artswith Film Two-tone meets Combat Frock


Singer-songwriter Emily Capell doesn’t mind being ‘Billy Bragged’. The 23-year-old Londoner has


been busy recently, releasing her debut album – the wittily titled Clash-inspired Combat Frock – touring with two-tone legends The Selecter and announcing a headline solo tour. The album follows three


provocatively titled EPs, Who Killed Smiley Culture?, Who Framed Winston Silcott? and Who Stands with Latasha Harlins? “I have no idea how to describe


my music,” she tells Arts with Attitude. “I start off country, then I go ska, I really like doo wop and Kirsty MacColl. People say it’s like London, very multicultural, and I agree with that because there’s a bit of everything in it. I know that’s the naffest answer ever, but you really can’t put my music in a box.” You can put her politics in a box,


though, because it runs in her family: her mother works for a union, her uncle was a blacklisted builder and her parents were active in the miners’ strike, the printers’ strike and the poll tax demonstrations. “There’s definitely room for


politics in music today but it’s hard 20 | theJournalist


because you don’t want to ram it down people’s throats,” she says. “And if you do, you get Billy Bragged straight away – which is great for me – but it’s not what everyone wants.” She started young, playing her


first gig aged 14, and has worked hard for her success. “I was quite happy supporting,


singing other people’s stuff, going out whenever,” she says, “but an album’s a bit scary because what if no one buys it? What if my nan buys every copy?” She looks back: “I had a million


jobs when I left school. I’ve worked as a teacher, as a customer care assistant, a baker. “I had a residency at the Dublin


Castle in Camden Town while working as a baker, so I’d play a gig, drive home for 1.30am, my alarm would go at five, I’d have to put a hairnet on and when you have a beehive it’s an absolute nightmare. It was horrendous. And I was a rubbish baker, burning everything. “I wouldn’t say I was exploited


because it gave me a lot of opportunities, but it was very, very hard work.”


www.emilycapell.co.uk


attitude


by Tim Lezard


Xmas book special The Killing In the Consulate Jonathan Rugman Channel 4’s BAFTA award-winning foreign affairs correspondent and NUJ member pieces together the last moments of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Khashoggi was filmed going in to the Saudi consulate in Turkey and was never seen alive again. In this brilliantly written book, Rugman reveals the context behind the murder and attempted cover-up. http://tinyurl.com/y5twy657


Motherwell Deborah Orr


This childhood memoir by former Independent and Guardian columnist Deborah Orr is to be published posthumously in January. She tragically died of cancer in October. Well-known for being fearless and outspoken, she writes about her Scottish working-class upbringing in council flats and, interestingly, what the decision to leave cost her. http://tinyurl.com/y2nqpas3


The Dance of Death Martin Rowson NUJ member and Guardian cartoonist Martin Rowson updates Holbein’s classic series of woodcuts to bring a contemporary corrupt and callous elite crashing down to earth with thoughts of their own mortality. We are treated to vicious


‘engravings’ of Paul Dacre, Richard Desmond, Robin Day and, my favourite, Rupert Murdoch – “Death knows why the rat swarms, but worms! You know who’ll feed ya? He


who controls all platforms in all available media.” https://selfmadehero.com/books/ the-dance-of-death


Our Mary John Callow Telling the extraordinary story of Mary Turner (1938-2017), the Brent dinner lady and trade union activist who rose to become president of the GMB union and chair of the Labour Party, this lavish coffee table book is a fitting memorial to a brilliant woman. www.lwbooks.co.uk/book/ our-mary


Sammy Vince Gledhill NUJ life member Vince Gledhill delves into his cuttings book to inform his novel of northern England in 1910. You can reminisce about


typewriters that go ‘thuck, thuck’ because they have three layers of


copy paper separated by two sheets of carbon in them, and the hooks, ticks and swirls of classic Pitman’s shorthand. And – if you want proof it’s fictional – Gledhill also refers to newspaper branch offices, staffed by reporters born on the patch who know it inside out. www.books2read.com/Sammy


Corbynism from Below Edited by Mark Perryman The co-founder of Philosophy Football brings together a diverse range of thinkers, writers and activists – Neal Lawson, Lindsey German, James


Some of the best things to


see and do with a bit of political bite


For listings email: arts@NUJ.org.uk


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28