Rammelzee R.I.P. Fast Company

This link leads you to my Fast Company piece on the late hiphop artist/visionary RAMMELZEE... thanks to Fab 5 Freddy for the insights...

El Pais Punky Reggae Party VG article

Diego Manrique wrote this article about me in El Pais after I gave a multi-media lecture at the Museum of Modern Art in Leon, Spain. Even if you can't read Spanish, if you speak English you can probably get a sense of what he's saying... anyway thanks Diego, and the Leon experience was terrific. The lecture theatre is super-chic, paneled in glossy black, and the place was packed. The lecture was Fairytale In The Supermarket: How Punk Freed Females. Let me know if you want me to bring the show to your town.

If you have any trouble finding this l Pais article, let me know.

DON'T JUDGE ME BY MY WEBSITE! It is about to have a fab facelift!

Remember the old saying about the shoemaker's kids? The ones with very chilly tootsies 'cos they have no shoes? Well, dear clients, friends and family, I'm afraid my site is suffering from that syndrome. I have been so busy writing other people's sites, bios and articles that my own internet presence could do with a polish that it will get very soon. Watch this space.

Just so you know what's happening Chez Vivien:

I am teaching my Classic Punk & Beyond course at NYU's Clive Davis Dept. of Recorded Music for the third time later this year.

There's a lot of interest in "Afrobeat Art," the book I am developing with "Fela's Artist" LEMI GHARIOKWU. Thanks to Ammo Talwar at Punch Records in Birmingham for all the faith and support.

MESSAGES OF HOPE, a track I co-wrote with my bred'ren in kinky combo Grasshopper, (the golden-voiced ANDY CAINE and producer ALEX MARSH,) was recently selected for the UK Street Beatz compilation. And of course, the songs like "Is It Love" that I co-wrote with Adriana Kaegi's TAG project, have been seriously acclaimed by the electro crowd.

We are about to send out the package for I'm A Wonderful Thing, Baby, the musical I have co-written with August Darnell of Kid Creole & the Coconuts. Our director is the fabulous JAY SCHEIB -- yes, the hunky, funky feller who was just named one of the 25 people most likely to change the face of American Theatre by American Theatre magazine. He has plays coming up at the Kitchen in Manhattan and later this year, at BAM's New Wave Festival. We are lucky to have GREG GUNTER as our Dramaturg. He helped develop many of the Disney musicals that have become an institution, such as The Lion King and The Little Mermaid, as well as having helped shape up the original Rent.

There's plenty more, too but I will save those goodies for later.

Send me a message and I will be sure to tell you when this site is re-vamped.

We'll Keep Holding On.

Adriana Kaegi's TAG album is going viral-- I co-wrote...

Happily for us all, my close sistr'en and endless inspiration, Adriana Kaegi, aka dearraddy ana Mama Coconut, has released her musical project called TAG. I co-wrote a bunch of it with her, often in our pads on the lower East Side. We really ahd fun doing it I have to say and it is getting great response... # 12 in the Reverb Nation.com to name but one. Going up, too. more info http://adrianakaegi.com

Le UN -- or FRONT COVER GAGA

As befits the first surge of spring, there's been much activity my end. Pollen notwithstanding. Here's some of it:

I'm happy to say that this month I have 2 front cover stories on the stands... how quaint does that sound!....one on BETH DITTO for OUT and one essay on David Byrne for FADER.... here's Beth in all her glory of every kind...

http://www.out.com/detail.asp?id=25015

I haven't got a link for the Byrne piece, but Fader's editor Julianne Shepherd encouraged a return to the old-school more free-flowing, less rigid style of writing the aesthetic I came up in in the UK rock press when it was a vibrant force and trained a whole generation of writers...

Also WORD magazine in the UK, edited by charming Mark Ellen, ran a piece on musicians lecturing and there's an interview with me plus a pic of me reading from THE BOOK of EXODUS to the audience at NY's Fillmore, before Family Man's WAILERS came onstage.... and here's a link to that reading...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y60QbvTeYNw

Special one love shout-outs to Pete Shelton, Charlie Shelton, Charles Nuckolls and Joly of punkcast.com for working with me like family to make it happen.

Book of Exodus is in the NY Review of Books

Thanks to Will Sweeney for pointing this out to me. I was happy to see that writer Joshua Jelly-Schapiro had obviously absorbed every ounce of my Exodus because his piece is steeped in the book and quotes (and credits) it extensively.

In Memoriam -- New York Times

It's certainly been a winter of winnowing among a certain generation; losses include old mates and colleagues Dickie Jobson and Rob Partridge, my lovely neighbour Miriam -- and now John Martyn (SOLID AIR...) who could teach us all a lesson in how to be a reveller.
I was called on to participate in the obituary Rob Kenner wrote for the New York Times about Vincent 'Tata' Forde, who was Bob Marley's mentor back in the government yards of Trenchtown; and then I wrote the NY Times obit for Gary Kurfirst, manager of the Talking Heads and Peter Tosh, among other progressives and New Wavers.
Here's the links:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/16/arts/16kurfirst.html?ref=obituaries
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/arts/music/04ford.html

I interviewed the super McGregor kids for the New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/arts/music/21gold.html

Isaac Hayes: how Black Moses bared his soul

I have a new piece up for the Daily Telegraph - check it out!

A new bit for NYTimes

NYTimes.com just published my story on Caribbean Fashion Week. Check it out.