RIP Poly Styrene.
I'm not the sort of person who would normally write a blog post when a famous person dies, even when I'm genuinely sad about it, because I often don't know what to say. But I'm going to do my best to find the words this time, because I owe thanks.
Poly Styrene, the singer of the punk band X-Ray Spex, died early this morning at the age of only 53.
When I was 15, I was ugly and awkward and inept. I was a feminist but didn't really understand what that meant. I didn't look like a supermodel - I didn't look like any sort of model - and wouldn't have had any idea of how to dress even if I had. I wore DM boots with ugly minidresses and hats I found in charity shops and I didn't know why other teenagers called me a freak. I had braces on my teeth and I was gawky and weird and strange and I felt alone in the world.
It was the mid-90s, so I don't have a fantastic story about paying 20p to see X-Ray Spex before they were famous at the end of a pier or in a pub or anything. If I had been in the right era, I wouldn't have gone to those gigs anyway. My story is much more boring. I was in a record shop that was having a clear-out sale, and I found a CD called "Punk Explosion" that was reduced to 99p. It had a picture on the front of a woman with a mohawk, and a man with a safety pin through his ear, and it was 99p and I was in the shop with a boy I liked and wanted to seem cool so I bought it.
In my room, I listened to the CD, and most of the songs were mediocre or crap (I repeat, it was 99p), but a handful stood out, and one of those was a song called "Plastic Bag".
My mother came into my room then, and said, "Oh, is this X-Ray Spex?"
She dug out a book about punk and showed me a picture of the band, and it was honestly like seeing things fit into place. Poly and I were not that similar in many ways - she was petite, while I was gawking and lumbering, like an elephant - but she had huge hair, and braces on her teeth, and she was performing wearing what looked like an old lady's cardigan and skirt, and she had mud or blood or something smeared all over her legs. She was a feminist! And she shouted and bellowed and screamed and didn't seem afraid of people thinking badly of her or laughing at her. I imagined she would just shout louder.
The next time I was in a group of people and feeling shy, I didn't try to hide my braces behind a weak, closed-mouth smile - I grinned and let everyone see them. I bought fishnet tights and let them rip and proudly wore them with my DM boots. When people called me a freak, I didn't ignore them any more. I told them to fuck off, or I gave them the V-sign, or I spat on the ground. (Which, OK, may not have been the best ideas and got me into trouble more than once, but I still feel, somewhere in the less-than-rational bits of my brain, that it's purer and more worthwhile and more satisfying to let people know you're angry.)
If I ever had a moment where I knew things were not always going to be this awful, then it was because of Poly Styrene.
Rest in... whatever the opposite of peace is, Poly, because peace hardly seems fitting for a firework like you. Thanks for inspiring me and a million others so very much.
Poly Styrene, the singer of the punk band X-Ray Spex, died early this morning at the age of only 53.
Click to viewWhen I was 15, I was ugly and awkward and inept. I was a feminist but didn't really understand what that meant. I didn't look like a supermodel - I didn't look like any sort of model - and wouldn't have had any idea of how to dress even if I had. I wore DM boots with ugly minidresses and hats I found in charity shops and I didn't know why other teenagers called me a freak. I had braces on my teeth and I was gawky and weird and strange and I felt alone in the world.
It was the mid-90s, so I don't have a fantastic story about paying 20p to see X-Ray Spex before they were famous at the end of a pier or in a pub or anything. If I had been in the right era, I wouldn't have gone to those gigs anyway. My story is much more boring. I was in a record shop that was having a clear-out sale, and I found a CD called "Punk Explosion" that was reduced to 99p. It had a picture on the front of a woman with a mohawk, and a man with a safety pin through his ear, and it was 99p and I was in the shop with a boy I liked and wanted to seem cool so I bought it.
In my room, I listened to the CD, and most of the songs were mediocre or crap (I repeat, it was 99p), but a handful stood out, and one of those was a song called "Plastic Bag".
My mother came into my room then, and said, "Oh, is this X-Ray Spex?"
She dug out a book about punk and showed me a picture of the band, and it was honestly like seeing things fit into place. Poly and I were not that similar in many ways - she was petite, while I was gawking and lumbering, like an elephant - but she had huge hair, and braces on her teeth, and she was performing wearing what looked like an old lady's cardigan and skirt, and she had mud or blood or something smeared all over her legs. She was a feminist! And she shouted and bellowed and screamed and didn't seem afraid of people thinking badly of her or laughing at her. I imagined she would just shout louder.
The next time I was in a group of people and feeling shy, I didn't try to hide my braces behind a weak, closed-mouth smile - I grinned and let everyone see them. I bought fishnet tights and let them rip and proudly wore them with my DM boots. When people called me a freak, I didn't ignore them any more. I told them to fuck off, or I gave them the V-sign, or I spat on the ground. (Which, OK, may not have been the best ideas and got me into trouble more than once, but I still feel, somewhere in the less-than-rational bits of my brain, that it's purer and more worthwhile and more satisfying to let people know you're angry.)
If I ever had a moment where I knew things were not always going to be this awful, then it was because of Poly Styrene.
Rest in... whatever the opposite of peace is, Poly, because peace hardly seems fitting for a firework like you. Thanks for inspiring me and a million others so very much.