny Norte (the name you can trust). In the house were west London’s finest Bashy and East London’s finest Kano- who both gave me a double hug on arrival which summed up how cool the crowd and vibe were.

RITA ON THE SUBTERANIA/ MODE STEPS.

Last night saw the official after party of the hugely anticipated launch of this year’s most talked about collaboration; adidas Originals by Rita Ora. Friends, family and Rita-bots alike came together to help the global icon celebrate her partnership with adidas Originals at West London’s Mode. Marking the achievement of a childhood goal of collaborating with the brand with the three stripes, Rita and friends danced the night away to music provided by DJs Moxie, Manny Norte and Lee Rous.

Guests including Rita Ora, Daisy Lowe, Nick Grimshaw, Jessie Ware, Henry Holland, Professor Green, and Nicola Roberts came out to show their support for the unveiling of the superstar’s exciting new fashion venture earlier in the evening at the brand new adidas Originals London Flagship Store.

DJ MANNY NORTE SPINS FOR RITA.

Known as much for her fearless take on fashion, as for her head turning musical collaborations, Rita Ora brings her energy and original spirit to every piece in the collection. The first collection, Black, is based on Rita’s London look – and each collection that follows take inspiration from very personal experiences and aspects of the global superstars life.

Rita says: “The collaboration came about through mutual love and appreciation. I have always been a fan of adidas Originals and respect what they stand for in their fearlessness and originality. I worked very closely with adidas Originals to put a personal touch in every piece with connections to my music, my career and my life. I’m really proud of the collection and beyond excited for my fans to get their hands on it!”

ADIDAS LADIES PAOLA AND AKUA, BBC MARKETING’S JAY DAVIDSON, JASMINE DOTIWALA AT RITA’S PARTY.

Super music producer Dready was dancing away in the middle of the dance floor, new artist to look out for Trishane was networking, singer song writer Roses Gabor looked uber fly, Island Music’s Benny Scarrs was having fun and we all danced up a storm onstage sipping rum and cokes. Rita’s new collection is as fly as you’d expect from this Ladbroke Grove chic and we were all attempting our best at swiping some off the display wall. Londoners hustling their graft hard all over town this week- got to love it!

LONDON LIVE TOPICAL CHAT

I finished my week as usual in the London Live hot seat talking to the lovely Claudia-Liza Armah where we discussed american comic legend Joan Rivers passing away, smuggling of illegal immigrants in Fiat Panda cars, Portobello Rd beefs between buskers and residents and the meanest sports fan ever!

JASMINE AND CLAUDIA WAKE UP LONDON.

One young lady that I’ve been hearing about over and over again this past year is Charli XCX. My music industry mates both behind and in front of the radio would whisper in conspiratorial tones ‘’keep a look out for Chari XCX – she’s about to blow up!’’ this year she’s featured on both Icona Pops hit ‘’I love it’’- which she wrote. She also appeared on Iggy Izaea’s hit ‘’fancy’’ and this past month she performed her own hits boom clap and break the rules at the MTV Video Music Awards. A quick check on twitter confirms that she’s spent the past year flying across the globe daily for tours and promo, as well as having been nominated for loads of global ‘’ones to watch’’ and awards this year.
So, she’s a bona fide singer songwriter that’s flying that British flag globally. She’s much bigger in Australia and America than she is the in the UK. I had to meet her to catch up on her story so far.

BACKGROUND

Like so many of this digital generation, this mixed race, Hertfordshire girl the Internet to make it to the top in her chosen field. Every music star from Rita Ora, Britney and Christina Aguilera is vying to work with this straight talking chic who’s full of contradictions regards feminism, youth movements and more.

I caught up with Charli who was born Charlotte Emma Aitchison, at a shoot for BEAT Magazine in Shoreditch Studios where she’d flow in directly from new york to politely take her seat and follow the stylist and photographers instructions for their shoot.

Its crazy to think this Bishops Stortford girl is making teenage music anthems for today’s generation of girls across the world that, like her, grew up on a diverse mix of music from pop to hip-hop.

CHARLI’S NEW SINGLE IS ”BREAK THE RULES”

She reveals that in her early days she had a fascination with London and city life. Her musical influences were Britney spice girls, shampoo, and typical girl pop. ‘‘At 14 i discovered Ed Banger and got into those acts’’.

At the age of 14 in 2007, she began recording her debut album on a loan granted by her parents…it takes one persuasive teen to convince adults to invest in the fickle music industry. ‘‘I never saw those songs as a debut album I just did songs at 14 that I put onto the internet, I made a deal with my dad, who ran a small venue in Bishops Stortford, I wanted to record some demos so he lent me the money to do that, so as soon as I made some cash, I paid him back. I don’t want people to think I was a spoilt rich kid cos I really wasn’t’’.

Her mothers Indian, and her fathers Scottish. Being from a mixed race background, she’s representing the very current generation of young Brits but this didn’t really have a massive influence one way or another of her influences or her experience of growing up ‘’ my parents never really pushed any particular music onto me so I just listened to Britney all day. I always saw myself as very normal and felt very comfy, my friends never made a big deal about my background. My parents were just happy with me doing whatever I wanted to do. I didn’t really see myself as being different, there was never really a thing made about it., I was very unaware of it until very recently actually and coming from the generation I’m from I don’t see anything , I just listened to Britney spears all the time’’.

CHARLI SINGS THE CHORUS IN ‘FANCY’- THE MOST SUCCESSFUL SONG OF THIS SUMER SPENDING WEEKS AT NO.1 IN CHARTS ACROSS THE WORLD!

In the same way that music reflects the society it comes from, celerity and tabloid faces should do the same. In recent years a lot of more diverse faces than before have sprung up with names like Jessica Ennis, Alexa Chung, Leona Lewis, Lewis Hamilton, and Charli, who all reflect the changing face of this generation. These declining cultural barriers must only be a good thing and Charli acknowledges that for her parent’s generation it was a lot different. ‘‘I think its great and amazing that any industry can be diverse, we can all just do what we want to do, coming from the generation that I come from its not shocking, but I recall my parents telling me when they were first a couple it was a shocking thing. I think its great to fly the flag for where you’re from’’. This reminds me of something that Olympian Jessica Ennis said when she described herself as more Sheffield than mixed race when asked where she identifies most strongly with.

Charli was signed at 15 and is still only 22 so no overnight success, it’s taken her years to get where she is. Being spotted so young and not going down the reality TV show route though, she says is a blessing in disguise. ‘‘When I was younger I was angry at that reality show world, cos I felt like I was working really hard and not getting the success that I deserved, but now I can see that it’s a good thing. My journey to where I am today has been long winded, with lots of twists and turns, and allowed me to become who I am. It didn’t happen for me sooner because I wasn’t ready, but the weird routes have helped me understand and given me more control’’.
This is demonstrated by her never getting lonely when on the road ‘’ I actually don’t get homesick- I love my family but I love touring. cos I’ve been doing this now for so long i have a lot of friends across the world. I stay grounded cos my mates don’t care about Charli XCX. That’s great cos i don’t wanna be a diva. If I am on the radio they turn it off lol!

ONLINE

She comes from a generation of artists where blogs and social media are paramount, and acknowledges the importance of online presence in her marketing…’’for me I wouldn’t be here without the internet, I like it, it’s a difficult thing to figure out and can cause stress for people but it keeps me accessing my fans that’s great’’.
She has nearly 200k twitter followers, engages with her fans regularly and is more than aware of the pro’s and con’s of being so available to her fans 24-7. ’’Just as easy you can access them, they can access you. but I see myself as a musician not a celeb. I see myself as an anti pop star, I think if you put out stuff about your personal life you become about that instead of your music.

When pressed on her definition of an ‘’anti pop star’’ she explains ‘’nowadays there seem to be a lot of rules about being a pop star, things you have to say the lies you have to tell, if u do something crazy it should be crazy weird and wild not walking out of a club drunk at 2am, I’m not into the tabloid crazy world. Also I’m just like a bit really weird. i don’t have time to play into the traditional pop star rules. I don’t like being rude I think it’s much harder to be rude, and much easier to be nice’’.

Pop stars working the web, is the norm now. A few years ago Rihanna wrote on twitter that only she would run her twitter and that there would be no more ‘’corny label tweets’ Now that Charli’s established herself, she’s still sitting in the pilot seat of her social media. ‘‘I do all my own social media its not time consuming its better when its from my brain as opposed to someone 20 years older at the label’’.

So like Bieber, the web and online marketing has had a huge impact on her career- in early 2008, she began posting songs from her album, on her official myspace. I also love the fact that she seems to have a fascination and obsession with female alternative rappers like Iggy azalea and uffie (I use the word ‘rappers’ loosely). ’’At 14 I began to make my own music, I wanted to make cool rap, white girl rap and I completely failed cos it didn’t sound good at all’’.

CHARLI WITH HER MATE IGGY AZALEA-THE MOST COMMERCIALLY SUCCESSFUL ”RAPPER” EVER.

She continues to gush about her love of female rappers

‘’I just wish I was a rapper, I was obsessed with Uffie, I’ve always thought that rappers were really cool and so I wanted to work with them cos i don’t think I’m good enough to be one. They’re just so fierce strong and powerful and I love that in a woman like Iggy or Brooke candy. I always have fun with them’’.

…’’but this guy Chaz Cool found me online and invited me to come and play at a party. I’d been to London and hadn’t gone out there so I was like yeay I’m so excited. I told my parents. They freaked out ‘’you wanna go to an illegal rave in hackney wick, I said they could come so they did, and that’s how I got into that scene’’.
The idea of adult parents at an illegal rave doesn’t come without its awkward scenarios though. Charli recalls a story about when her father was offered the MDNA drug but thought the seller had said MDA- the flooring boards. Her father reassured the seller that he would if he had enough room in the car shocking the seller who wondered just how much he wanted to buy! LOL

So this Straight talking, dark pop princess, turned attending raves at 14 into an international pop career.

MUSIC/ SOUND

Like Timbaland, Kanye, Jessie J, Naughty Boy and more, CHARLI’S the latest in a long list of acts that started writing/producing hits for others. of course, record labels are now hip to the pie chart money split and if they can cut someone out to make more profit then that’s the strongest card to play. Signing charli means they keep all the writing, publishing and keep their golden egg -laying chicken close to home. She’s responsible for writing some of this years biggest pop hits from ‘’fancy’’ to ‘’I love it’’. The way the music industry talks about her, it sounds like she knocks out hits in minutes. Is it really that simple? She admits ‘’I love it was written in 30 mins in a hotel room, songs that come the fastest are the better ones as its your instinct that the 1st recorded thing is the best’’.

Her hit boom clap is on constant rotation on radio but Charli was hitting the big time early in her career with zero radio play. We debate whether one day mainstream radio and its monotonous playlists will all just die ‘’my 1st record didn’t get any radio play at all and I still managed to tour all across the states, but now my singles are on radio I see its good for it. Its not detrimental to your success, there are lots of different types of radio. It’s definitely helped me get a wider audience but the internets what’s really helped me and music thrives there. It’s hard to say about radio-it surely pushes pop acts to another level’’

With break the rules there are young girls globally loving to embrace their rebellious side- but I’m a bit older than Charli and have seen many a strong rebellious female music star in my time push the envelope, I don’t think anything will in my mind top Madonna’s sex book, so I wonder if there can be such a thing as a rebel in pop any more? Or have all the rebellious stances been played out? ‘’ I think you can be a rebel still, it goes back to my earlier definition of pop star vs. anti-pop star. You can break the rules by even wearing what you want to wear and not playing by the rules of record labels. I dress how I dress for me. ’My new music album isn’t a straight up pop record in way so I am reveling by making exactly what I want and I hope to push boundaries with that. Other artists like Grimes, Lorde and Sky Ferreira are really pushing the envelope too.
‘’I’ve always been different; when I was younger I had media training and was told I was the worst person that she had ever media trained. Then there was a meeting just about my hair and what to do with it. I was like ‘ what is this about?! You guys don’t even have hair’.

Most people are intrigued that Charli gave her hit song – I LOVE IT away. Like Ne-Yo many years ago who wrote ‘’you should let me love you’’ for Mario and then was plucked to be the front man, leaving fans to ask ‘where is Mario now?’’ its anyone’s guess as to whether we will see another huge hit for Icona Pop again or whether they will do a Psy and fall off the radar into one hit wonder world.

Charli says there’s no way that ‘’I love it’’ would have ever made her own personal music catalogue ‘’that song was written 2011/12 i was in Stockholm and writing with this guy Patrick Berger, I was nervous, I asked him to send some beats, he did, one was for I love it, I wrote it quickly and took it to him the next day, he loved it and said it was cool. We were going to get a coffee and bumped into the girl from icona pop and she heard the song and her group recorded it. I didn’t want it cos I didn’t want to make a record like that. It was nothing like the record I’d already slaved away for five years and it didn’t fit on my album but fitted so well with them’’.

After “I love it” was released, Charli had said that she had her ‘’first real experience with the bad side of the music industry and how people can change and how it can become like more of a struggle. It wasn’t a very enjoyable experience. When it should be a time for celebration it’s never really been that nice’. Its funny when u see the whole music industry machine pump into action. Even though it was Icona Pops song I observed a lot from my position, when moneys involved some people go crazy, it became a bit weird and then thereafter I’d always be asked to keep recreating that song for lots of other artists. I started becoming jaded and annoying. It opened up a lot of weirdness to me’’.

FELLOW MUSIC PEERS

Charli’s a fan of ladies like Kate bush, Britney and Bjork- she said that when she was 7 she really wanted to be a spice girl, and that girl power never dies! – She also comes across as a powerful, kick ass girl bringing a new round of girl power; something she see’s herself fitting into comfortably. ‘’ I feel like there’s a huge wave of girl power around now with feminism regularly being discussed by high profile artists, I knew what girl power was when I was younger bit wasn’t picking up on it when I was 7, but now there’s so much to talk about and that people are talking about it is great. I want to encourage my fans to be themselves and be strong females and never feel like they’re not adequate and that they have to fit into rules, I feel like my fans already believe that anyway’’.

She’s a fireball of contradictions; she delights and provokes, is passionate and pushes the boundaries of pop music with her stances on sexy outfits vs. empowered women. When it comes to sexuality and image she is strong about her position. ‘’I think u can be a feminist in the pop industry and I definitely see myself as a feminist. I think there are different perceptions on what a feminist is and how u should dress, but those boundaries are being broken down, people say how can u be a feminist when you dress like that and I don’t even understand that statement because I believe that men and women can wear whatever they like cos its about equality’’.

CHARLI IN HER ‘BREAK THE RULES’ VIDEO.

Her views on the Miley Cyrus twerking storm are supportive. ‘‘I think she was just doing her and good for her, I think she’s punk and one of the only punk artists out there now. I’ve seen her live show and its genuinely one of the best shows I’ve ever seen in my life and then I think good for her. I don’t think that performance was thought through and intended to cause as much offence as it did’’.

As well as girl power, she also mentioned that you’d noticed ‘’a decay in youth culture, stating, “I don’t feel like there’s anything for people to really grab onto these days. There’s no movement to speak of.” (Rolling stone mag)
With me she expands ‘’i feel like in the 60s there was a real feeling and identity in the air that everyone could be a part of and hold on to and now I feel that’s not the same anymore, it still lives a bit now, but more on the internet as opposed to being in reality. There’s nothing to be angry about that’s when all the best stuff in pop happens when people are angry, and that’s why feminism is exciting to me cos its something that’s important instead of just falling out of a nightclub going ‘’here I am, again, doing this, nothing really important again’’

Charli has toured with Coldplay and Ellie Goulding, and is building up quite a celeb following- Rita Ora and Britney want to work with her but she’s turned down working with some stars that have come calling- (She rejected a collaboration with Christina Aguilera). She shares with me her criteria for pressing red or green.

USA

Americans have always had a healthy fascination with British pop stars from the Beatles to spice girls, but recently there’s been a really strong British movement taking over the USA,– from Adele to Ed Sheeran, Sam smith and naughty boy- everyone says Charli is next to blow. ‘’ I don’t feel any pressure cos I promised myself last year that I wouldn’t care about ‘’success and charts’’ anymore cos its really stressful, I made a promise to myself to make music that feels right and cool, and its worked, its not the forefront of my question anymore’’.

IMAGE / BRAND

Art is a big influence in her work- she’s been inspired by musicians as well as artists and photographers. at 15 she was photographed by David bailey- that’s an incredible story! She name drops even more spectacularly ‘’David bailey was actually my 2nd photo shoot ever- my first was Rankin, David hated me, he was classic David bailey and i was like a right little bitch, but then we got in front of the camera we just clicked, he was incredible to work with and he invited me back a week later so I did something right’’

There’s certainly no Barbie doll TOWIE style fashion for this rock meets punk lady. Iggy azalea says its “badass that Charli can do a dance routine in a cheerleading outfit and still be punk rock’, she’s been referred to as the ‘dark pop princess’, calls her sound ‘’ magical, ethereal, gangsta pop.’’ and calls her look Disney grunge. i laugh at the contradictions ‘’I am all about contradictions actually yes, I like things that sit on the edge of bring slightly wrong, so wrong that its slightly right. i like contradiction a lot and think it produces good art!

Her look and brand are as distinctive as her music, and her image and attitude really match her sound – with her own font logo and fashion sense too, she smiles ‘’it is intentional’ ‘I’m behind everything i do, every video i create is my treatment or idea. It’s the same with everything I wear, I feel like as I’ve grown up and I’ve found my own style, i don’t follow fashion i have my own style – I’m not a slave to fashion man’’.

We finish with a couple of funny anecdotes that may surprise most people. Her 1st ever gig was in a disused peanut factory and she has a recording of a ghost on her phone after staying in a hotel, which was reputed to be haunted. The ghost apparently drowned in the frozen lake and likes to hang out in the hotels billiard room. Charli and pals recorded through the night and the next day when playing the sounds back heard this really low-pitched woman’s voice talking. I know what you’re wondering. No. The ghost didn’t make it onto any tracks.

Do you know who you really are and where you came from? No. Really.

Every time I would ask my African Americans friends where they were originally from, they’d always insist ‘America’. Even though I’d question that they most likely had a journey across from the Caribbean or Africa at some stage in their lineage, they’d flatly deny that history, and say their ancestors as far back as time could tell, stated they were American and that’s what they were comfortable with.

Some may be happy with this; others may want to find out where exactly from the motherland Africa they are from. Maybe there isn’t a direct line of family history or you are adopted and curious to know more.

However, if you’re going to get your DNA tested, you’d better brace yourself for the results. A tester revealed to me that a young wealthy Muslim man came in to have his DNA tested for his birthday and found just two generations earlier he has Jewish roots. He was shaken to say the least.

The pro’s and con’s of the test raced around my mind. What if I could make a real connection to my past? Could it reveal something interesting about my ancestors or better yet me? This information is easily accessible in my DNA. Most people think they know their family history but what if there’s more? It could redefine the way I think about my family history. Learn about all the places and cultures that make me who I am. It’s a great way to get in touch with who you are and your family story. What’s my ethnicity? Where am I from? The answer is literally at my finger tips- in my DNA. So I can trace my family’s generations throughout the ages way beyond the paper trail. DNA testing has evolved so quickly in recent years that DNA testing like this wasn’t even possible a few short years ago. It seemed too good an opportunity to miss.

I found out about it at the London launch of osargenews.com, an African Diaspora news aggregator delivering news twice daily to all African and African Diaspora countries.- the site offers news, blogs and original content and covers politics, business, arts & entertainment, technology, society and local information along with a recruitment section, documentaries of the diaspora and ground breaking DNA testing products. As my father is from Kenya I was intrigued. Yes, was that kid that pushed all the buttons that I was warned not to.

I’d seen it on television and read about in the newspapers, and it makes you think twice. For those who aren’t keen on needles, the good news is that all commercial testing companies use mouth swabs, so the whole process is blissfully painless. A friendly lady handed me a few ear bud like swabs and rubbed them inside my cheeks and popped them into a sealed envelope- which I had to lick and seal myself. Two weeks later my results were in. They compared my unique DNA to billions of people all around the world to find the common strands that help define our ethnicity and where we are originally from.

Genetic testing has become the new middle class trend in recent years. Does the birthday boy have everything he could ever want already? Coffee maker, Porsche, personalized Louis Vuitton luggage, Rolex watch, a day at Silverstone, and a season pass to his sports team’s games? Well give him something that money can buy! His own DNA ancestry test! Show him who he really is. Does he descend from kings or….

DNA testing is a big thing for the National Health Service too. This month in the UK, it has been announced that our government would be spending on new medical DNA testing so that they can better understand the genetic lineage of people who are ill and determine if they’re prone to certain diseases. The UK is set to become the world leader in groundbreaking genetic research into cancer and rare diseases, which will transform how diseases are diagnosed and treated, thanks to a package of investment worth more than £300million, the Prime Minister announced this month. If you are part of a group who is at a high risk for certain genetic diseases (such as Tay-Sachs for Jewish people and Sickle-Cell Anemia for Black people), it is imperative that you get tested before you have children. This can save so much heartbreak for you and your family, but also makes you aware of the possibilities out there before making a life-changing decision. After having her DNA tested — a process which can cost anywhere from a hundred dollars to several thousand — Angelina Jolie learned that she is a carrier of a defective BRCA1 gene. That defect, though not the only determinant of breast cancer, meant a 65% chance she’d get the same disease that killed her mother. Some DNA tests do focus on testing or health, the one that I had done focus’ on my genetic ancestry..

I kept being warned that my results might surprise me. In the case of many African ancestry tests, for example, approximately 25-30 percent of those tested will learn that their paternal line is European in origin. This is the legacy of plantation society coming down to us in our genes, and was seen in BBC’s ‘Motherland: A Genetic Journey’.

Frankly you could have told me I was from anywhere globally and nothing would’ve been a shock or surprise one way or the other. I have Persian ancestral and religious background. Persians were thrown out of Persia years ago and it was renamed Iran. So I’ve always seen myself as a bit of a refugee. I feel like I belong to everywhere and nowhere. But I am curious to know to get an idea of geographical origin well before genealogical records began.

Two weeks after my swab results came back from the laboratory, I sat down with Dr Michael Baird, one of the world’s leading human geneticists, who explained my results to me after I grilled him on the procedure and why it was so new and current for people of African heritage.(Look up Dr M Baird- he is a huge international DNA expert, that’s been used at the centre of huge legal cases like Anna Nicole Smith/ OJ Simpson etc)

Tell us in layman’s terms about the new African Diaspora specific DNA testing products exclusive to osargenews.com and what is possible now when it comes to finding out about our historical and ancestral roots? How does it work?

Our DNA contains a great deal of information including where we came from. This is because DNA is passed along from generation to generation and characteristics of our ancestors are still present in our DNA, if you know how to unlock the information. By collecting a few cells from the inside of your cheek, enough DNA can be isolated to perform a number of tests that can start you on your journey to learn about your ancestral roots. Once your sample arrives at the lab, DNA is isolated and testing performed that can provide information about your ancestral roots. Depending on the test you choose, you can learn about what biogeographic groups your DNA contains, information about your maternal and/or paternal ancestors, or what current populations you most closely resemble. You can choose the path you want to take for your journey to discover your ancestral roots.

Why is this a relatively new area that the AFRICAN DIASPORA should be interested in?

Advances in DNA technology allow one to more accurately extract information from your DNA to answer questions you may have about where you came from. Recent work with African populations has contributed to the ability to make connections that were not possible previously. The osargenews.com site provides useful information about a number of different aspects related to the African Diaspora including DNA tests that can help in the journey of understanding.

How does the African GPS Tracking System work?

The GPS (Geographic Populations Structure) is a new way to analyze DNA data developed by Dr. Eran Elhaik of The Sheffield University that can provide coordinates to pin point the geographic location of your ancestors. The same type of sample is collected for the GPS test but can provide results for male and female lineage, people that may be biologically related as cousins, and the geographic location of your ancestor(s).

Have the global African diaspora been open to finding out about their ancestral past or have some people shied away from the truth as many stories have come from centuries of pain historically?

The journey required to find one’s ancestral roots is a personal journey. Many have embraces the science behind the testing and been able to make meaningful connections with their past.

Are there examples of case studies that have shocked or been a surprise to people interested in finding out about their historical roots?

I do not have any such stories since we do not typically follow up with clients once they have received their results. However, I am sure there are surprises among those that have taken DNA tests.

Africa has tended not to have a global voice for so long and for so long been painted in a disproportionate light by western media and governments- why do you think this is?

Hopefully as people embrace their African roots, their voices will be heard.

What should the western world be aware of when it comes to the massive ground breaking strides forward that the African continent is making?

The continent of Africa will play a major role in the future of the world, just as it did as the birthplace of humanity.

Any final comments on how people can get involved?
If people want to start their journey of self-discovery of their ancestral roots, they should get involved with appropriate social media sites like osargenews.com and consider having their DNA tested.

My own results? I was handed and talked through a stack of easily understandable graphs and certificates that are fascinating. I come from the M group who were around 60,000 years ago and originated in east Africa. My ancestors were amongst the first humans to leave Africa, migrating along the southern coasts of Asia. My bio-geographical chart showed, surprisingly, that I am 75% European, 13% east Asian, 7% sub-Saharan African and….5% indigenous American!

Another surprise was that my high-resolution native population match showed that my DNA matches mostly from the Maldives, India then Europe. My high resolution world match results come in high from Mesopotamia – the name for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, corresponding to modern-day Iraq, Kuwait, the northeastern section of Syria and to a much lesser extent southeastern Turkey and smaller parts of southwestern Iran. Finally they also gave me my genetic profile, which is unique to me and me alone. Honestly, to an untrained eye like mine it just resembled numerous car registration numbers like codes but was nevertheless fascinating.

So no huge surprises for me, aside from a bit of American Indian and Maldivian roots. But for my friend- the writer and comedienne Angie Le Mar it was deep and emotional. Angie hails from Jamaica but her tests came back showing that her bloodline was pure, and much less mixed than mine, and came from an exact location identified in West Africa. She’s always had a pull towards Ghana so this confirmed her instinct.

So, what to gift the person who has everything? Tell them who they really are!The test costs around £250, half the price of those costly Louboutin designer shoes!
What’s really exciting about DNA testing is that it’s all about YOU!

Start your research at osargenews.com. You never know what you might unearth! Good luck!

AFROBEATS STAR D’BANJ AND KANYE WEST.

Alongside the usual diverse array of pop, indie, rock, hip-hop, dub step, grime and more musical genres of live shows that happen nightly across the UK, in recent years, a very exciting new party player has entered the fray. He goes by the name Afrobeats and is clearly here to stay with venue bookings across the country for its main stars set in stone.

Numerous pieces have already been written about the afrobeats scene. Its play listed on Radio 1, the BET Awards this year recognized the acts on air, black music star’s Kanye and Akon have signed up African talent, and now the trend of collaborations between Afrobeats artists, and international acts from other genres seems to be exploding.

UK chart music star Wretch32 who collaborated with afrobeats act Sarkodi tells me it’s a good thing

“It’s so good to see Afro beat acts getting worldwide recognition. A genre as strong as that deserves to be global – its talent you can’t deny’’, whilst British (via Congo) comedian / host Eddie Kadi enthuses ‘’It is testament to how far the music has come and its ability to cross over. As a result we will now see a rise in new Afrobeats stars from the diaspora’’

The infectious beats pumping out of Africa are something that the world cannot ignore. A sound so popular and specifically African conjures up the term Afrobeats. The popular sound taking over the UK airwaves pay homage to the old skool highlife sounds of Afrobeat, conceived by Nigeria’s musical genius Fela Kuti. The evolved, modern genre is a young and funky twist, where you can find memorable hooks sang in Pidgin English over an Afro infused hip-hop beat.

It’s right here in London that we see the magnitude of its success. Clubs and radios stations are being forced to play Afrobeats to cater for its high demand. The demographic and economic presence of Africans in the Diaspora has been the wagon through which Afrobeats is breaking into our western consciousness.

Let’s start with Nigeria. It’s so huge it’s akin to a continent with numerous tribes in itself. There are over 165 Million people in Nigeria alone, not to talk of the Nigerian community living abroad. So that puts into perspective the potential reach that embrace and support this monstrous musical movement which is spreading its tentacles globally, and therefore generating a lot of money in the process.

Nigerian born, British based, female music act May7ven even feels that the scene is even having a beneficial economical effect in the UK

‘’Afrobeats has travelled far in a relatively short space of time here in the UK. We still have a long way to go, but the progress is good, steady and we have certainly got the attention of the entire music industry the world over. Odd tracks are getting play listed on day time on some of the UK’s leading radio stations, and we’re starting to have a presence in the charts and clubs. Also, with the frequency of the large scale concerts holding at 5,000 capacity venues headlined by Afrobeats stars, we can certainly now claim to be contributing to the UK economy however little. People may laugh but the airlines are making money, hotels, FEU (Foreign entertainment tax) UK Boarder, jobs are being created!’’

In the early days of the Nigerian Pop music, acts like Eedris Abdulkareem attempted to gain equal footing with American artists such as 50 cent, by inflammatorily sitting in 50 Cents first class seat; a protest to the unequal treatment of indigenous artists by Nigerian promoters and concert organisers. After reportedly being told to ‘Get out of that seat’, Abdulkareem responded “You cannot treat me as a second and or third class citizen in my own country, I will not take it from anybody,” Abdulkareem said after the infraction. “If 50 Cent is a star in America, I am equally one in Africa.”

Fast-forward to 2014 and we’re seeing more Western superstars seeking out African talent and wanting to become a part of this addictive music phenomenon. This movement was internationally recognised when Kanye West signed Nigerian acts D’banj and Don Jazzy to his G.O.O.D music label in 2011. it has to be said. Jaws dropped. People were impressed and excited. Nothing could prepare fans for the moment when Kanye West walked on stage to join Nigeria’s hottest exports- the then ‘Mo’Hits’ turned ‘Mavin Records’ label. Kanye joined them at Hammersmith Apollo in London for their third instalment of the Koko Koncert series (2011). The excitement was intense. Fans alike stamped, shouted and screamed in awe as Kanye West took off his chain and put it around Dbanj’s neck, announcing to the world that the signing was official. Dbanj and Don Jazzy were then the newest members to join G.O.O.D Music.

Tim Westwood (CapitalXtra) said at the time: “I know Kanye well, but when he arrived back stage it was so exciting – it was a hot moment in the game. When he came on stage to perform and then 
passed the Good Music chain to the D’Banj, the crowd went crazy”!

Some acts have even been accused of jumping onto this latest fad as a business angle. Abrantee Boateng is a radio presenter on CapitalXtra in the UK who champions the afrobeats genre and is known as DJ Abrantee and states..

‘’there’s definitely been a steady rise as a lot of people still don’t understand the whole afrobeats movement although they are jumping on the band wagon, which is a good thing, as it now shows that people are taking notice. One thing is for sure, in every club around the world you will now definitely hear the DJ play an afrobeats set, which wasn’t happening before’’

DJ Shortee Blitz says …

‘’ The Afrobeat Scene on an international level is growing like crazy!! From a dj standpoint. I can play certain tunes all over the world and they’ll get love, whether they know its afrobeat or not. I suppose it depends on the type of dj you are. Whether you play by numbers or play the shit you actually feel…’’

May7ven seems to the outside world to have gone from an R&B Branded Artist to Afrobeats, but she disputes that and clarifies …

‘’ It would appear that way as I was part of the growth here in the UK when it started. When I started my career, I called my style AFR&B, African R&B just because I felt I was different and simply somehow wanted to incorporate my culture, sounds and language into my music as some of my male counterparts such as 419 squad, JJC Skills, Weird MC and co. There were no templates to follow from any other female singers on TV or radio combining African drums, language or sound with real R&B at that time and I wanted to pioneer something as a female artist amongst the many R&B females around at that time. It was during a meeting with Guy Moot from EMI at the time, where he spoke about being original and suggested that there wasn’t that much of a difference between Jamelia, Kele Le Roc and a few of us at the time and he was right. I wanted to be original and stand out; I believe it is working for me now, as you now witness a wealth of female Afrobeats artist’s actively working, combining R&B with Afrobeats. I have travelled the world, performed for presidents, received multiple awards and am in a position to be as unique and original as I want, standing out in my own lane. It is still tough, but my last 3 independent releases have had received A-List on UK radio and across various TV stations right here in the UK, which is fundamental in building a bigger fan base outside of this genre. I still have a long way to go and a massive agenda so I take nothing at all for granted’’.

So how many of the new collaborations from her genre are authentic? So far there have been numerous alliances between African and international acts, in the same way as in the early British days of urban music trying to break out to a bigger listener demographic, we used to persuade American acts with huge amounts of UK record labels cash, to feature on our remixes. The idea that now the occasional UK acts, as well as American is being sought out, to feature with afrobeats talent, is telling.

The collaborations usually still involve a huge exchange of cash and persuasion from the African teams side, but American and UK acts aren’t silly. They see this scene is blowing up with an unstoppable momentum of its own, and want to be seen as part of the movement. The international act is of course, always expected to shout out the African act in their verse. (Sean Paul) ‘’Fuse ODG and SPeezy- WHAT WE TELL THEM?-BLAZE THEM!’’…./ (Kanye) ‘’That D Banj cause hysteria, As we step of the plane in Nigeria’’…../ (Rick Ross)‘’Konvict music-Turn up the music we bumping P Square’’….and so on.

After all what’s the point of parting with bucket loads of cash without a personalised co-sign right? (Probably just because I’m British), the UK/African collaborations sound more authentic and less forced to me than the American ones. Something to do with the diaspora community here in London being much more engaged with African culture be it food, friends or music than the American’s who seem so far removed from it all).

Some things never change though. The joint videos are still materialistic urban cliché’s with opulence in the form of champagne, shaking posteriors, exotic palm tree’s, penthouse suites, the love of wearing all white and yachts- The difference here however, that’s hilarious, is that a lot of African communities are actually filthy rich and keepin it real, unlike early UK and U.S acts, who often had to act out and fake their bragadocious wealth.

The videos also expectantly feature an over sexualisation of women and you’ll see that reflected again in the collaboration between African act Dr Sid and X Factor alumni Alexandra Burke who collaborated earlier this year on their single Baby Tornado. Alexandra rocks a skimpy clinging red mini dress and shorts whilst she suggestively and sexily sings her chorus.

ALEXANDRA BURKE AND SID.

“We shot the video for ‘Baby Tornado Remix’ featuring Alexandra Burke with UK producers Uzo Oleh and Michael Buckman”, says Dr Sid. “They were able to bring something different to my visuals. The magic happened when both our styles met. Alex brought her sexy vibe, while I brought my African flavour. I feel it was a great synergy between the UK and Nigeria and am very proud of the result. African music will thrive with or without international recognition because it’s not just music- it’s also a culture. It can never die out- it will just keep evolving. Having the support and interest internationally, is an added bonus. I continue to be grateful for all the support”.

Alexandra herself has an opinion on what is helping Afrobeats star rise.

‘’Personally I think social media, clubs and the radio all play a massive part in fuelling the love of the Afrobeats scene. Not only that, but also most importantly Afrobeats is a joy to listen to. It’s particularly great to listen to when you are in need of cheering up, as it will never fail to make you want to dance. It always puts a smile on my face. I’ve been friends with Dr Sid for a while, I actually met him through his fiancé. I told him about my love for Afrobeats and we sat in my studio and listened to his album. It all just worked out. I heard his song Baby Tornado and fell in love. We wrote the verse and I recorded it there and then in my studio at home. It was a magical experience. Shooting the video for Baby Tornado was awesome. The energy was electric. The vibe was totally natural. Dr Sid made me feel right at home. He also taught me all the right dance moves! It was great, I look back with very fond memories’’.

ALEXANDRA ON THE VIDEO SET FOR BABY TORNADO.

Maybe Alexandra’s collaboration and the afrobeats movement in the UK will encourage MOBO to televise an afrobeats category next year as BET did this year. MOBO CEO Kanya King explained ….

‘’Afrobeats has been around for a while, but it’s definitely starting to gain the recognition it unreservedly deserves. Afrobeats has more recently taken off in a big way I would say – there are now one hour long sets on mainstream radio stations in the UK such as BBC 1Xtra and Capital Xtra. We have seen Afrobeat artists such as Fuse ODG flourish on the dance floors. If you look at his ground-breaking success – achieving the highest charting UK Afrobeats single to date, collaborating with Sean Paul and a spellbinding performance at last year’s MOBO Awards – it’s difficult to escape the impact Afrobeats has had on the UK music scene and worldwide which now leads to great collaborations between African and international artists, a clear win-win and thus also creating more opportunities for African artists to gain popularity in other parts of the world. We’re very happy to be supporting this development’’

MOBO CEO KANYA KING.

ITV News host Charlene White is awed by the speed of the movement…

‘‘the pace at which the scene has been moving is incredible. I remember being in Kenya visiting a friend early 2011 – and falling in love with D’Banj’s track Gbono Feli Feli. So to fast forward to 2014 and see international acts (finally!) seeing how strong the market is for Afrobeats is great. What has also been wonderful is to see so many UK house producers working with Afrobeat sounds like Fela Kuti. These changes can only be seen as positive’’.

As a supporter of black music over two decades, journalist Hattie Collins, (Music Ed: i-D,Freelance: The Guardian, Grazia, RWD, BEAT, ASOS, The Hunger, G-Shock, The Sunday Times Culture…) has seen the African acts fight for their right to party in the global music industry, across many decades….

‘’ It’s exciting to see the slow spread of Afrobeats; for so long anything from Africa (and indeed Brazil, India, South America and so on) is thrown into the somewhat reductive ‘world music’ and therefore ‘niche’ category. In fact, Afrobeats is as thrilling and important as anything the UK or the US has produced and has the potential to be as globally culturally important as Hip Hop, R&B or Dancehall. It’s taken a few years, but finally, it’s not unusual to read about Azonto on Noisey or listen to a mix from Mista Silva on i-D. Now we can all cheer on Stylo G and Fuse ODG as they get another Top 10, or when we hear that Kanye West has signed D’Banj to G.O.O.D music and Tinie inked Wizkid to Disturbing London. The latter is an important point; these days, the all-important co-sign can often make or break an artist. Having the OK from a Kanye, Jay, Wayne or Drake can make the world of difference – see Drizzy’s recent Popcaan endorsement as proof, as well as Sean Paul teaming up with Ghanaian raised Fuse. Together, the two bagged a Top 3 with Dangerous Love. When a mainstream act endorses a new artist or genre, it shines a hugely powerful spotlight and sends a powerful message. The future of Afrobeats looks incredibly bright right now, and deservedly so. It’s about time that African, Indian, Brazilian music was invited from the shadow of the land of niche to be fully embraced by audiences worldwide’’.

Vietnamese Afrobeats DJ Neptizzle from Reprezent Radio says…

“I am a firm believer that it is a collective effort of Artists, DJ’s, promoters and fans that are keeping this genre relevant. As a non- African DJ that plays Afrobeats- I learnt very quickly how powerful the music is. There ain’t no party like an African party! The fact that someone like Alexandra Burke, or even myself who doesn’t come from an African background can appreciate the music and want to be involved, speaks volumes of just how influential the music is. The language barrier doesn’t hold anyone back either. For me, it’s about the beat, the rhythm and the enjoyment! It’s so infectious I’m not surprised that international collaborations are happening. Even if the collaborations are happening just for money, or purely out of love of the music- either way the music is spreading and it shouldn’t be ignored if you want to stay ahead of the game’’.

May7ven feels collaborations have their perks and drawbacks ‘’ Collaborations are always a great thing and a positive step if done properly. Examples of Wyclef and FuseODG on Antenna are a great example of getting the mainstream to finally pay attention to a hit song, exposing it to a wider audience. It is an opportunity to tap into the international artists audience presenting our style and genre of music to their world in a fashion they are familiar with, rather than forcing it down their throats. It is also a sign that times are changing and the international stars themselves welcome this sound and generation of hit makers to compliment their own records; their aren’t many examples of this so far as at the moment Afrobeats artists are the ones featuring them. Chingy welcomed and featured 2Face Idibia and myself on his own record and on the Alexandra Burke track that I am on, her team approached us to feature on a remix of her own track and not the other way round so certainly a good sign. With the exception of Fuse ODG and 2Face, the collaborations have only been good for raising the profile of the afrobeats artists in their own industry, as the international artist are not the ones promoting the songs; for example Rick Ross and P Square arguably the biggest collaboration for Afrobeats but it was noted that Rick Ross was not actively promoting/releasing or even tweeting about the song; we have had some amazing features but none of them have really penetrated the desired territories.Alexandra Burke also did one with Sid, I think it is good for him as it’s a nice song but equally Alex in her case benefits and shows her versatility and exposes her to the African market if she was to have her own release there or try her hands in Afrobeats’’.

DJ Abrantee concludes ‘’Before the scene came to commercial awareness it was already there on the underground, and more importantly the artists were doing the Afrobeats back in Africa creating their own scene. What’s happened now is the UK are taking notice of the Afrobeats scene due to artists like Dbanj, P Square ,May7ven, Mista Silva, Atumpan, Moelogo and of course Fuse all getting daytime playlists on commercial radio and charting ,which wasn’t happening before. Loads of people would tell me that the afrobeats scene wouldn’t last and that it would dwindle away. What you’ve got to understand is that Afrobeats is not a man made genre back in Nigeria /Ghana and the rest of Africa. The artists are living the music they make, and the knock on effect is that the new artists from the UK and beyond are now adapting that style and adding their own western style, to create an even more vibrant sound and culture incorporating the dances and more in terms of collaborations. I was recently at the MTV Mama awards where afrobeats artist collaborated with U.S artists in a big way: Sarkodie with Migel, Trey Songz with D Banj and French Montana with Ice Prince, so collaborations are definitely happening on a big scale. Collaborations from different genres of music are always a good thing as it just broadens the genre into different markets, which is healthy for the scene’’.

As we head into the last quarter of 2014, the UK has been given an array of confirmed gigs and Afrobeats tours from the likes of Iyanya, Mafikizolo, Tiwa Savage, Wizkid, Davido and Dr Sid. This further reiterates the words of Sid that ‘the scene will continue to thrive with or without international support’. There will always be a demand. I look forward to see what else the scene has in store.

My TOP FIVE AFROBEATS COLLABORATIONS (IN NO PARTICULAR ODER) ARE:

5-Fuse and Sean Paul:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cdpbjfV4e4
Dangerous Love stormed the UK chart at number 3!

4-Dbanj and Kanye West:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8CUbMu-pdg
Scape Goat was a massive look with Kanye jumping on a favourite of
Dbanj’s

3-P Square and Rick Ross:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY2H2ZP56K4
Beautiful Onyinye

2- Timaya ft Sean Paul:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4tWUJKiT1M

1- DR Sid and Alexandra Burke:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2UGjxk5Mjs

To see just how strong the collaboration route is becoming take a look at just a few of the other major collaborations between Afrobeats artists and international artists:

VIDEOS:

Fuse ft Wyclef ‘Antenna remix’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LCoksSQMzsGhana/US

Ice Prince ft French Montana – I Swear:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhqVanTPqKoNigeria/US

Dbanj FT Snoop Dogg Endowed remix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diNW3D4SfRcNigeria/US (2011)

TRACKS
Dbanj and Kanye West:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuyxLYeoVqk – Scape Goat was a massive look with Kanye jumping on a favourite of Dbanj’s. Nigeria/US

Sarkodie and Wretch 32 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmKbV-nWty4 – massive Ghana/uk link up

Watch the throne- ‘lift off’ The track which ft Beyonce, Kanye, Jay Z was co-produced by Nigerian hit producer Don Jazzy:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZCNs0rnKxkUS/Nigeria

Wizkid ft Wale ‘Drop’:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suMFolZ4–4Nigeria/US

Usually nothing David Cameron says affects the music industry. This week he’s shaken the whole UK scene up by announcing that from October, music videos will go through the same classification system as films and other video content, in an attempt to give parents more information to protect children from “graphic content”.

The voluntary pilot will involve the big three music labels in the UK – Sony, Universal and Warner Music – as well as the British Board of Classification (BBFC), YouTube and music video platform Vevo. The big three labels will conduct the pilot, but the BPI, which represents Sony, Universal and Warner Music and more than 300 independent music companies, expects that all music labels will adopt the system once finalised. It will run for three months, kicking off in October.

The music labels will submit music videos that they consider could contain content that should be classified as for age 12 or over, using BBFC guidelines. The BBFC will then rate the videos as it does with other content, for which the labels will pay a fee to cover the cost of rating in the same way that the film industry currently does. The rating process should take around 24 hours.

A rating of 12, 15 or 18 will be assigned to the music video and passed on to the label. Videos deemed not to include objectionable content for children under 12 will not be classified.
The three-month pilot is intended to finalise a system that works for rating the videos and having the data tagged to them when uploaded to say they are classified. For the initial trial it will simply be a notification on the video of an age classification.

After the three-month trial it is expected that YouTube and Vevo, as well as other video hosting services, will look at developing parental control filters that screen out videos marked as inappropriate for children of specific age ranges.

When I first heard this I had two reactions; both negative and positive…

From a negative point of view – David Cameron –seems to have a very out-dated way of thinking. He suggested that people ‘’buy music videos’’ so I’m not sure if he really understands how the internet works and that music videos are freely viewable on numerous online platforms and that for kids, if something’s banned, its even more desirable. Alas young people are more tech savvy than adults, they live online. They will track it down wherever it lives like they do video games, which also have ratings.

The main thing about this move that suggests it wont make any difference, is that it only applies to UK acts and videos which aren’t the biggest culprits- the American and Caribbean artists are much more racy.
British talent like Adele, Naughty Boy, Emeli Sande, Ed Sheeran, Charlie XCX and more have made global impact with billions of sales with never having removed a sock let alone their underwear.
Its artists like Rihanna, Beyonce and Miley Cyrus, who are signed to the American arm of the big labels, that are the culprits in this court and they wont be included in the new age classifications.

This move to me isn’t about helping the over sexualisation of children in the UK, but is about votes and being seen to be pro-family- elections are coming up and David Cameron mentioned this during a speech about families this week.

From a positive point of view, Its really important to understand that David Cameron is talking about ‘’advice’’ not ‘’restricting access’’ which many have their proverbial knickers in a twist about. However, this move isn’t for the kids, it’s for the parents so they can make an informed choice. This is not about freedom of speech, but about being responsible. He’s been talking all year about the sexualisation of women and girls in the media, from female genital mutilation, to women’s rights globally, so this is a natural next step in his current campaign.

Speaking of campaigns, on change.org there’s a petition online that nearly 19k people have already signed here in the UK, so there is strong feeling about this in many areas.

The fact is that music videos have become more sexually explicit over the years since I was a presenter on MTV News, Over a decade ago we had more of a balance with music videos, they were much more creative. Racy videos have been around since the early 80’s but never have they been so gratuitous as they are now. Music is not about sex, but today’s generation often align the two together, and think it is and that’s wrong.

In the eighties and nineties, as well as raunchy Madonna, Grace Jones and Jodeci X-rated videos, we also had very creative, artistic efforts. But now that a lot of big budgets have been cut, often pop stars and videos directors resort to the old tried and tested titillation route.

Sex sells- we all know this. I made a lot of making of the video shows for MTV in the nineties for 15 years, and can tell you that the casting couch is not a myth and its even worse in 2014. Directors love it and pop stars love it even more. One very famous pop star married, and now has a family with his sexy video leading lady.

Video commissioners at record labels will lazily green light the same video directors, who know and use the same video girls in all their work. There are also a lot of backhanded deals that go on in the industry with acts, directors and video commissioners using the same people over and again, so maybe Cameron’s new move will encourage British labels and directors to be more artistically creative and spread their creative pools more widely?

I know female superstars who are constantly trying to push the boundaries and ‘’out-sexy’’ each other. To some this is women empowering themselves, to others its helping mould the minds of very young impressionable young people in a very unhealthy way. Today we are bombarded by music videos that are very sexually explicit and demeaning to women on social media, in bars, cafes and shops at all times of the day. During my time at MTV, videos were restricted to watershed rules like TV and played after 9pm if too sexy. So I understand why David Cameron wants to help censor the content, but at this stage its like the barn door closing after the music horse has bolted.

The sexy girls that frolicked in these videos used to be sneered at as one level above groupie status in my day. Now its an envied viable career option for many young women happy to act like porn stars ‘’just until I make the big time-then I’ll show them I have brains as well as boobs’’ cliché lines.

Parents should be concerned about the influence that music videos have on their sons and daughters. They contribute to a culture that says that women should not be treated as equals and with respect. There’s considerable evidence from research, that sexualisation in music videos creates a context in which violence against women and girls flourishes.

Also, make no mistake this isn’t just about young girls being overly sexualised. Young men, more than any other time in history, are hyper sexualised and are learning very negative behaviours about sex, relationships and love these days, leading to the rise of male depression, gang rape, stress, pressure, metal health and suicide.

More importantly I would say is that parents actually need to spend more quality time with their children instead of plonking them down in front of the computer or TV virtual babysitter.

You cannot block the Internet, but even if the new ratings system can be switched on just at home so the child is aware that the parents don’t allow it and wont accept it, this sends a clear message to kids that set boundaries and plants seeds in their heads that what they’re watching is of a sensitive nature.

I work with hundreds of young people in my capacity as executive producer of London360, which is made by young TV reporters from all across the capital. Their view on music videos such as Blurred Lines and Wrecking Ball are that the pop stars look desperate for attention and make themselves look cheap. But they also acknowledge that their younger siblings are mimicking the moves with glee. How can anyone not feel awkward, if they observe a child watching Miley Cyrus bending over forwards and Robin Thicke gyrating into her from behind?

Many of them also laugh and think Cameron’s attempt is too little too late. A few did admit though, that seeing an age advisory sign and knowing its inappropriate for them, whilst making them feel rebellious, would subconsciously place a seed that it was a boundary and that it was wrong or a sensitive area. Also, they think their parents will be much more hands on if they were to spot an age guide before a video.

Many ask whether the blame should lie not with the government scrambling around trying to clean up the music industry’s mess, but that the industry, which is inherently sexist, should step up and take responsibility?

But this is an industry that’s built on sexism. Yes. The music industry is a sexist place to work in. Ask yourself who’s in charge of every music label in the UK. Its all men running our industry, it always has been and always will be- regardless of each generation’s diversity initiatives.

Aditionally put the media in the dock to defend itself as well the music industry. Do the media ever talk about females without dissecting their looks, sexuality and body? The media attend a male music stars live show and talk about his set, performance and musical ability. They attend the female pop stars and it’s all about what she’s wearing and how sexy she looked. C’mon son!

So props to Mr Cameron for trying to navigate these shark infested waters of big bucks music billionaires, but the game has been set and will get more and more pornographic until we are all de-sensitised to cricketers penises on twitter and men having sex with snakes.

It’s like an old episode of nineties car crash youth culture show THE WORD, where THE HOPEFULS had to suggest the most outrageous thing they would be prepared do to appear on television. Now they have the capacity for their own 15 minutes of fame, the music video is the last place David should focus his attentions on- there’s much worse out there.

aDIDAS ORGINIALS STORE LAUNCH PARTY


PARTY GUESTS HAD THEIR FACES PRINTED ONTO TEE SHIRTS.

However flat the London weather gets in the summer, a key staple in this Londoner’s diary, are the sporadic Adidas events and parties, that regularly unite London’s movers and shakers.

Last week they threw a party for the launch of their new originals flagship store just off Carnaby Street. As if all the fun moments that they always have us jumping up and down with glee at aren’t enough- this time guests were welcomed with a live photo-shoot from talented photographer Charlotte Rutherford with our portraits then printed onto t-shirts.

Presenting the very best of adidas Originals across trainer drops, limited edition releases and collaborations, the Flagship Store goes one step beyond the retail – playing host to exclusive events throughout the year, for which I will be clearing my diary. Taking inspiration from the city we all love and champion daily, I have so much synergy with the new store- it champions youth and creativity with a diverse and ever-growing cultural offering. There’s a reason so many young people rock the brand. Its supported grass roots and mainstream talent for decades and now is stronger than ever.

Guests were chowing down on succulent tasting food from Dalston’s very own Rita’s who provided the food whilst a host of local talent contributed too. London artist Rosanna Webster created a window installation inspired by the sights and sounds of the neighbourhood while street artist Malarko produced artwork inspired by the colourful characters of London.

GEORGE TO POET ENTERTAINED THE GUESTS WITH HIS SPOKE WORD GENIUS.

Adidas functions always have faces from various walks of life and this one was no different as music acts, creative arts influencers and tastemakers all intermingled. Wretch 32, John Boyega, Mr Hudson, Luke Worrall, Aaron Frew, Alexis Knox, Josh Johnson and India Rose were holding court amongst others.

BROTHER SAMUEL ROLLED IN ALL CASUAL IN HIS THREE STRIPE CASUAL LOOK.

We were all so consumed with this entire buzzing atmosphere, that when Hollywood legend Samuel L Jackson and London’s finest international actor and music dj Idris Elba strolled in, the whole venue froze in shock as things moved in slow-mo, before erupting again in a frenzy of excitement!

ALEXIS KNOX IN THE HOUSE.

The night was capped off with live performances from musician Elli Ingram and spoken-word artist George the Poet, and premiere film screening from Nic Hamilton.
** NOTE TO SNEAKER PIMPS ANDTRAINER BUFFS- To celebrate the opening of the London Flagship Sore, adidas Originals has produced a special edition of 2014’s most coveted silhouette ZX Flux. Satellite imagery of the streets of London have been applied across the shoe’s to produce a slick, understated shoe that is clean, considered, and firmly rooted in the culture and character of the city that inspires it.
=========================================================================

THE LAUNCH OF OSARGENEWS.COM AND AFICAN DNA TESTING.

ANGIE LE MAR WITH GUESTS AND CELEBS THAT HAVE HAD THEIR DNA ANCESTRY TESTED, ALONGSIDE OSARGENEWS.COM FOUNDER MORRELL MAISON AND DR BAIRD.

Next. I joined Britain’s first black female stand up comedienne Angie Le Mar at the Tricycle Theatre on Saturday for the launch of osargenews.com, an online news platform for the global AFRICAN DIASPORA. Wherever you’re based in the word, you can now stay abreast of all news that is of interest or that affects the African community.

OSARGENEWS.COM FOUNDER MOREELL MAISON AND ACTRESS JUDITH JACOBS.

Osargenews.com is an online platform delivering news twice daily to subscribers via an email address. With access to news from over 100 different countries, it is possible to stay on top of the latest news stories from any of the featured countries or from the African Diaspora as a whole.
The launch of osargenews.com, a free African Diaspora News aggregator, saw playwright Angie Le Mar, the osargenews.com Brand Ambassador, welcome and talk to the packed theatre about why this was an important platform for the community to engage with each other.
She said “osargenews.com is a fantastic opportunity for Africans and people of the African Diaspora to stay connected to their roots and their heritage. It is also a valuable platform for those interested in finding out more about what is happening in those parts of the world and I am delighted to be the Ambassador for such an exciting project”

Angie interviews Esther Stanford-Xosei onstage- Esther is an internationally acclaimed Reparationist, Jurisconsult, dynamic community advocate and radio Broadcaster.

She also introduced the new African Diaspora specific DNA testing products exclusive to osargenews.com and unveiled her DNA test results for the first time which showed that even though she is Jamaican she has west African roots. She also hosted a conversation with Dr Michael Baird, one of the worlds leading human geneticists and Dr Eran Elhaik, one of the foremost experts on DNA testing and inventor of the African GPS Tracking System. In a nutshell this is like the TV show ‘’who do you think you are?’’. If you’ve ever wondered about your DNA ancestral roots, then this is a chance for you to find out exactly where your DNA traces back to. One doctor revealed to me that a Muslim man that had come in to have his DNA tested, found to his shock that he had Jewish roots! Knowledge is power! I too had my cheek cells swabbed and sent off to a laboratory and will have my results back this week! How exciting. I could be descended from royalty!…or….anyway I digress…
=================================================================
AFRICAN CARIBBEAN LEUKAEMIA TRUST CHARITY FUNRUN.

PRE-RUN WITH MARTINJAY AND FEMI OYENIRAN.

I finished my week at the beautifully green picturesque Lloyd Park in Croydon, where I was taking part in the 5k charityrun for the ACLT Charity. Running alongside me were soca music maestro Martin Jay who was a true trooper- he had been up all night at a function, and was multi tasking arranging for this weekends carnival costumes to escape (via their birth in Trinidad) from Gatwick in time.

THE GOGGLEBOX LADIES SANDY AND QUEENIE CAN’T WAIT TO GET THIS RUN STARTED!.

Also with us were Gogglbox stars Sandy and Queenie as well as actor Femi Oyeniran. The turnout was incredible and raised a lot of awareness for a great cause.

ACTOR FEMI OYENIRAN WITH ACLT CO-FUNDER ORIN LEWIS.

ACLT Co founder Orin Lewis thanked us all on behalf of the affected community members and families for turning out so early on a Sunday morning. A huge canvas of Orin and Beverleys son Daniel was also placed in full view for us to be reminded of the catalyst for this great organisation.

I couldn’t help thinking of the irony that one day we will all be affected in some way by a medical need and until it happens to us we never take things like this seriously. If all the people I saw focusing on the latest £500 Christian Laboutin trainers simply donated a tenner charities like this would be in a stronger position to help those affected.

POST RUN RELIEF.

We were warmed up and then set loose with some of us sprinting two laps around the park and others of us more casually speed walking. I’ll let you guess which group I belonged to.

AND ITS A WRAP!- WELL DONE EVERYONE!

Post run we had fun in the sun watching the afternoon teams play 5 a side footie and scoffed the delicious jerk chicken aroma that I had been following whilst running around the park!

NOEL CLARKE WITH JASMINE ONSTAGE AT #WHEREISTHELOVE IN ROUNDWOOD CENTRE, HARLESDEN.
ALL PICS COURTESY OF Cheryl Dempster @DreadArts and LONDON360.

Black Eyed Peas once asked ‘where is the love?’ and this past weekend it was most certainly alive and well in Harlesden, west London.

LOCAL POLITICIAN DAWN BUTLER.

Local west London celebrities: BAFTA Award winning actor Noel Clarke, Hip Hop Shakespeare founder Akala , new generation poet George the Poet,local politician Dawn Butler, and The Dep Mayor of Brent Cllr Lesley Jones all joined 700 locals and the London360 TV reporting crew at the Roundwood Centre for the second annual community unity event thrown by Undiluted Expressionz with support from Brent Youth Support Services. (The first event last year bridged the gap between generations, reigniting the community spirit and the sense of the notion that it takes a village to raise a child and saw 350 people attend.)

THE CROWD WAS 700 STRONG.

This weekend’s free event was hosted by the amazingly powerful presenter Peaches who had the crowd eating out of her hand and was titled ‘Mind the Gap 2 – Where is the Love?’ an event focusing the community on the growingly worrying theme of ‘Sex, love and respect between young people’ in 2014, and nearly 700 were in attendance.

#WHEREISTHELOVE HOST PEACHES.

The subject matter of sex and relationships was inspired by, a BBC news story on 26 November, 2013, reporting on an official two year Inquiry by the Children’s Commission, looking at sexual exploitation by gangs across England. Thousands of teenage girls in London are shown to be at risk of being raped and lured into situations, where boys repeatedly sexually abuse them, with many attacks unreported.

Davis Williams, Founder of Undiluted Expressionz, who felt compelled to create ‘Mind the Gap 2 – Where is the Love’, told me, “We have spoken to many young people who felt unsure how to address issues of both self-respect and a mutual respect for each other, and we wanted to give them an uncensored and safe environment where they could connect with other young people in open and honest dialogue”.

Davis Williams, Founder of Undiluted Expressionz.

Saturday’s community edutainment event explored sex, love and mutual respect between teenagers. The event aimed to increase the levels of confidence and self-esteem amongst young women and addressed young men’s attitudes to girls and women in order to encourage mutual respect and positive relationships. There were various master classes, performances, inspirational speakers, fashion and dance shows and workshops during the day including a ‘Love Master Class’ hosted by accredited Life and Relationship Coach Des O’Connor, a performace by Akala and there was an onstage Q&A, which I hosted with actor and director, Noel Clarke.

GEORGE THE POET PERFORMING AT ROUNDWOOD CENTRE.

GEORGE THE POET TALKING TO MIKE WALSH FROM THE LONDON360 TV CAMERA CREW

Local celebrity George The Poet, is a very articulate performer with an incredibly strong voice who told us

‘’ I think a lot of young people fall in to situations and patterns that maybe they may have grown up getting used to and thinking that such and such is normal, so I think that it is important that we engage them and deliberately try to shape their expectations and their conduct, their behaviour towards each other. I hope that this event will give these young people new expectations, I think growing up around this area we see a lot of broken homes, we see a lot of fatherlessness, we see a lot of resentment and I think when that starts off in the household, it then seeps out in to the actual community when you go outdoors, that is why I made a whole EP about this called the ‘Chicken and the Egg’. It’s just about the cycle of fatherlessness so when these guys got in contact with me I was thinking this links up perfectly because this is exactly what is top of my agenda right now’’.

AKALA PERFORMING AT #WHEREISTHELOVE

MOBO Award winning rapper, poet and journalist Akala is an immensely powerful live performer, and had all 700-audience members quiet and attentive, as he schooled them with his very personalised, stylistic inspiring wordplay.

“Mind the Gap was without question one of the best community events I have attended out of literally hundreds. The energy was electric, organisation on point, the age range of attendees was vast, the message was positive without being contrived and it seems the organisers have every intention of creating a proper legacy”

NOEL CLARKE

Straight afterwards, many attendees didn’t believe that a conversation with Noel Clarke would actually happen and couldn’t believe he was actually in the building. They didn’t need reminding about why Noel Clarkes very existence, is a great thing for youth from disenfranchised backgrounds that need a public figure that they can relate to. Noel Clarke is a leader and a hero to this generation. He has made it and conquered the movie world on his own terms, partly because he is great at writing authentic stories about communities, relationships and scenarios in the same way that our favourite music stars have written rap verses about their struggles and surroundings.

Of course now, Noel has made numerous films about a very diverse set of topics from British crime thrillers, horror films in storage facilities, to female athletes, former soldiers and more, but as he’s a director that just happens to be black, he’s often only labelled as the maker of cult classic urban city films Kidulthood and Adulthood. Even though they were both made at least eight years ago they’re still as relevant today with their reflection of young people growing up in inner city life. The situations he writes about are uber real to all disadvantaged inner city communities and show relationships between adults and youth, girlfriends and boyfriends and even girlfriends and girl friends. He’s an adventurous filmmaker and doesn’t mince his words. When we talk about relationships, young people, sex and love, we want to talk to the people we trust and who’s opinion we value, and Noel Clarke to many is that person.

NOEL AND JASMINE STRAIGHT AFTER THEIR Q&A SESSION- RELIEVED IT’S OVER LOL!

Noel wasn’t originally comfortable at being asked to speak about this subject. As he put it ‘’I’m not a sexpert’’ but we reassured him that his authenticity was what the crowd wanted to witness. His own experiences are so similar to many of ours. Growing up on a west London housing estate with his single mother, and fighting to make it in an industry that is notoriously tough to get up in.

He agreed it was important for him to attend even though it wasn’t an area he was used to speaking publicly about

‘’ I’ve written about a lot of things that I saw when I was growing up, but obviously I’m older now and I still see that there’s stuff going on with young people that is important and needs to be addressed. We need to make sure that young people keep the respect for themselves; we need to make sure that that young people are going on the right path. I feel that this is an important issue and if I can come here and just talk about my experiences then maybe if I can help just one person, then I’m happy to do that’’.

So many young people today are bombarded with images of success and peer pressure. Noel said it was about standing your ground ‘’There’s something I want to tell all young people or even older people that are in their jobs, that is never be afraid to be an individual. Peer pressure is never something that really affected me because I was never a person that succumbed to it. I was always an individual, I was always the sort of person that if people were doing things that I didn’t really want to do, I wouldn’t do it. I feel that’s important. You young people have to retain your identity, make sure that you are true to yourself, don’t just do something because somebody else is doing it, don’t just do something because a bunch of other people are … don’t just go left because a bunch of other people are going left. Retain who you are and try not to bow to peer pressure. That was something I never really bowed to, I was always strong-minded in that respect and so peer pressure didn’t really happen for me’’.

Surprisingly Noel said that being brought up without a father led to some positive actions on his part ‘’ I feel like being raised by a single mum made me more respectful of women, but it didn’t stop me from doing disrespectful things. I feel like we are all going to make mistakes and were all going to do disrespectful things, but you have to maintain a base level of respect for yourself as a female and a male, and you have to respect the people that are around you. It’s not always easy, I mean don’t get me wrong, my father see’s my children, so he sees his grandchildren but I feel like you can make a positive out of any negative situation and my farther taught me as much how to behave by not being there, as he would have by being there. So, I’m with my woman and I’ve got two children and you never see me in newspapers and you never see me in press and you never hear any stories about any badness I’ve done because I’ve done an ‘’unthinkable thing’’ (sarcasm) by having one woman and having my children with that one woman. I’m not anybody’s baby daddy (crowd whistle and cheer) Thank you, so you won’t find me in the newspaper, and I feel like part of turning a negative and not being raised by someone, being that kid at sports day who didn’t have a dad to do a daddy son race was like that’s not happening to my kids, that’s not happening, so I raise my children and I win that sports day race every year, I’m not even rabbiting. When it comes to the dad and son race I’m winning it! Not just to be there, I’m there and I’m winning the race!’’

If we listen to the old adage that behaviour is learnt and passed down from generation to generation, it seems incredible that Noel was raised by a single mother, on a housing estate in west London, but ended up being quite traditional by marrying his wife first, having his children after marriage, and turning the negative of his father not being around, into a positive.

Noel nodded ‘’for me the most important thing was learning from the mistakes of the man previous, and like I said, you can learn positive behaviour from your parents but also me seeing him not being there. That affected me, as a young man and I didn’t want raise children be it female or male, and not be there. I feel like he missed out on so much, that’s not something I wanted to do, so I’m proud to raise my kids, I’m proud to take them to swimming and football, I’m proud to miss out and sacrifice some things because I want to spend time with my children so ultimately it’s not a sacrifice, because you’re giving them more than they could ever get. Every situation where there is a negative you have to look at it like- there’s people that go the glass if half empty, and there’s people that go the glass is half full, my thing is let’s put more in the glass you know, I’m working hard’’.

So many things are the same from one generation to the next regards teenage years and experimenting with love and relationships. However the one thing that’s changed the current generations engagement is the Internet and social media. Lots of young people may see things like sexting and nudie selfies as being just harmless fun. I wondered what Noel would explain to his own children in the future about this area?

THE CROWD HAD A GREAT TIME.

‘’ My thing is that with stuff like that, the world has changed in a very salacious way. You have to understand that if you’re going to take pictures like that and you’re going to send them to people, there’s a very good possibility that they are going to end up somewhere you don’t want them to end up. So I’m not going to sit here and tell you don’t do that because I can’t control what you do but make sure you are responsible for your own actions, make sure you understand if you do anything like that and it appears online, you can’t be upset about it. What I would say to young people, is most importantly, respect yourself. When you are going to go for a job interview in years to come and people are googling you, you don’t want a picture to come up where you’re doing something you shouldn’t be doing because in today’s world with the internet, with online, that what will happen. So more importantly than me sitting here and telling you what to do, respect yourself’’.

During the chat we touched on the fact that countless young females are now getting entwined in a variety of dangerous scenarios across the country, and how women in particular should be taking their own personal safety seriously when it comes to trusting men and danger. Although I wanted to highlight, particularly as I work with a lot of young men too, that it’s not just about women being in danger, but men also are under a lot of pressure these days.

When it comes to us girls, we have our friends, we have our mothers, we tend to research, girls gossip and chat to people, and men tend to hold a lot of their pressures to themselves whether they’re older men or younger men. These days men have stress, tension, this can lead to illness, mental illness, suicide rates for young men is really high. I think men are being really hyper sexualised by often the media who tell men to man up, and they’re not real men if they don’t lead fast lives, fast cars, fast women etc.

I wondered if Noel thought that men are under a lot of pressure, and whether creative types like himself, are pressurised into making these gangsta types more prominent in their content?

‘’Firstly everyone is under a lot of pressure in all these things and I feel like there is a pressure on men to behave in a certain way. There is this pressure of you having to ‘’behave road’’, you don’t have to be. I’m from Ladbroke Grove, raised by a single mother. A lot of my friends did go to jail, a lot of my friends committed suicide and I’m sitting here talking to you because there are choices, you can make choices and you can respect yourself and for me, the pressure is the pressure that you put on to yourself. If you ignore peer pressure, if you are not afraid to be an individual and lead your own life, regardless of what people are telling you what to do and how to do it, then that is the beginning of you becoming the person that you can be. A lot of the things these young people are doing with this road life, they think about the money now, and the trainers… that’s not going to pay your bills when you’re broke. I know guys that have a £60k car but renting a council flat, that makes no sense to me you know, get a property, live well, live smart and I feel like that’s what I did, and it’s not that I’m better than anyone else because the environment I’ve come from, I shouldn’t necessarily be here but you have to make sure that you are not afraid to be an individual and you can respect yourselves and others around you and that’s all I can really say about it (crowd claps).

Noel left the stage to a resounding level of applause having closed the night leaving all on a high.

ATTENDEES WERE ALSO TREATED TO A FASHION SHOW.

Later, a local 56-year-old man was delighted with the rooms energy stating “I felt the event brought it home that my purpose in life is to serve my community. The smiles on the children’s faces, the happiness, joy and love made the event worth attending’’

A young person also felt the energy and cried out in frustration “Akala and Andrew Muhammad taught us so much. Why don’t they teach us our history in school? I am only 15 and I learnt more tonight than I did in my whole school year this year.

So after an exhilarating, stimulating day, a barrage of #whereisthelove tweets trending on twitter, much positive energy was distributed between the community. Hopefully a few golden nuggets were taken in and placed strong moral seed standards with the young people as well as open relaxed doors for conversation between parents and their children.

Only time will tell whether we will have made people think twice about not being the star attraction, in yet another video that goes viral, of young people intoxicated after a party that’s filmed by their friends, and talked about on the other side of the world, that also gets them fired from their jobs as well as follows their reputations for ever.

#WHEREISTHELOVE? – IT’S RIGHT HERE!
Contact www.undilutedexpressionz.com today and find out how together we can make the community a better place for the young people to grow, discover and succeed.

LATE AT THE TATE

Graffiti legend Mode 2 live painting inside Tate Britain’s Clore Studio for #LateAtTate #SpacesBetween

There’s been a real push into diversifying every area of our London Lives this year, from conferences and seminars on the subject, within industries as far and wide as the police force, the music industry, television and beyond.

Late at the Tate is a bi-monthly event with an aim of diversifying its clientele, and I love it as it gives me a chance to explore art after hours, in a very relaxed way. It’s another free-for-all evening; where organisers bring together the worlds of visual art and spoken art, for a huge number of young hip hop fans. Late at Tate is a programme of events for young and diverse audiences held at Tate Britain on a bi-monthly basis featuring music, film, fashion and live performance.
Last time it was one single event in the Turner Room, which was so full and crowded that people had to experience it from outside, so this time around they had numerous stunts all across the art gallery at different times.

Outside the front entrance were hip-hop ciphers where Hip-hop connoisseur DJ Snuff was seen and heard to be throwing down some stark beats for the various MC’S- both male and female- who were reciting some really authentic eighties sounding verses. Live music in this garden also saw an eclectic mix of artists like emerging Jazz outfit Parshmaune and international Hip-hop collective End Of The Weak who have teamed up with London-based MC cypher event Higher Learning to showcase a selection of high quality wordsmiths.

Inside the white imposing building, both visual artists and spoken word talent were doing their thing in various rooms around the gallery. The great thing was nothing really clashed and you were able to calmly wonder from one moment to the next.

Brit graffiti artist Mode 2 and beatbox champion Reeps One doing his thing at Late At The Tate

The night was called Spaces Between – a celebration of youth culture through word and sound, and featured some of the UK’s leading and emerging storytellers and musicians, inspired by the artwork in the Tate Collection. Spaces Between explored the individual voice and its transformation and influence on youth culture using various spaces throughout Tate Britain to show how it exists between social structures and cultural boundaries.

Other highlights on the evening included a spoken word showcase within the grand spaces of the Duveen Galleries inspired by this year’s Tate Britain Commission sculptor Phyllida Barlow; a workshop with UK beatbox champion Reeps One in the Manton foyer; an acoustic performance by hotly-tipped rapper Little Simz against a backdrop of stunning portraits from the Tate Collection and live painting by leading British graffiti artist Mode 2 in the Clore Studio.

Artist Benjamin Wachenje poses with his portrait of Jonzi D.

A huge piece of artwork from artist Benjamin Wachenje, was unveiled and the crowd were delighted to see that it was a portrait Hip-hop choreographer and cultural icon Jonzi D. Benjamin said he’d admired Jonzi for two decades and he respected the fact that Jonzi rapped in a British accent not an American one. They proceeded to discuss arts and the community for an enraptured crowd that had gathered to hear them speak and were delighted that Jonzi was delighted that he was ‘’Hung at the Tate’’. Benjamin said

‘’I wanted to get to know all these rappers in the UK so I thought what better way to get close to them – it would be a great idea to paint them, of all the rappers portraits I’ve painted the two people I’ve painted most often are Jonzi D and Ty. Recently Jonzi D rejected his MBE but I think the best way I have been able to recognise him is by painting him and this now being hung at The Tate’’.

Late at Tate programmer Adrian Shaw told us:

“These events are now led by the Young People’s Programme with the aim of giving young people a genuine voice in the gallery. So it’s really great to be working with Louder Than Words with their commitment and in-depth experience of working within the youth cultural sector.”

One of the highlights for me was of relatively new act Little Simz, who started making her music when she was nine years old, inspired by fellow female MC Missy Elliott and Busta Rhymes. Clearly also influenced by acts like Lauryn Hill and Jill Scott, Lil Simz performed a live acoustic performance, against the backdrop of stunning portraits from the Tate Collection to a very enthusiastic crowd.

Very special acoustic performance from @littlesimz inside #ForgottenFaces at #LateAtTate Britain #SpacesBetween #LouderThanWords @tategallery

The next one, should you wish to please your eyes and ears simultaneously is on Friday 3 October 2014, 18.00 – 22.00. Bring no airs and graces, just an open mind to explore new things and meet new like-minded people with a passion for creative arts and a zealous joy for life.

====================================================
LAURA MVULA REMAKE OF ”SING TO THE MOON”

Next the incomparable Laura Mvula hosted an intimate album playback listening session for her remake of her debut album ‘’sing to the moon’’. Laura has rerecorded her critically acclaimed debut album at the Abbey Road Studios with the Metropole Orchestra, conducted by Jules Buckley.

The session was held at the plush Olympic Studios in Barnes, west London where crew, tour team, family, friends, music media and press were gathered for the aural treat. Sat in regal red velvet seats in their screening room we were treated to mini fish & chips, cupcakes and drinks and encouraged to settle back and take in the hauntingly dulcet tones of Ms Mvula.

Each seat also had a beautifully printed out keepsake sheet of her music which was a very elegant touch. (I will file mine away with my hoard of music star memoribilia for my future charity sale lol!). The session began with a short 6 minute screening of the making of the album with Laura, Jules and others talking us through the experience. Then we sat back and allowed ourselves to be carried away on a musical journey as the room dimmed and quietened.

Laura comes from ”good stock” with a very strong team behind her. Her manager Kwame Kwaten has been managing and making stars out of unknowns for years. A well focused team that see’s the long road is incredibly important in this music game. Surrounding yourself with ”yes people” aka enablers who make their cash off you and scarper can lead to quick fame, quick kick to the kerb!

JASMINE WITH LAURA POST LISTEN OF HER AMAZING NEW REMAKE OF ”SING TO THE MOON” AT OLYMPIC STUDIOS.

Afterwards we went to catch up with Laura as she signed our music song sheets, which she had kindly placed on all her guests’ seats. It turns out the reason that the album was remade was as in 2013, following the release of her first album, Laura was asked to perform at the BBC prom. When she had originally written the songs in her bedroom Laura had imagined them with an orchestra and conductor Jules Buckley did such an incredible job that the urban prom was a huge success. Of course the next logical step was that plans came together for an orchestral version of the full album and as now Jules had moved and was the helm of the Metropole Orkest, the worlds leading pop and jazz orchestra, it was a no brainer to collaborate again.

The playback was a huge success and the audience left on a high. Laura really has an extremely unique voice and style and if you’d like to catch her live, then pencil Tuesday 19 August 2014, at 10:15PM at the Royal Albert Hall for a Late Night Prom in your diary, to see what all the well deserved fuss is all about.

KEVIN POWELL DINNER

Having great food and conversation with friends is good; having met them via social media from international waters is great! Knowing that it was our mutual love and living of hip hop culture that made it happen…priceless!
A table full of people passionate about the art of spoken word, giving back to the community and hip-hop lovers gathered in honour of Kevin Powell. I hosted the dinner for him at khan’s Indian restaurant in Westbourne grove. Amongst the guests were hip-hop journalist Ill Will, photographer Jenni Baptiste, Ty, PR lady Jodie Dalmeda and Adidas top lady Paola Lucktung.

If you’re a member of the black music community you should get to know who Kevin is. When I was a young lady at school and university I ran to the corner store to buy VIBE magazine monthly and Kevin was one of its most prolific, regular writers. He documented the lies and debates of the hip-hop scene from the beginning with legends like Biggie and Tupac and was our window into a world we loved.

Kevin is one of the most acclaimed political, cultural, literary, and hip-hop voices in America today. He is the author of 11 books, including “Barack Obama, Ronald Reagan, and the Ghost of Dr. King: Blogs and Essays.” Among his upcoming books will be a memoir of his very difficult childhood and youth, to be released in 2015 by Simon & Schuster; and in 2016 he will publish a biography of Tupac Shakur, the late rapper and controversial American icon.

Kevin’s writings have also appeared in CNN.com, Esquire, Ebony, The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, ESPN.com, and Vibe Magazine, where he worked for many years as a senior writer, interviewing public figures as different as Tupac Shakur and General Colin Powell. Kevin also routinely appears in interviews on television, radio, and in print and on the internet discussing major issues of our time.

As an activist Kevin is the president and co-founder of BK Nation, a new national organization—progressive and multicultural, and focused on matters like education, civic engagement and leadership training, health and wellness, social media, arts and culture, and job and small business creation.

Kevin was another of his regular trips to the UK visiting Wales to do a series of lectures and workshops with young people. In the past hes been here for the 100th birthday of 20th century poet Dylan Thomas, and the connections between Welsh and American poetry and spoken-word traditions. As a result, he has been named the International Ambassador for the Dylan Thomas Centennial in America for 2014. Moreover, as a pop culture curator Kevin produced the very first exhibit on the history of hip-hop in America, at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, which also toured America and overseas.

==================================================================

TAPONESWA MAVUNGA- LEAVES WARNER MUSIC AND THE UK FOR MTV BASE SOUTH AFRICA.

#TEAMUK lose a staple key influencer as she moves to South Africa.

The great and the good of the music industry all turned out at newly opening private members club the library in St Martins Lane, to bid our homegirl Taponeswa Mavunga, or Tappy as she’s known, all the best as she leaves London to move to South Africa.

GUESTS INCLUDING MOBO CEO KANYA KING, BOUGI CEO ROZAN AHMED, PHOTOGRAPHER TO THE STARS PAUL H, ADIDAS MAVEN PAOLA LUCKTUNG, BBC MARKETING LADY JAY DAVIDSON, MUSIC MANAGER EXTRORDINAIRE KWAME KWATEN, MUSIC TALENT MANAGER CHANELLE NEWMAN, PR LADY JODIE DALMEDA AND FORMER MIROR 3AM GIRL SARAH TETTAH BID TAPPY FAREWELL.

Tappy has been at Warner Music for 16 years and responsible for being a major team player in the careers of acts like Ed Sheeran, Sean Paul and more.
Always pleasant, professional and lots of fun she’s been an integral part of the black music industry and will be sorely missed.
But our loss is MTV Base Africa’s gain. Tappy will be joining the MTV team out in SA, and will no doubt bring a great element to pushing the African music scene, which she is incredibly passionate about.

============

THE LADIES TALK LONDON PANEL.

Ladies Talk

Ladies Talk is a regular TV panel show, hosted by Playwright and comedienne Angie Le Mar. in its second year, the show is transmitted to numerous countries across the African continent as well as the UK on Sky TV. Angie is now taking the show global to 109 countries with a diferent, diverse panelof local ladies from each location- congratulations Ang!

LADIES TALK IN THIS WEEK’S VOICE NEWSPAPER.

===========

London Live

As usual I finished my week on London’s local TV channel London Live on the breakfast show #wakeuplondon on the Daily Grind slot where we discussed genetic sequence testing all across the UK, teachers being attacked by students at a rate of 93 PER DAY every day last year, the Justin Beiber, Selena Gomez, Orlando Bloom, Miranda Kerr love square (one up from a love triangle!), and a sausage eating speed competition…for dogs! Pet owners filming their animals and posting stuff on YouTube is getting outta control!

JASMINE AND NAUGHTY BOY IN HIS EALING STUDIO.

There have been a lot of seminars, conferences and features about diversity in media this year. People often talk about the fact that nothings changed over the past few decades in the UK, when it comes to sharing the love with diverse communities.
I disagree. If you’ve been in the game as long as I have you can acknowledge change when it’s there.

There was a time that the youth of today couldn’t even imagine existed in the past, when young ethnic Brits couldn’t dream of making it in the UK music charts or becoming household names in daily tabloids. Nowadays names like Dizzee Rascal, Tinie Tempeh, Leona Lewis, Ms Dynamite, Wretch32 and more are given a nearly equal playing field as their paler counterpart peers.

Only a decade ago we in the media and music industries were up in arms that the British media didn’t take black and Asian British talent seriously. Radio wouldn’t playlist them, tabloids weren’t interested, but on the street of the UK, thousands in urban areas and beyond were bubbling to their tracks.

If I wrote a book and exposed which famous gate keepers and faces a decade ago, refused to support or play this talent back then, but quickly jumped on the band wagon once they saw this British urban music train was speeding ahead to success with or without them, you’d never believe me.

Some of these names swore to me point blank, that they’d never play or support our homegrown talent- most of these DJ’s and tastemakers are now out of a job.
The ones that saw the future, clung onto their jobs for a while longer but now it’s the true champions of our scene that are moving ahead as a part of an extended movement to (as my mate Mariah once said-) ‘make it happen’.

Don’t get me wrong, there are still miles to go before we have a totally fair entry-level system and routes for true high progression within these areas, but it is improving.

A few years ago international music star Jay Sean- an Asian male from Hounslow just couldn’t get a break in the British music game. He had hits, was popular and articulate but there always seemed to be a problem with accepting him as a music star. He was tenacious and pushed ahead through different record labels, managers and teams until finally American behemoth black music label Cash Money spotted and picked him up. Cash Money looks after Nicki Minaj and Lil Wayne amongst others and is beyond powerful. As soon as they scooped up Jay Sean he became an international star with hits in numerous entries internationally- now he’s gone clear. The British press may not focus on him much but why should he care- he’s a global face elsewhere.

Someone that hasn’t had the same problem in the UK is Asian male music super producer and artist Naughty Boy. Born Shahid Khan to Muslim Pakistani parents in Watford, he has made hits for other stars, made stars out of nobodies and is now appearing in British press as well as international talk shows and festivals.
This week the UK’s most ground breaking news show- Channel 4 News- also ran a feature about him.

NB ON CHANNEL 4 NEWS.

My mum religiously watches all the daily news shows and so it’s been ingrained in my family to know what’s going on across the world. It also means we are all passive observers to news shows between 6-10pm nightly and critique them all the time.
Whilst most of the other big news names tend to make ‘’cut and paste’’ bulletins using news footage from Reuters and APTN style news hubs, Channel 4 produce their own content.

They send their main news anchors like Jon Snow out to international war zones or lighter news locations across the UK. They find new faces to report on news and reflect the country I live in most accurately. They also change what’s been seen as the norm in news for so many decades. Their news reporters are a truly diverse mix of British residents. It’s like a United Colours of Benetton advert nightly at 7pm! It’s inclusive and doesn’t make me shudder thinking ‘’oh no another ethnic face on TV- what negative crime have they committed?’’

When the Woolwich atrocity happened, one of the first witnesses on the scene that tweeted was a rapper called Boyadee who had had minimal mainstream success. Channel 4 spotted his potential and now he is one of their regular reporters. That’s risky but brilliant TV.

In the same way when Channel 4 News ran the Naughty Boy feature this week, it wasn’t to make a huge deal of his ethnicity, but to celebrate a young British mans success in the music scene. A man that entered Deal Or No Deal and won £44k to start his own music studio fro his parents back garden shed.

NB ON DEAL OR NO DEAL.

Shahid Khan became Naughty Boy- (he saw it as his superhero pseudonym and thinks it sounds very British) after music became such a big influence in his young life. Watching Bollywood movies, playing with his dad’s cassette recorder of cassette tapes from Southall and playing piano at school are his earliest musical memories.

NB AND HIS FAMILY.

There are millions of bedroom music producers all across the UK now so what was it about Shahid that made him stand out and make it? Answer- his luck is what happened when his preparation met opportunity!

NB AS A BABY.

This son of a taxi driver applied and won a grant in 2006 from the Prince’s Trust. Speaking to the Watford Observer in 2009 about the opportunity, Khan said “The Prince’s Trust has a scheme where they want to help people who they feel can set up their own business. I wanted to make music but I didn’t have any equipment. They said they wanted to help me’’. The same year he went on Deal or no Deal and won 44,000 on it!

This is a man that is reaching for every opportunity available to him. No chip on his shoulder. Not passively wondering when his time will come. He’s making things happen for himself.

He then met a then yet unknown Emile Sande in 2009 at a singers showcase and loved her voice so much, persuaded her to listen to his tracks in his beaten up car outside the venue and asked if they could work together. He paid for her in bed & breakfasts whilst recording and now both their journeys have progressed from unknowns to international stars.

NB AND HIS PARTNER IN RYHME-EMILE SANDE.

Most young Asians are encouraged to go down traditional white-collar routes like doctor/lawyer/solicitor- Shahid was studying Business and Marketing before dropping out to pursue his musical interests.

There have been countless debates about being young and Muslim in Britain in the past few years, especially with the recent radicalization of young Muslims. Naughty boy has loads of opinions about the media portrayal about Muslims. ‘’I’ve never had a problem with the UK press, they’ve always been very supportive but I do think they don’t always get the balance on stories right. For example I was recently working at a fund raiser for Palestine with Jemima Khan, Russell Brand and Elton John but there wasn’t one bit of media about it the next day’’.

Naughty Boy is living proof that many young British Muslims are well integrated into British society – there are so many successful stores about young Muslims that aren’t told. He says ‘’Life is not about having money. It’s more about inner struggle and trying to understand your real purpose.”

One thing he’s passionate about is being an ambassador for the British Asian Trust, where he recently dined with Prince Charles and gave him his album. Apparently Charles took it home and Prince Harry declared it was the coolest music Charles had ever brought back!

NB AT THE BRITISH ASIAN TRUST DINNER WHERE HE MET PRINCE CHARLES.

The great thing about this producer is I never get the vibe that he’s chasing stars. In fact it seems to be the other way around. My record label contacts regularly confide in me, that superstar managers are re routing their artist’s schedules, so they can spend some time working in Naughty Boys studio in the leafy suburb of Ealing in west London, where he’s usually hanging out with his best mate Zayn from One Direction. Britney, Rihanna, Katy Perry, Mary J Blige and more are all examples of names keen to collaborate.

NB AND BEST MATE ZAYN MALIK FROM ONE DIRECTION.

The studio is a small, black painted room akin to a young boy’s bedroom. Containing a fish tank, a fitness machine, rails of clothes and Adidas sneakers, a medicine cabinet and toiletries for overnight stays, random gifts he’s been given from goody bags like champagne bottles, boxes of chocolates and amongst all this his beloved cat Barry (yes-really), who is leaping about sticking his nose into everything. Ultimate chaos!

A CORNER OF NB’S STUDIO-HOTEL CABANNA.

He has the Midas touch and really enjoys making stars out of unknowns like Emile, Sam Smith, Sam Romans and more. This former pizza delivery boy now has Simon Cowell on speed dial and is bessie mates with 1D’s Zayn Malik- I sat with them both on NB’s table at the recent Asian Awards.

NB with Zayn Malik, Preeya Kalidas and Jasmine at this years Asain Awards.

Recently 1D were all over the press in after smoking weed and this past week both NB and Zayn were all over the papers internationally for jumping into the Israel/ Gaza debate after tweeting ‘’#freePalestine’’. NB is very passionate about the subject and distraught about the children that are being maimed and killed everyday ‘’I am not about sides, I’m about peace’’.

His solo album HOTEL CABANNA was visionary in that he saw it as a piece of music and a movie with NB playing producer and director. The album is a morality tale about the trappings of success. NB’s role, as manager of the hotel, is “making sure everyone’s learning their lesson”. He thinks for too long the pop and urban music scene has focused to heavily on the trappings of success.

Another trapping and path that many music acts and videos go down is imagery with an over-sexualisation of women – there is always huge debate across the industry about this- the most recent example being Pharrell/Robin Thicke/ Miley Cyrus when it comes to objectification and over-sexualisation, NB’s managed to steer clear of this and let his music do the talking. ‘’ I think sex sells, it’s easy and based on insecurity, but I think it should be more about…soul?’’ It is so refreshing and important to have a man say that there is no need for music videos to be all about sex. When female artists say it, they are dismissed as prudes.

His hit song La la la has been in the top ten in 83 countries and just hit one million UK sales, it’s the 148th song to ever make it. It also has over 330 million views on YouTube. British music acts are responsible for generating a huge deal of business for the UK economy and NB should get personal letter of thanks from David Cameron for the amount of UK music export finance generated via his productions!

He’s said ‘’I want to bring the sound back to the UK and prove that the US sound has become somewhat stale, the same sound is being recycled over and over again for the same acts. I want to show that in Britain we make vital, innovative sounds that are as, if not more, valid than the big American producers.”
It was never in his plan to be famous- the TODAY SHOW and TONIGHT WITH DAVID LETTERMAN are American sows he’s been on (check them out on YouTube), so clearly he is very famous now and enjoying it.

NB’s brand new single ‘Home’ features SAM ROMANS, and is released 21 July and will no doubt be flying high in the charts this weekend!

Lets all salute him- the boy’s done well!

The key influencers and movers and shakers of the music industry were out in full force last night for the annual adidas summer hip-hop karaoke summer party, this time in conjunction with DJ Target, celebrating adidas classics.
(MORE EXCLUSIVE PICS FROM THE NIGHT COMING LATER ODAY!-KEEP CHECKING!)

Held at the West London Chelsea football club location -Under the Bridge (Stamford Bridge) nightclub, the venue was packed and heaving with ballers and b girls by 8pm, and people were throwing names on the list to grab the mic later in the night and show-off their verbal flow skills.

The walls around the venue were dramatic with hundreds of huge,framed and mounted pieces of artwork showcasing both British and international actsover the years who Adidas have supported rocked their fly-ass 3-stripe looks.(and make no mistake, acts that get clothing brand support at this level can get global profile in fashion campaigns and this catapaults their music profile’s higher!).

SUPER MUSIC PRODUCER DREADY (BUSTA RHYMES ETC) AND ADIDAS HEAD HONCHO PAOLA LUCKTUNG TAKE A SELFIE AVEC MOI!

Music faces in the crowd included Wretch32, Bashy, J2K, Boy Better Know’s JME, Princess Nyah, Dready, Capital Xtra’s Kojo, Only Way Is Essex reaity show cast member Jasmin Walia, Clement Marfo, DJ Manny Norte, Radio1Xtra Head Austin, onstage host and compere DJ Seani B, and of course DJ Target who was running the night.

The party pack looked like the best Adidas ad shoot ever, all rocking their three stripe classics, and I have to say….and I will let Wretch finish his moment on the mic,…. but I reckon I rocked my look hardest.

In an especially bespoke fresh to death white tracksuit, with blinged out sleeves, and monogrammed initialled bling on the reverse, I lost count of the number of compliments and photos our matching tracksuits received.

A giant photo booth that fitted up to six people, captured all the frolics, and had us all acting out our hip-hop star fantasies with passion lol.

These regular three stripe functions always bring out a very cool happy hip-hop family crowd and this night was no different. Talent that are all ages either Adidas sponsored or recognise its long history of supporting black music culture, from music, TV and sports all mingle and get their thrill of trying each others day jobs out.

Olympic athlete Jeanette Kwakye is not afraid of the track or the mic and on arrival stepped straight onstage to duet with her rhyming partner-musician Jacob Banks for a rendition of Drunk In Love.

Jeanette and Jacob- athletics and music comes together!

Radio 1 Newsbeat’s reporter Nestor McGregor showed off the face behind the nations showbiz reporting voice, by being an early mic handler!

Newsbeat’s Nestor pon de mic!

Another couple attempted Hov and Bey’s Bonnie and Clyde and Wretch32 jumped onstage to join in with the end of yet another group of friends who were doing a great job on his hit single Traktor.

Actor Jay Brown, fresh from his recent Channel 4 mini doc screening, physced himself up (with a lil pep talk from me,- to go kill Vanilla Ice’s Ice Ice Baby LOL.

ACTOR JAY BROWN GETS DOWN WITH ICE ICE BABY!.

However, my favourite set of the night were the female Radio1/1Xtra female staff who took on, and smashed So Solid Crew’s 21 Seconds with menace and vigour. Spittng the lyrics as comfortably as if they were born reciting them, they had the whole room hyped and cheering alongside them.

RADIO1XTRA/RADIO1 FEMALE STAFF SMASH 21 SECONDS- (HOW MUCH FUN MUST IT BE TO WORK WITH THEM!)

Other peeps that jumped onstage for their moment-included comedienne Miss London, media princess Remel London and their crew.

Compere Seani B put myself and Adidas brand leader Paola Lucktung on blast a few times, by urging us to take the mic, but after my horrific experience a few years ago at a ChoiceFM function where I couldn’t name the tune after the intro 5 seconds being played and being heckled, I decided to play it safe and not expose to all, the fact that I am tone deaf and couldn’t sing to save my life!

CAPITAL XTRA’S BREAKFAST SHOW HOST AND COMEDY POWER PLAYER KOJO KNOWS WHO’S THE BOSS.

Nearer the end of the night a merry gent picked me up and carried me to the stage in a fireman’s lift, and dropped me on it, to encourage my usual show-off tactics, but alas in room full of my peers, I know when to hold it down and politely declined.

If it’s a business social function, however merry and intimate the crowd is, you have to maintain a status of professionalism. In a parallel universe it’s the same advice as Biggie gave when he said ‘never get high on your own supply’.

As music festivals go, Lovebox isn’t really about hard-core music and fans- it’s a party, where music is just one of the main players, alongside try-hard arty visuals, semi-naked stunts and top class food merriment.

PHOTOS COURTESY JASMINE DOTIWALA AND Victor Frankowski.

JASMINE WITH NASIR JONES AKA NAS.

The festival is deep in the heart of east London and a long walk from the station. At the entrance of Victoria Park huge queues, with a very well behaved crowd are fast moving, and flanked by blatant dudes selling most kinds of drugs like market traders. Balloon sellers yelling ‘‘laughing gas- three for a fiver!’’ (That you can pay for via cred card- a real WTF? moment!). The grounds inside are testament to their hustling abilities as balloon canisters looking like giant silver bullet pellets are left discarded everywhere.

Everywhere you look there are great visuals like multi-coloured tutus high up sitting in tree trunks, fluorescent cushions and sofas to lounge on, and harem-like set ups across the main grounds as well as the VIP. Look one way you’ll see semi naked, fetish wearing men, fighting in boxing rings. On another side are, deck chairs, spray-painted cars, magicians doing card tricks and sequin painted ladies doing impressive stunts with huge hoola hoops.

The food stalls are impressive. From gourmet hotdogs, Nando’s, cupcakes, burgers, paella, salad shacks, bagels and BBQ- alcohol and fresh juices, a totally thought out 360 degree culinary experience! Special shout out to the jerk chicken stall which had queues 50 deep, all weekend long, awaiting their generous plates of curry goat and rice and peas- there was even a Rasta plate option for vegetarians. Also, not sure how they managed to organize schedules for everyone’s bladders, but it’s the only festival where I’ve been with no lengthy queuing for toilets.

JASMINE WITH MODEL RACHEL RITFELD AT LOVEBOX

Lovebox fashion is young and fast forward moving. The girls are cute in their predictable festival fashion garms of wellies, fake flower garlands, shorts so short they may well have just worn g strings and lots of quirky takes on Rock&roll chic and hip-hop street fabulosity. The fresh to death looks are accompanied by lots of sunburnt skin. Slightly unfairly, the weather on Saturday had been widely predicted to be stormy and wet, so many were rocking sensible footwear, which made for amusing viewing in the relentless dry heat. Whilst there may have been numerous sunburnt sunstroke victims, their Twitter feeds the next day would tell you they had a brilliant party and that’s all that really matters.

JASMINE WITH RAPPER RODNEY P AND FRIENDS IN THE VVIP AT LOVEBOX.

To give you a sense of how young the Lovebox demographic is, at some point in the past few years, its become de rigour for men at London based music festivals, to be totally topless showing off their baby smooth torso skin, (either men have stopped growing hair on their chests or they’re all waxing and shaving!), the waistband of their designer underpants must be showing under their baggy knee length shorts as they flex and posture their way around the festival chatting up anyone that catches their eye.

Not comfortable catching their eye of or ogling men young enough to be my sons, I ran for refuge into the VIP. Like most festivals, the VIP isn’t really the best area in the place to be at. There are always more maze-like internal VVIP and VVVIP areas inside this area, akin to the Russian dolls where as you get closer to the epicentre you actually stand shoulder to shoulder with the main performing acts and their management teams.
It was this area that I was lucky enough to chill out in alongside my music industry peers (and Where M.I.A’s manager later stormed out of at end of her acts set muttering something about never coming to Lovebox again after there was a mishap with her technical staging, which looked to me like it was M.I.A’s fault but was later blamed on the crew- •shrug-shoulders* what do I know!)

JASMINE WITH MI.A’S MUSIC PRODUCTION CREW AND FRIENDS.

Most festivals have a type of music or genre they stick to. You tend to know what you’re getting with Glastonbury –mostly rock and indie, Wireless caters to the urban crowd, but Lovebox is a true reflection of the current all-inclusive, multi-genre-loving youth. It’s the new generation music festivals cooler London younger sibling. With a really mixed up line-up of music acts of all ages, genres and success levels that’s very brave in booking a huge cross section of music acts.

Much of the hip-hop community were ecstatic when it was announced that Nas was set to celebrate the 20th anniversary of his seminal 1994 album ‘Illmatic’ by reissuing the record as ‘Illmatic XX’, but when we heard he would also perform the classic material at Lovebox, it was a no brainer, I’d have to venture out of my west London comfort zone and make the pilgrimage to Lovebox for Nasir Jones – known to the 25 million people who have bought his albums worldwide to date as simply Nas. I’ve seen him numerous times, the time at Kentish Towns Forum, when fans were standing on seats screaming alongside his every lyric from the rafters to the stalls, the time at Brixton where a fan actually popped off a real gunshot on his classic ‘’made to look’’ lol.

NEW DISC LINE UP;

Disc One:
‘The Genesis’
‘NY State Of Mind’
‘Life’s A Bitch’
‘The World Is Yours’
‘Halftime’
‘Memory Lane (Sittin’ In Da Park)’
‘One Love’
‘One Time 4 Your Mind’
‘Represent’
‘It Ain’t Hard To Tell
Read more at http://www.nme.com/news/various-artists/75290#9hbIhyHd1U3zuCcQ.99

Disc Two:
‘I’m a Villain’ (previously unreleased)
The Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Show on WKCR October 28, 1993 (previously unreleased freestyle)
‘Halftime’ (Butcher Remix)
‘It Ain’t Hard To Tell’ (Remix) (promo single)
‘One Love’ (LG Main Mix)
‘Life’s A Bitch’ (Arsenal Mix) (promo single)
‘One Love’ (One L Main Mix)
‘The World Is Yours’ (Tip Mix)
‘It Ain’t Hard To Tell’ (The Stink Mix) (UK single)
‘It Ain’t Hard To Tell’ (The Laidback Remix) (UK single)

A film about the making of the album was also released this year, called Time Is Illmatic, but watching Nas perform and talk through his work was as good as a movie being played out live in front of our eyes. I wont lie, so many older acts have performed such poor renditions in recent years and been ridiculed back to their homelands – shout out Jodeci!- that I did have misgivings, but I needn’t have worried, the show was incredible!

Illmatic- (meaning “beyond ill” or “the ultimate”), when it was released in 1994 was given a 5 mic rating by The Source- hip-hops then print press bible. It was their highest rating and very controversial at the time.
During my time at MTV I don’t think we ever had a best albums list that Illmatic didn’t feature on. It was one of the quintessential hip hop recordings of the 1990s and I recall during my numerous interviews with many hip-hop stars of the time, many from Common to Jay Z cited Illmatic as an early inspiration for them.

This album uses samples galore in the best example of hip hoppers honoring banging beats. Nas wrote it in a small room, in his small apartment in Queensbridge and it went on to achieve pantheon status for its poetic and cinematic depiction of inner-city blight. On the album, Nas used intricate lyrical patterns to describe his unsafe surroundings, an environment that proved risky for the young rapper, although it provided a great canvas for his narrative skills. With producers DJ Premier, Large Professor, Pete Rock and Q-Tip, Nas created a singularly evocative album. You didn’t have to be from New York to see the dilapidated buildings, cracked sidewalks and rusty basketball rims. Back then and even now it could be a parallel borough of inner city England. Queensbridge. Queens Park. One and the same. This Lovebox set was clearly a proud moment for him and fans like us who recall, reflect and acknowledged their loyalty from the start of his career.

During Nas Lovebox set a stage design depicting the urban landscape of Queensbridge, with graffiti-lined streets, a subway entrance. Nas rocked a three-piece suit and performed with the National Symphony Orchestra at the Kennedy Center when he did the same gig earlier this year. For Lovebox a simple ‘’world is yours’’ t-shirt, long shorts and trainers.

DJ Green Lantern was on the decks as Nas hit the stage, and from his first bars on the first track I was able to exhale as I took in that his vocals sounded as strong and crisp as they were decades ago. The lyrics sound just as relevant today and it was incredulous to think that he wrote them as a teenager. Spoken word genius about racial segregation, educational inequality, public housing, and the prison system, he was just 20 when the album was released.

Back then I remember growing up in Harlesden and Southall and he seemed to speak of similar stories that happened around me but that the mainstream media seemed oblivious to. Being a street soldier, selling drugs to make ends meet, having to deal with the dangers that come along with that lifestyle. No wonder he was compared to the God-Rakim.

LOVEBOX AT NIGHT!

Nas has written some of the most quotable lyrics in the history of rap….

“Life’s a bitch and then you die/ That’s why we get high/ ‘Cause you never know when you’re gonna go”…..’’you can hate me now/ but I won’t stop now’’…’’all I need is one mic’’…

…and the Lovebox crowd in the first few rows flowed with him word for word, although a lot of the kids much further back clearly hadn’t even heard of Nas let alone his songs. They were carried by the hype of us hard-core aging B Girls and Boys though and joined in choruses with their drunken joy. However, the irony is not lost on the fact that our communities haven’t become safer over two decades and that the UK’s youth can relate now more than ever to many of his lyrics.

In a 1994 interview Nas spoke about Illmatic, saying that “this feels like a big project that’s gonna affect the world’’ but who would’ve thought he’d be performing it to a passionate crowd at Lovebox twenty years later. Hip-hop critics and journos are often dismissed when they speak on content and thoughts about music but so many of us said this was a classic album back then and it’s proved the test of time.

Could Nas have imagined that Hollywood legend Robert de Niro would be singing its praises at the Tribeca film festival earlier this year? Or those British kids who weren’t even born in 1994 and that equate great hip-hop with Drake and Jay Z would acknowledge his masterpiece in 2014?

Nas explained at the time…

‘’When my rap generation started, it was about bringing you inside my apartment. It wasn’t about being a rap star; it was about anything other than. I want you to know who I am: what the streets taste like, feel like, and smell like. What the cops talk like, walk like, and think like. What crackheads do — I wanted you to smell it, feel it. It was important to me that I told the story that way because I thought that it wouldn’t be told if I didn’t tell it. I thought this was a great point in time in the 1990s in [New York City] that needed to be documented and my life needed to be told. “While it’s sad that there’s so much frontin’ in the rap world today, this should only make us sit up and pay attention when a rapper comes along who’s not about milking the latest trend and running off with the loot’’

LOVEBOX NIGHT TIME FUN.

Nas has said he was trying to make a flawless album when he made llmatic- and he did. With his lyrics that depicted a lifestyle that drew in fans globally, in his raspy deep voice for one still young had us hooked at London’s clubs like Subterainia and Hanover Grand week in-week out. Whole thesis and university courses could be set-and have been- on Illmatic. Nas made the type of music that helped hip-hop become a respected and dissected art form where critics could discuss lyrical content, album artwork, iconic production values and helped birth a whole back pack wearing hip hop geek.

I won’t say I wasn’t surprised that young Lovebox fans were able to join in with Nas call and responses to his hit songs, I was. Its always hard to admit you’re an aging B-girl but there is pride looking back and knowing this man made some of the soundtrack to an important part of my life and was now influencing those that come after us.

Nas’ set was smooth and flowed, as he’s been performing this tour all across the USA this year. Earlier this year at the New York show he said ‘’ Twenty years ago, “I felt like my words had to be harsh, but I’m a little more refined now, don’t get it twisted. I’m still hood, though.”

At Victoria Park he recognised that not everyone in attendance was a Nas fan and many weren’t even born when the album was released. Here he said ‘’I’m Nas for those that done know me, I’m the one that said hip-hop was dead! ‘’Half of you weren’t even born when I made this album!” the 40-year-old rapper shouted to the crowd, but last year he was named the best rapper of all time in a poll voted for by NME.COM readers, so clearly young music fans do research for great music.

Nas’ prowled around the Lovebox stage with the confidence and regal stance of a lion king. He ran through his classics like a marathon runner. Firstly One love, then Streetdreams. When he introduced ‘’ I can’’ he urged the crowd ‘’you guys are the new world leaders!’’ When he performed his classic hit Got yourself a gun I couldn’t help laugh and recall THAT Brixton show a few years ago at the same moment a Brixton man had popped a real shot off into the crowd!

This set was good but lower energy than when I’ve seen him in the past- he knew the crowd wasn’t all die-hard, ride or die legacy fans. This album represents me, us our youth. Unlike people who pass and hope their legacies will remain someplace, Illmatic will be played when my generation are octogenarians. To be able to perform your album after 20 years and it still sound fresh is dope beyond belief.

To see a hip-hop legend perform a classic album front to back live is a true fans dream and I think Nas has set a new blueprint and all music acts should celebrate seminal milestones in this way. At Lovebox he reminded us that he’s still one of the best, a hip-hop icon that has always kept it 100% real and for this set alone for me, Lovebox really is a music festival in a league of its own!

ONE OF THIS WEEK MOVERS & SHAKERS- MY OLD PAL MELVIN ODOOM!

Its been a hectic, yet fun week, that epitomises a typical summer in London. I kick started it with the premier launch night of the London Indian Film Festival where actress Emma Thompson had produced the opening night gala film SOLD, about a 13 year old Nepalese girl sold into sex slavery in Kolkata before Gillian Anderson (X Files)- who plays an American photographer, helps rescue her.

GILLIAN ANDERSON IN SOLD.

Gillian was part of an interesting Q&A session with the audience straight after the movie, which really focused on just how many millions of children globally are trafficked annually.

GILLIAN ANDERSON AT THE LONDON INDIAN FILM FESTIVAL- SOLD MOVIE PREMIER.

LONDON FABULOSITY

Then there were a myriad of commitments from my regular Friday breakfast slot on London Live talking you through the days Daily Grind stories, to engagement parties for music industry colleagues.
Watch The Daily Grind again here:
http://www.londonlive.co.uk/news/jasmine-dotiwala-takes-a-loot-at-the-headlines#play

JASMINE ON LONDON LIVE EVERY FRIDAY AT 6.20/7.20/8.20AM.

All this was followed by brunches with my ladies in the private members club at The Electric in Portobello Road, and a triple birthday celebration for man about town, creative lifestyle consultant and Will I Am’s communications manager Tim Wade and his 3 year old twin boys with his gorgeous lady TV goddess Lisa Snowden which included drinks, nibbles, cake and loads of friends and family who also just happened to be over achievers like BBC Radio London’s Vanessa Feltz and her TV agent beau Ben and more.

MAN ABOUT TOWN TIM WADE CELEBRATES HIS BITHDAY AND HIS THREE YEAR OLD TWINS BIG DAY TOO!

Next the LONDON360 reporters attended the Jack Petchy Speak Out Challenge where hundreds of young people are mentored and trained to speak to a public audience of hundreds. The BBC’s Brenda Emmanus, AJ from KISSFM and Baroness Sloss, judged the final competition. Supporters in the house included Apprentice winner and business entrepreneur Tim Campbell and more. Next they attended the National Diversity Awards pre-awards celebration dinner, before running along to capture some amazing V Inspired and Evening Standard Frontline campaign stories of young achievers who have overcome obstacles in their lives!

JASMINE WITH HER OLD MTV COMPADRE-MELVIN ODOOM- PRODUCER OF YOMO: YOU ONLY MARRY ONCE” WEBSERIES

Something that continues to frustrate many of us in the industry are the media’s laziness in only plucking out and promoting the same young talent over and over again as if only one exists out there. There are literally hundreds of diverse young talented people doing exceptionally well out there so please look further than the same old ones you catapulted to fame 4 years ago. One young man that’s making his moves both in front of the airwaves as behind is my old MTV presenter Melvin Odoom.
One half of the KISSFM radio breakfast duo- Melvin has just produced a new online web series titled YOMO – a pun of YOLO- which stands for You Only Marry Once. So many young people globally are only accessing TV content online and many online series get picked up by mainstream broadcasters for a TV transmission too.

Following a private screening of the pilot episode of YOMO at Channel 4 headquarters last week, industry professionals had the opportunity to ask questions and give comments. The general consensus was that YOMO was a breath of fresh air that succinctly captured the essence of Britain’s rich diverse communities and that this story would most certainly make easy and essential viewing.

Typical quotes on the night were similar to ”As creatives we had become frustrated at the lack of diversity on our screens, so rather than moan and wait for someone else to provide the opportunities, we wanted to do something about it. We created Ment2Excel Digital to provide a platform for shows like YOMO! Ghandi said, “Be the change that you want to see in the world” – We are working hard to be a part of that change”.

Created by Melvin’s sister Yonah Odoom and her friend Moshana Khan from North West Actors, the comedy centres around two young women living and loving in London – trying to find a husband. Both are fast approaching thirty, and the reality of being left on the shelf – is becoming just that – a reality. Determined not to grow old as lonely spinsters with just themselves and a cat for company, they decide to go on an all out assault to find their future husbands.

For Yo & Mo marriage is for life, therefore they are determined to make sure it’s with the right guy, even if it means meeting all the wrong ones!

Lenny Henrys ‘Act for Change’ has recently highlighted the problems faced by ethnic minorities in the media. Not only is the conception of this show – proof of those issues, but its presence also offers a solution – independently produced shows.

Melvin said of the show “YOMO is funny and smart, and is the type of show that has been missing from the landscape. I love the fact that rather than waiting for opportunities, the girls went out there to make it happen. This is the future”

I sat down with Melvin to talk about YOMO and what inspired him to make it? ‘’The web series was written and created by my sister Yonah Odoom and her best friend/actor buddy Moshana Khan. Being single girls they were getting pressure from their families on finding a husband and settling down! It’s quite common especially for women their age (ahem!) – Anyway they thought they would document some of their experiences as single women looking for love. They are both very talented actors and writers, so when they came to me with the idea, it was a no brainer.A lot of the times actors of black and ethnic minority descent do not have as many opportunities to play multifaceted roles, and when they do the roles can be clichés and stereotypes, we wanted to do something which broke out of that box”.

Don’t worry though, Melvin isn’t thinking of chucking in his front of camera roles like BBC3’s DON’T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF for behind it ‘’I still love presenting, and haven’t got any plans to stop! But I have always at some point wanted to get involved in producing shows. One of the other reasons for the birth of YOMO was because of a conversation that Yonah, Moshana and I had about the lack of diverse roles available for black and Asian actors. We came to the conclusion that the way forward was to create your own show. So we enlisted the help of Russell & Nana at Ment2Excel Digital and the YOMO journey began!’’

Alot of online TV series have been made this past few years about the Nigerian community- its interesting that their time now. But Melvin’s not trying to change any stereotypes.

‘’We weren’t really out to change any misconceptions; we just wanted to tell our story. We think there are funny stories out there, regardless of your culture!’’

The unusual angle this web series has is that is easily blends the second and third generation immigrant youth into the same story, and is truly reflective of London’s youthful all inclusive friendships regardless of cultural makeups today, specifically the interaction between Asian and African relationships. ‘’One of the things that Yonah and Moshana have found through their friendship is the amount of similarities between both families. Moshana calls my Mum “Mum” and vice versa! She’s at home in our house, eating jollof all the time (maybe too much!) – When different communities start to look closely at each other, you notice that there are usually more similarities than differences!!’’

Like many a new creative arts project Melvin has been resourceful in having this web series made, ‘‘in order to make it happen, we had to fund the pilot ourselves. We are now looking for investors as well as going down the crowd-funding root. The model for funding shows is definitely changing, and with names such as Spike Lee going down this root, it makes it even more credible! So watch this space!’’

You can watch YOMO | Web Series | Episode 1: The African, Asian Persuasion, here:

NOW I’m off to Soho for the MOBO ‘Lost In Love’ EP Listening Party, in honour of east London singer/song writer MIKE HOUGH!

JASMINE WITH HER FRIEND AND COLLEAGUE- JACK OF MANY TRADES- KOJO.

Networks are important. Your network is your net worth.
It starts with a random introduction that usually leads to lifelong friendships and business partners.

Many years ago, my friend, the west London singer Estelle introduced me to her friend Kojo, a comedian who had started hosting a weekly comedy night at corks wine bar opposite Selfridges in central London. Kojo’s nights pulled in literally hundreds of young, urban, excited comedy fans each Sunday, for an evening of new young comedians cutting their teeth on a hip hop inspired audience.

I saw the movement growing to incredible sizes and as the then Head of MTV Base production persuaded my bosses to let me make and air this live night for TV. they weren’t initially convinced about comedy on a music channel, but after I explained that hip hop culture includes much more than just music they let me give it a shot. it rated beautifully, created a huge buzz for the home grown UK talent and before long Kojo’s Comedy Fun House was a series that ran and ran.

KOJO IS IN THE PLATINUM TEAM OF SEASON 6 WILD N OUT TEAM IN NYC.

A couple of years later whilst I was out in New York celebrating my birthday with a private dinner party with both English friends who were in town as well as my American mates, I introduced Kojo to entertainment impresario Nick Cannon who at the time was acting, directing and making movies, hosting a morning breakfast radio slot, building his NCredible clothing and media production empire as well as hosting cornerstone American programming like Americas Got Talent and is of course hubby to the biggest female superstar of our time- Ms Mariah Carey.

A few more years down the line and Nick calls me and tells me he wants to include some UK talent in the sixth season of his MTV hit show Nick Cannon presents- Wild N Out, and who would I suggest to appear on his next series. Before I even had a chance to respond he said ‘’hey how about your friend Kojo who you told me about?’’ Great. No need for me to make any decisions. 3 phone calls later between myself, Kojo and Nicks PA and Kojo was on a plane to NYC.
Now he’s starring in one of the two Wild N Out teams in this series – an opportunity that’s huge for up and coming talent to get their faces and content exposed to an American audience. He’s even been described out there as ‘’ Great Britain’s comedic treasure Kojo’’.

Kojo’s now back in the UK on his daily morning breakfast radio sow on CapitalXtra and been talking to me about his journey from his Hackney roots to what will no doubt soon be Hollywood.
‘’I met Nick Cannon in NY early 2009, when my old MTV Base boss (•smile•) flew over to NY ,where I was living at the time, to celebrate her birthday, and she introduced me to Mariah Carey who was in attendance with her then boyfriend Nick Cannon, who was someone I looked up to. Since that moment Nick and I stayed in touch and it’s only now something’s come up for us to work together’’.

Nick is clearly an inspiration for many young talented men globally and Kojo is no exception taking every bit of advice seriously ‘‘the filming process of Wild N Out was amazing. Seeing so many people from all over America loving the same thing as me, making people laugh. The set was amazing, crew were so professional and they really make the whole cast work together on the show to bring the best for the audience. Nick tells us it’s not about being the best out of a bad cast but the cast knowing when to take a joke and give a joke’’.

KOJO WITH THE BOSS- RICK ROSS- CAPTAIN OF THE BLACK TEAM-SEASON 6 WILD N OUT.

Clearly the urban hip-hop genre is much bigger stateside than it is here in the UK. Hip-hop megastar Rick Ross heads up the opposite team to Nick Cannon. Kojo found the Americas certainly have a different mentality to that which he’s used to ‘’The differences between working with UK talent and US talent is, the Americans are very confident in what they do and very rarely 2nd guess themselves. Where as UK talent think it’s a good Idea but don’t deliver with conviction. I’ve always had the mentality of the Americans hence why I’ve achieved so much with so little’’.

Kojo is great at being his own champion and stays focused no matter where his career is. Like a chameleon he takes on new challenges. He wasn’t a TV or radio host but that stop him trying and now they are his main gigs. ‘’This is great exposure for me in America. When Nick spoke to me on the phone, I was at JFK airport by the time he hung up. The show is very popular and is shown all over America so will help the strong brand I have here over there. There will be more opportunities from this’’.

And he’s already milking every opportunity life throws his way with new projects. The admirable thing about him is that he’s not afraid to take risks and fail. Even if a genre isn’t his forte he’ll give it a go. That’s the attitude of a winner. ‘’I’ve been writing movie scripts and theatre productions for the last 6 months with my first short film Wasteman Diaries coming out on July 23rd and my theatre play Above Romance is out at Hackney Empire on the 2nd of August. I’m also back on the road around the UK doing what I love the most- stand up comedy – in October’’.

His dreams aren’t meagre ‘’Nick Cannon is one of the nicest men you could ever wish to meet and he has shown a lot of faith in me to deliver. I hope to emulate his success one day’’.

MASTERCARD PRICELESS PHARRELL GIG AT O2’S BROOKYN BOWL.
ALL PHARRELL SHOW PICS Copyright Paul Hampartsoumian 2014.

JASMINE WITH PHARRELL

MasterCard continue with their VIP exclusive access only music shows, which this week was hosted by the coolest man in the universe- mister Pharrell Williams!
I was lucky enough to watch the sound check before the show thanks to my connects- Mervyn Lyn (Strategic Partnership Solutions) and Shaun Springer (Mastercard) and so enjoyed a cocktail before the doors opened with the Mastercard crew.

Pharrell was joined by an all male band and all female set of dancers (one representing every flavour). He performed a long set of his best-known hits. The medley just went on and on and on proving just how much of a Midas touch this man has had for the past two decades.

At one point he and his NERD/ Startrek production outfit were responsible for over 90% of hits in the UK and American charts and now he goes from the man behind the scenes to the main star frontman.

His Oprah appearance recently proved he’s a sensitive soul that just cant believe how his hit song ‘’Happy’’ has had humanity globally dancing and making their own versions of his video dancing down a street. Its now the most played track at any celebration from weddings, birthdays, christenings and any life flagship date and will no doubt be Pharrells version of Mariah Carey’s’’all I want for Christmas’’. It’s the song that will keep giving both us and him (financially) for decades to come.

JASMINE WITH KEN AND PAOLA FROM ADIDAS AT THE PRICELESS PHARRELL GIG.

At his Brooklyn Bowl gig the fans were treated to a totally free evening of fancy nibbles like mini burgers, chicken skewers and pizza bites as well as all drinks on tap. Literally, as their slogan says… a ‘’priceless’’ night!

Halfway through his show he stopped just once to speak to the crowd, telling us how much he champions equality for females, and he acknowledges that often he has made ropey choices about songs he’s involved in, but should there be any doubt, he is for female empowerment and will continue to do all that he can to push it!.

Brooklyn bowl must get a special shout out. London’s newest bowling, partying and music venue is sexy and plush as hell with an incredible visual, laser tech line up of equipment as well as unbelievable sound acoustics for live performers.
Pharrel’s set list looked something like this, as I recall when I wasn’t dancing and screaming manically.

‎Frontin
Marilyn Monroe
Give it to me
Pass the covousier
Lap dance
Beautiful
‎Drop like it’s hot
Blurred lines
Get lucky

Skateboard P was looking as fly as ever with another hat, beaded jewellery accessorised, Adidas jeans look but I was most mortified that he was rocking Uggs! Yes, yes, I know Uggs were originally made for men in Australia but we’re not in Australia and this is the coolest man on earth!
My other half has been rocking them for years and now Pharrells co-signed it I cant force him to take them off at the door before we leave home anymore. Sheesh. The girls will continue to laugh at me.

——————————————-
LONDON360 AMBASSADOR NOEL CLARKE SPEAKS.

MY BROTHER NOEL CLARKE AND I ON OUR FAVOURITE STREET.

NOEL CLARKE popped into the LONDON360 studios to meet the latest team of reporters and share his personal life stories thoughts and anecdotes with them. Noel is one of London360’s ambassadors alongside Alesha Dixon , Jon Snow and Eddie Nestor. The reporters grilled him both on and off camera and Noel left them with various standout thoughts such as;

“Cos of the moves people like me & Idris are making, some young black man may be James Bond in the future! We’re laying important foundations”
“The more it scares you, the better it is. Don’t ever pass up an opportunity that comes your way. You’ll always regret it”
“If you don’t like a film I’ve made its water off a ducks back. We don’t all like everything. If youre not listening u missed the message”
“I was once offered £1200 a week to join Family Affairs. I was a broke gym instructor but refused it cos I had self belief that it wasn’t me”
“Hard work and dedication will always beat talent in the long run. Get somewhere early, over prepare, don’t burn bridges”
“The single most important thing I’ve learnt in life is to adapt. Conversate in an office yet be real w/your friends- Adapt for the situation”
“My Brilliant moment would be having both my son’s. you can’t imagine how it changes your life. Cutting the cord. It changes your mentality”
“My Brilliant Moments are diverse. I mentor young people & I want to see them grow in the industry. I appreciate those that came before me”
“As a kid I worked very hard and learnt skills on the job, I never set out to make inspirational content, its just stories I have in me”
“I’m not trying to be a role model for others. Getting the BAFTA and OLIVER AWARD may inspire others and if so good”
“If my career stopped tmrw I dunno what I would do, acting, directing, screen writing is what I DO-i am always the change I wanna see!”
“I get tweets daily from people asking for advice-my advice to all is go and make it happen. Whilst you’re tweeting others are doing it”
“U drive yourself mad if u worry about who likes u. U have to jump through hoops in the UK whereas in the USA they just see my credentials”
“winning the Lawrence Olivier Award was nice and I respect the brand but I don’t kiss it nightly -i just get on with my work”
“It was important for me to put 4 women and women of colour in my movie 4321”

So much knowledge- preach Noel!
———————————-

LONDON LIVE- THE DAILY GRIND!

I finished the week as usual with my Friday breakfast slot on London’s best breakfast show –WAKE UP LONDON with my Daily Grind slot where we talked all things Jean Claude Junker-the drinking, smoking president-in-waiting of Europe,………… benefits and public services affecting the middle classes detrimentally (get rid of the Waitrose shop, home coffee machine, organic yoga and bikram classes now!), ………this weekends annual BET Awards out in L.A where 6 of our black London music stars are nominated!. ( style icon of UK music-Tinie Tempah, king of grime for over a decade Dizzee Rascal, the man who always keeps it realer than real- Ghetts, MOBO stars and last years most buzz worthy act- Krept & Konan, the most unique vocal style we’ve heard in years- Laura Mvula and Roc Nation princess Rita Ora!) and…………….why we could all be unemployed soon due to robotic news presenters on TV. Until they can ad lib like me there’s no competition LOL!

JASMINE WITH BREAKFAST SHOW HOST GAVIN RAMJAUN.

TO WATCH TODAY’S SLOT AGAIN HERES THE LINK!
Benefits, BET Awards and Robot Presenters! @jasminedotiwala takes us through todays hot topics: http://bit.ly/1pV99ag #WakeUpLondon

JASMINE WITH JIMMY WALES.

As they say, life, death and taxes is the one thing that we can be sure will affect us all and when we leave this blessed planet it would be amazing to exit knowing you’ve made a substantial mark on humanity. I relish meeting those that have changed the status quo and the way we live.

Nowadays no one uses a print copy of the olde worlde style encyclopaedia but everyone logs onto Wikipedia to find out the basics about anything at all. Wikipedia doesn’t just give us straight facts – its an information tool that anyone globally can and do contribute to and mould for the best most updated, factual accurate information.

The founder of Wikipedia Jimmy Wales this fortnight took time out to meet the LONDON360 team and talk about his support for TECH4GOOD. The Tech4Good Awards recognise organisations and individuals who use digital technology to improve the lives of others.

Usually when the media interview Jimmy they make a huge deal about the fact that he’s the only world famous Internet entrepreneur who isn’t a billionaire. To which his recent response to a journalist was ‘‘that fact is true, I’m not a billionaire. So? You aren’t either, so are not most people. It’s kind of a stupid thing to bang on about’’. So we didn’t. Here’s how our conversation went.

Can you tell me a bit about what motivated you to start Wikipedia?”

Jimmy: “So I had been looking at the growth of software, free software, programmers coming together from all over the world, collaborating, to build all the really great software that runs the Internet. Analytics, Apache, Pearl and HP, all of these fundamental software tools people are using to build the web, which are all open-source projects, all of whom are volunteers and it got me thinking about what else could be built in this way? We got this great opportunity of an Internet where people can communicate on, what else could be built? I hit upon the idea of an encyclopaedia that we could bring people together and give a free encyclopaedia to every person on the planet, in their own language and I was very excited about that idea. Here we are today”
Well today we’re the fifth most popular website with over 500 million users every month so we’ve become part of the infrastructure of the world people are relying on us for anything at a time. For free and with no advertising it’s had a huge impact, for me I’m particularly proud of the impact it is having on the developing world. We seeing a lot of growth in the developing world and that’s where the humanitarian mission of wiki is becoming more important and strong and that a net billion people are coming online and that’s why they’re going from very little information to having the world open to them and we’re pumped to be there helping them find out by their government and learn about their politicians. Whatever it is to me that very exciting.
Wikipedia is a freely licenced encyclopaedia written by thousands of volunteers in many languages, the original vision for Wikipedia is for all of us to imagine a world in which every single person on the planet is given free access to the sum of all human knowledge, and that’s what we’re doing at Wikipedia

In terms of the motivation of the people involved, what sort of things would you say about their motivation? What motivates them to do what they do?”

Jimmy: “Yeah, I think it’s 2 things. First, you know, imagine a world where every single person is given free access to the sum of human knowledge through what we are doing. That’s our vision, which is very exciting, this big thing and if you are going to spent a lot of time on a hobby, you might as well be doing something that’s historic and important and that’s meaningful to people. But that’s not enough, there a lot of things that can be historically important, but that’s not very fun, this is very fun. People enjoy the process of editing Wikipedia, than you get those people who you agree, disagree and argue with, but in a constructive way. It’s an intellectual hobby, people really like, and people get really passionate about. So I think it’s a combination of those two things. It’s fun with purpose, is what makes the community really work. “

And in terms of achieving that encyclopaedia for everybody where do you put yourself on the scale in terms of how far along the line…

A few years ago I formulated in a more precise way to say I want to have at least 250 000 entries in every language that has at least 1 million native speakers because people say that in every popular language there are only three speakers. We probably won’t be able to make a separate encyclopaedia for them but we can have a million speakers. We have some small languages like that, that have been very successful and that’s about 339 languages depending on how you count and we are a long way from that. In the languages of the developing world there is a long way to go in the smaller languages particularly in the smaller languages of Africa there is a lot of work to be done; but in the larger languages, in the European languages, in the Chinese, Japanese we have come a long way towards that goal.

I do think that there are some big leaps happening faster than people realise in terms of Internet access. You know you can find predications from a few years ago when your smart phones become big in Africa and you realize today actually five years ago, three years ago we were probable two years too conservative. In fact it is coming really fast, much faster than people realize. I think that is going to have some sharp impacts in the community. Look at the percentage of people that have access to the Internet in various countries. A lot of places in the developing world are experiencing what we all experienced in the late 90s of sky rocketing access to the internet, sky rocketing participation – it is coming to them now and that is a very exciting time obviously.

And using devices that we could never imagine at the time the differences in these things and on the phone and nonetheless computer is a completely different experience…

For us one of the challenges is excessive building. If people are coming on a device than if it is the smart phone it is easy and its quite a good experience to read Wikipedia on a smart phone but I don’t think you are ever going to really edit Wikipedia from a smart phone…

That won’t change I think there is room for a bit more video. I always love it when people contribute to high quality photos and illustrations and things like that, those are important but not as important as changing the overall nature of the product Encyclopaedia is texting and that’s fine. There are other things. There is not a lot of demand from the community for video – it is really hard to collaboratively edit a video if someone posts a video and I think ‘oh there is an error there they should have done this differently’. Well there is not much you can do about it after the fact whereas with text you can say ‘oh I can add that or I see a mistake you made there or I can see a way it could be better phrased and I see a dialog along that’. Text is very fluid so it’s easy to continually improve text so I think that’s the nature of it and most of the topics in encyclopaedia text is really ideal. Audio, no in terms of access ability making sure that screen reader software works on our Wikipedia – something that is always a nagging problem because it’s so easy to change something and breaks people’s screen readers and they complain and we have to fix it again but we really try to be as successful as we can.

Turning to tech 4 good I was trying to think of a couple examples that will sit alongside Wikipedia that are not for profit tech-driven globally do you have some examples that you sort of place yourself amongst.

I never think about that question we are so absorbed in doing what we do that we don’t really compare ourselves. I think if you think in a broader way I don’t know if any other organisation are like us but there is a broader movement and spirit around the internet of the users of the Internet so while Youtube is a commercial platform a great a mass of content on Youtube is not commercial it’s just people sharing knowledge and I was just reading about music editing software so creating music and apparently there’s hundreds and hundreds of videos on Youtube explaining details of how to do it. If you have a software saying I want to learn how to make music using software there is an enormous amount of free educational material that people have just posted because it is their hobby and they love it so that is the spirit of Wikipedia that I know something and I’d love to share it.

If you had a child that is in to Mindcraft you know full well that’s all they do is watch YouTube, Mindcraft is the same thing there’s the same spirit of sharing and developing

I play Mindcraft all the time as does my 17 year old daughter there’s massive amount of Mindcraft in there. I have heard of some cases they spend more time watching Mindcraft on You Tube than they do actually playing which is interesting.

Looking ahead, I know you have been advising the government, UK government for example, what kind of lessons do you think there are about the way that tech can be used for good, social good, even stuff that you have learnt through Wikipedia or just generally.

I think that one of the most important lessons of Wikipedia is that there’s an enormous amount of good will out there and so when we think about designing projects for good, we should be designing around that good will or rather the good people not designing around the very tiny minority of people who are trouble makers and that is a big mistake I see people making. They start thinking what could the bad people do, lets design the system around that to stop them from doing that and there’s consequences that stop the good people from spontaneously doing good, so that kind of approach and design of software, design of communities is really key and something I think we should see a lot more of.

Can government introduce that do you think, is there any role they can play in that?

They can stay out of the way as much as possible, one of the big mistakes can be made is for politicians to imagine that they know what to do in the world of tech and entrepreneurship in general, and in general they don’t and they cant and it is not the right thing. What they should do is what they should be good at which is make sure that the legal structure is solid, understandable and fair to allow for innovation within that framework, and they get out of the way.

In five years time what is going to be different about Wikipedia with all the technology, which we’re using?

The two big changes you’ll see will be one will be visible to you and the other wont. The visible change will be that the editing environment will become a lot more like a word processor much more friendly. Right now when you click on edit you get wiki mark-up language and it’s a bit of a learning curve on how to do it. We want to eliminate the barrier so that is a visible change. The invisible change is what I’ve talked about already which is invisible to me which is the growth of Wikipedia in the developing world. We probably won’t notice when Zulu Wikipedia goes from two hundred entries to two thousand entries but the people who do speak Zulu will notice and that’s a big change.

I know Wikipedia is very assessable to the disabled and the elderly and perhaps those with learning difficulties, was that something built in at the very beginning was that part of your mantra. And if so why?

Yeah it’s been core sometimes we’ve had a mixed track record on it. It’s something we are making sure Wikipedia works on screen readers, making sure the site is usable and we follow all the best practises of accessibility. And occasionally we break something and we try and fix it as quick as we can so there are issues on Wikipedia, which we can improve in terms of accessibility. But it is a core value and its part of our mission to say we want a free encyclopaedia in every major language for everyone on the planet. And that’s including for the blind and every other disability, which they may have. We want to make it available.

So in your view technologies good and technology is moving all the time. Do you have a vision of what the big next vision is going to be?

Yeah. In terms of tech 4 good for me one of the biggest things we’ve talked about briefly but its mobile in the developing world. There are phones coming out now the cheapest one I’ve seen so far for an android smartphone is $41. Which is reaching hundreds of thousands millions of people who could never have reached it before. They’re coming online for the first time there joining the global conversation. They’re using twitter or facebook or Wikipedia they’re reading the newspaper. That is a true revolution and I think that’s going to have an enormous impact. In places where people are finally able to get organised over the tyrants that rule over them. The kleptocrats that steal the money form them those sorts of things. They begin to gain the opportunity to gain some power and I think that’s incredible.

What was your brilliant moment that caused you to create Wikipedia?

The interesting question of what was my brilliant moment is one that I really struggled with because I don’t think there was a brilliant moment. I think maybe the brilliant moment which is lost in the sands of time now, was the realisation that I wasn’t going to have a brilliant moment and that I need to allow other people to have lots of brilliant moments. So the creation of Wikipedia and the growth of Wikipedia required a lot of innovations by a lot of people. Developing the community norms and rules and editorial standards umm…. various genius changes to the software, things like that made a big difference. Other than saying I had the idea to create a free encyclopaedia for everyone, maybe that was a brilliant moment, I don’t think that was that important. I think lots of people have great ideas and they never do anything with them so for me I would say I’m a carpenter and architect, I’m a builder I build things, keep things moving forward

What impact do you think Wikipedia has had so far?

I think Wikipedia has had an enormous impact on the world. I’m really proud of our community and the things that we have accomplished. We’ve got 550,000,000 readers every month now so that’s a substantial portion of the planet. Were continuing to grow, were really excited for the next five years as we see the next billion people come online in the developing world and join in the global conversation. We want Wikipedia to be there for them to help them in the same way it has helped all of the rest of us so its an exciting time.
The evolution of Wikipedia has been very minimal actually, its an interesting thing that the original vision, the original concept, the original software, the original look of the site is all very similar today, a few things have changed here and there and obviously its bigger.
But one of the reasons that Wikipedia has been so successful is that the simple core idea, a free encyclopaedia for everyone has always been the driving force and it has helped us make decisions through the years and as long as we have remained true to that mission we have prospered and so I that sense we were not completely different than we were 7 years, we are pretty much the same as we were 7 years ago just bigger and better.

What do you think is the most important lesson you have learnt since you have started that you want to share?

The single lesson that I have learnt from Wikipedia, the main thing is that there is an enormous number of wonderful people out there, in general if you think that that out of a 1000 people who turn up in the world, there’s probably 10 of them that are really annoying, and only 1 of them is actually destructive. But the 99 can deal with the 10 and the 1 you have to learn to cope with somehow. But in general we should design our systems we should design our societies we should design our software, the tools that we us are around the assumption that most people are good and we should allow the flexibility and ability to do what it is they want to do. Yes we have to deal with difficult people, that’s a piece of it but don’t design things about the difficult people first, don’t think of all of the horrible things people might do, lets lock everything down so they wont do that. Look at all of the great things people might do and lets design for that, and then yes, we have to cope with the trouble.

What is your ultimate goal for Wikipedia?

The goal for Wikipedia is to have a free encyclopaedia for every single person on the planet in their own language, to make that a little more specific, the goal is to have 250,000 articles in every language that has as least 1,000,000 native speakers, so that’s about 330 languages. We are a long way off form that now, there’s a lot of work to be done in the developing world but it is a growing, we are on the way.

JASMINE WITH ACTOR AND FILM MAKER RAY PANTHAKI.

THE DAILY GRIND ON LONDON LIVE

I started my week as usual at London Live on the breakfast show #WAKEUPLONDON- The Daily Grind slot, which I do every Friday. Tune in to hear the quirkiest, exclusive stories from across the capital. Joining us in the studio are always a number of new exciting documentary filmmakers as well as key influencers and more.
Last week it was my fellow Parsi mover & shaker, former Eastenders actor/ filmmaker Ray Panthaki, who told us about his new hard-hitting film Life Sentence- that highlights the devastating effects on a family of a fatal stabbing.

It’s a film about knife violence and Ray wants it to be shown to all London’s schoolchildren in an effort to help tackle the culture of youth violence. The film was originally made as a tribute to Ben Kinsella, the brother of former Eastenders actress Brooke Kinsella, after he was stabbed to death in London. Ray used to date Brooke at the time, and told London Live about the devastation caused by the murder on the family of the 16-year-old who was stabbed to death in Islington in June 2008.

He said:

“You don’t expect anything like that to happen to someone you know, especially someone so close to you. The film reflects what I witnessed; it was a family, one of the most loving families I have ever met, falling apart one by one. “In the film I am trying to get across the effect on that family, that they each lost a part of them that day and they will never be the same again. That is the harsh reality. “Ben was like a brother to me at the time and this was a way of channelling my anger.”

His film Life Sentence, won the best short film award at the East End Film Festival last year and was long listed for the BAFTA awards earlier this year. Ray also co-produced the Noel Clarke epic, Kidulthood, and said: “It is easy to do a film saying put down your knives but I wanted to tell the story from a different point of view, from the view of someone’s sister or grandmother. “I have seen the reaction the film has on young people and I want it to have a wider audience. I want to get it into schools and in prisons. The film’s ending in particular sparks a lot of debate. At first they say ‘what is going on’ but then they understand.”

Last year 12 teenagers were murdered in London, seven of them victims of knife crime so this film is timely and relevant. Spread the word!.

===============

JASMINE CATCHES UP WITH THE WONDERFUL CHUKA UMUNNA AT MOBOVATION.

MOBOVATION BREAKFAST

Next I popped along to an early morning breakfast event for MOBO called MOBOvation, where MOBO CEO Kanya King was hosting a breakfast gathering for VIPs in media and entertainment, to launch her new brand for unsung acts, and MOBO art exhibition, at Roast restaurant in Borough market. Joining the fancy start to the day were politicians like Chukka Umunna, entertainment impresario Jonathon Shalit, heads of record labels, TV society’s, music acts like Labrinth, Akala, Jahmene Douglas and Jermain Jackman who spoke movingly about the MOBO legacy.

==================

JASMINE WITH FOUNDER OF WIKIPEDIA- JIMMY WALES.

MEETING THE FOUNDER OF WIKIPEDIA

As they say, life, death and taxes is the one thing that we can be sure will affect us all and when we leave this blessed planet it would be amazing to exit knowing you’ve made a substantial mark on humanity. I relish in meeting those that have changed the status quo and the way we live. Nowadays no one uses a print copy of the olde worlde encyclopaedia but everyone logs onto Wikipedia to find out the basics about anything at all. Wiki doesn’t tell us what’s what- the residents of the world all contribute their knowledge to its content.
The founder of Wikipedia Jimmy Wales was in town to pick up an award for TECH4GOOD, and sat down and spoke to us about his vision and brilliant moments that inspired his brand. The full report and interview will be put up soon but here are a couple of snippets from our chat;

‘’I had been looking at the growth of software, free software, and programmers coming together from all over the world, collaborating, to build all the really great software that runs the Internet. Analytics, Apache, Pearl and HP, all of these fundamental software tools people are using to build the web, which are all open-source projects, all of whom are volunteers and it got me thinking about what else could be built in this way? We got this great opportunity of an Internet where people can communicate on, what else could be built? I hit upon the idea of an encyclopaedia that we could bring people together and give a free encyclopaedia to every person on the planet, in their own language and I was very excited about that idea. Here we are today”

‘’Imagine a world where every single person is given free access to the sum of human knowledge through what we are doing. That’s our vision, which is very exciting, this big thing and if you are going to spent a lot of time on a hobby, you might as well be doing something that’s historic and important and that’s meaningful to people. But that’s not enough, there a lot of things that can be historically important, but that’s not very fun, this is very fun. People enjoy the process of editing Wikipedia, than you get those people who you agree, disagree and argue with, but in a constructive way. It’s an intellectual hobby, people really like, and people get really passionate about. So I think it’s a combination of those two things. It’s fun with purpose, is what makes the community really work’’.
=====================

RUDOLPH WALKERS INTER SCHOOL DRAMA AWARDS.

RUDOLPH WALKER TAKES THE STAGE AT HIS AWARDS.

At the weekend, up at Millfield Arts Centre, actor and Eastenders legend Rudolph walker brought together a host of celebrity mates for his annual RWiSDA (Rudolph Walker Inter School Drama Awards) awards.

RWiSDA was first pioneered in the 1970’s with two schools from Brixton by Rudolph to help young people give them a sense of responsibility, to enable to use their spare time in a positive and productive way to offer an alternative to “hanging around” after school and to alleviate the boredom which may lead to anti-social behaviour.

WINNERS AT THE AWARDS 2014.

The Rudolph Walker Foundation Objectives are:
1. To provide young people with a sense of purpose.
2. To recognise that different people have different talent and skills, which need to be nurtured individually and sympathetically to help them fulfil those talents and skills.
3. To understand that self-esteem is crucial to the development of responsibility and ambition in young people; and to develop self-esteem through teamwork and common objectives and goals.
4. To give participants achievable goals that will be of practical educational value to children, young people and adults in our community.
5. To address a significant gap in provisions.
The foundation holds an annual Drama Competition (RWISDA) between young people and between schools nationally and internationally in a way that helps young people to use their spare time in a positive and productive way, and to offer an alternative to “hanging around” after school, alleviating the boredom syndrome that can lead to anti-social behaviour.

ACTORS AND CELEB FRIENDS MENTOR THE YOUNG PEOPLES DRAMA SETS….SEE WHO YOU CAN SPOT!

‎Retired boxer Michael Watson MBE, Retired former police superintendent Leroy Logan, singer Jermain Jackman (who I was sat next to), practically every Eastenders cast member and more celebrated 6 north London schools that had made the final cut.

MICHAEL WATSON MBE AWARDS A PRIZE!

TV and radio host and the nest man to lead any function with his free-styling entertainment- Kat Boyce ensured we enjoyed a very inspiring afternoon. Michael Watson awarded prizes, Jermain revealed that his solo album coming soon would be titled Genesis and I watched the stars of our future take their first showbiz steps!

HOST WITH THE MOST- KAT BOYCE GRILLS JERMAIN JACKMAN.

==============

JASMINE WITH PREEYA KALIDAS AND JPESQ.

PREEYA KALIDAS IN KHANDAN

Finally I was invited by my friend, actress Preeya Kalidas to go and see her in her latest live stage show of Khandan at the Royal Court Theatre. The rest of the cast included Sudha Bhuchar, Neil D’Souza, Rez Kempton and Zita Sattar.

Preeya last appeared at the Royal Court in Oxford Street. Her other theatre credits include Joseph and the Technicolour Dreamcoat and Bombay Dreams in the West End. Her television credits include Eastenders and Britz. On film her credits include Four Lions and Bend It Like Beckham and this time, as ever, she played the character that shakes things up!

Based around an Indian family- The Gill family- the audience are sat in the round in their intimate living room. The play highlights culture clashes, sibling rivalries and endless cups of chah (tea)…

Widowed matriarch Jeeto (Sudha Bhuchar) has a strong sense of her past and principles. She’s spent her life working hard and making sacrifices for her children. But eldest son Pal (Rez Kempton), isn’t following in her footsteps. He’s struggling with his role at the head of their expanding household. Crumbling under the weight of his father’s legacy, the family business is at risk and the last remaining link to their roots in the Punjab is in jeopardy.

Preeya- is seen like never before (check it out I don’t want to spoil it for you-its on until Saturday). Its a warm and funny play about tradition and ambition and the strong message that we all tend to have everything at our fingertips and sometimes imagining that we always want and need more can lead to our own downfall.

Now I’m off to see Pharrell at his Mastercard private gig- as they say….#priceless!