Are White Rabbits the best unsigned band in America?

Take out your stopwatches a la Alice in Wonderland, and start counting the minutes until this new group hits the big time.

White Rabbits may well be the best unsigned band I’ve seen play live in years. I’ve made it to several gigs this month, amongst which were The Kooks at The Fillmore (still breaking over here, small venue, not as strong live as I had hoped), and Arctic Monkeys at the Hammerstein Ballroom – terrible sound, static crowd, enormously disappointing and, apart from CSS's stellar showing on Friday, was getting used to underwhelming live sets in this city.

Hopping along to White Rabbits on Saturday night at The Bowery Ballroom at the very last minute (I’m late, I’m late for a very important date) my expectations were somewhere beneath ground level. Unsigned band, tiny venue. The only reason I levered myself off the sofa of death was that I was invited by my friend A who has immaculate taste (but then she does own a properly good indie record label.)

They describe themselves as purveyors of honky tonk calypso, but this doesn’t even begin to describe their (seriously credible) sound. With two lead vocals, plus frenetic piano playing, and extraordinary layered percussion (two drum kits, maracas, bells, tambourine,) it all melds into a glorious, uplifting noise. Although it’s hard to keep track as the band members hop around the stage swapping guitars for maracas, and drums for keyboards and goodness knows what else. A band this comprehensively talented makes their live performance an absolute joy. The anoraks will appreciate their musicianship, the girls their (extremely) good looks, the press their charm & manners – and everyone will love their live infectious energy and chutzpah.

Their debut album, Fort Nightly, has just been released here and, on mutiple plays so far, I reckon it’s one of the albums of 2007 already. If you’re in London, they play at White Heat @ Madame Jo-Jo's & at Water Rats in June, and they take to the Q Stage at Glasto. GO, go go….

Dancing, drinking & raining.

The condensed nature of this island, combined with cheap cabs and a 24hr subway system makes an evening with four or five engagements a breeze. In London, where it takes an hour to get anywhere, and a cab costs on average $30 a ride, an evening can feasibly only contain one event, unless one has a very large expense account or bottomless pockets.

Take Friday night: I had my first ever frozen Margarita (delicious) before a private view at Pierogi in Williamsburg, dropped into the US launch of Moleskin’s chic - & useful – City Guides at the Art Director's club (loved Zadie Smith's personalised version), and then lovely L & I went to see Brazilian dance rockers CSS play at the Fillmore @ Irving Plaza. I'm glad we caught them at this tiny 500 person venue: they play Wembley Arena, supporting Gwen Stefani this summer. The set was so frenetic that even the Concession stand girls were dancing on the tables during the encore. We loved them: an energetic, funny, sexy dance rock hybrid with a huge dollop of latin sex.

High as a kite from dancing endorphins, we checked out The Park in Chelsea for a piece I’m writing on rooftop bars,(beautiful garden, good drinks, lovely manager) told the not so cute boys hitting on us that we were lesbians, and then finished the night off with way too many Martinis in the Games Room at Soho House. Crawled home by way of Pop Burger.

It is therefore all the more admirable that I managed to haul my sorry ass down to the Bowery Ballroom to see White Rabbits play last night. More of the astonishingly good Rabbits later.

After a week of complaining about the weather, it’s now bucketing down. I have a supper tonight in Nolita with TvB, a French photographer who is in town to shoot for US InStyle. Guess I’ll be taking a cab…

Coincidences & connections

What a week. Apart from sweltering in the heat (although I have been told countless times that I am experiencing a delightful New York spring, and that when summer comes then I’ll reminisce fondly about the mild weather back in May), I have been glued to my keyboard during the day, and managing to drink my bodyweight in vodka in the evenings.

I finished David Mitchell’s Ghostwritten, a first novel so brilliant I despair of ever writing anything so interesting, elegiac, evocative and just so damn good. It deals with coincidences and passing connections across the world. It was an apt book to read here: my life in New York consists of a chain of my own (rather more banal) coincidences & connections.

On Thursday JSL asked me to join him & Elizabeth Wurtzel for supper at Fish, in the West Village. Elizabeth is now studying for a JD at Yale School of Law and is in New York for the summer as an associate at an NY law firm. She’s both fiercely intelligent and very attractive. By happenstance alone, sitting at the next table were three of my NY English friends, (including T, a model so gorgeous that men’s jaws drop when she walks by).

Other connections this week: P, the sexy boy I met at A&A’s wedding emailed to say that he had stumbled across this blog through Google; another reminder that any person one mentions on a blog will eventually read your comments. Good thing I was (rightly) very complimentary about him. Elizabeth wrote this cogent & timely piece in the Wall Street Journal on the implications of speaking one's mind about other people's characters on-line.

On Saturday I had a blind date with M, a photographer whom I met on line. We discovered that not only does he shoot for the magazine for which I was an editor for five years, but that I had actually produced several of his US based stories back in 2000.

We met for coffee for a couple of hours at The Bean. It’s the first date I've been on where I was equally dating the datee’s dog, but I think I passed muster with the dog. I had got off to a bad start in an email complaining about minute, over-pampered dogs in Manhattan, expecting that one day I would accidentally impale one on a stiletto whilst marching down Madison. He then mentioned his Chihuahua. He's not my type, but he’s great company, and we hatched a plan for a story driving a Bentley on an iconic drive in the US (Bentley have offered me any of their cars to drive/write about if I have a suitable travel story in the US).

poof

Sorry for the break in blogging. I had to do that thing called work. And blimey it's HOT. Hot, hot, hotter than hot. SO hot that I had to hotfoot it down to Old Navy today and buy myself three pairs of short shorts, a new denim mini and an easy breezy sundress before I put myself in danger of expiring from heat exhaustion in my denim pedal pushers. At $20 a pop, it was hardly breaking the bank and at least now I won't flash my knickers when riding my bike.

Right got to go lie down in front of a fan now.

How to attract the boys this summer: wear blue

I used to think that wearing anything other than black marked me out as a fashion naïf. I spent my twenties shuffling around Vogue House looking like Morticia’s younger sister in a series of black shift dresses, black pencil skirts, black twin sets, LBD’s – well, you get the picture. Then as age began to take its toll, I had an epiphany: black really only suits the very young and the very old. Next to the face it drains and, frankly, given my cocktail intake, I need all the help that I can get.

Apparently black clothes make up 41% of the British woman’s wardrobe and that doesn’t surprise me: black slims, refines, hones the silhouette and it doesn’t show the dirt. (I feel for the members of the American Navy currently in Manhattan for Fleet Week. Even off duty, they have to wear their dress uniforms. I overheard an officer yesterday complaining that sitting on the subway is an activity best not indulged in white trousers)

Until a couple of years ago colour felt wrong, suburban and cheap, but then designers started playing around with florals, and brighter colours, until fast forward to this season when strong colour seemed absolutely right on the runway. The bright Yves Klein blue that Stella McCartney used looked modern and deeply covetable. And she wasn’t the only one who saw the future as blue: Osman Yousefzada, DKNY, Lanvin and Christopher Kane used a bright blue to great effect too.

Apart from my obsession with black clothing, I’ve always hated bright blue. My school summer uniform consisted of an electric blue nylon skirt and matching jumper. It was beyond hideous with my pale skin, and I swore never to wear the colour after I passed my GCSEs. Which makes it all the more astonishing that my summer wardrobe staple is a cobalt blue cotton dress (£25) from COS. Apart from being immensely flattering in colour and in cut, it acts like a veritable man magnet. I’ve never been a flicky hair, pout over the shoulder kind of girl, so men rarely throw me compliments in the street but, combined with a fake tan, this dress is like catnip for boys. I’m kicking myself for not discovering this years ago.

Top to bottom: Stella McCartney, Osman Yousefzada, DKNY
Images: Style.com

Summer shoes

I've never been a Steve Madden type of girl. The shoes always seem well, a little cheap, a little tacky. Just an inch too high, or the heel just off. Until yesterday, that is. I am obsessed by finding summer sandals that don't rub my feet: I find that the toe post in most leather flip flops rubs unbearably, and the lovely Roman style Calvin Klein sandals I had my eye on were like wearing sandpaper when I eventually tried them on. And Birkenstocks are the work of the anti-style devil. I had seen a quite sweet pair of Steve Madden ballet flats in American Vague (I'm sure they were in the mag as a sop to the executive fashion editor), so thought I might as well pop in - no stone unturned and all that. And I found these

On seeing the gold pair my first thought was ooh Marbella and the second was ah ha Essex meets Manhattan. But then I slipped a foot in and changed my mind. They actually look ok...flips flips can be very flimsy looking, too bare for the city, but these seem a little less naked. The (invisible) padded upper sole is the real selling point though - these are so stupidly comfortable that I bought the gold to wear with black, and the brown for everything else. And the real plus point? $29.99 each - a whole 15 squid each. Genius.

Soho: The Kartell Mademoiselle chair exhibition

I have been rather social of late. D & H flew in on Friday for The International Contemporary Furniture Fair ,(the NYC version of 100% Design & Salone), so we caught up over fiendishly good gin cocktails at the ludicrous bar at The Hudson Hotel, after which lovely L & I headed to The Gramercy to check out the new private rooftop bar (more of this later).

After a weekend spent at ICFF meeting designers, I dedicated Monday night to design party hopping down Greene Street in Soho with JSL, from Boffi up to B&B Italia. Of most note (that is items noted before I drank too much delicious Prosecco and my camera battery died) was the clever reworking of Philippe Starck's 2004 classic, the Mademoiselle chair for Kartell, by several Italian fashion houses including Burberry, Moschino, Dolce & Gabbana, Valentino and Etro, turning a simple upholstered Perspex piece into a covetable collector's item.


We ended the evening over som tam & curry at Tai Thai on Bedford in Williamsburg in Brooklyn after drinking some lethal vodka at a busy party (filled with people dressed in the kind of hmm, ironic clothing that style commentators admire on Chloe Sevigny but actually just makes you look like your house burnt down & you had to get a last minute outfit from Cancer Research whilst your eyes were still blinded by the smoke) thrown by ID & LLadro at design store The Future Perfect,& its neighbour A&G Merch a shop filled with covetable modernist pieces at silly prices. One more cocktail & I would have been walking home over the Williamsburg Bridge with a floor light under my arm.


Chairs (Top to bottom) by Burberry, Moschino & Valentino.
Pictures by me - can't you tell?

Catching up: My life in the East Village

I’ve been a bit hit and miss on the blogging front of late. Either you get four entries in as many hours or nothing but a picture of my dog (admittedly very adorable) for days. I’ve also realised that it is a bit unfocussed: I use it as a clearing house for my industry rants, as a way of avoiding writing 25 identical emails a week to my friends & family back in London, and as a record of my life in Manhattan and elsewhere. Still, the most important thing is that it means I am writing on a regular basis which, as a freelance hack isn’t always a given. I’ve also just found my camera cable so I am adding photographs to all my old entries where the pics are relevant.

I still can’t believe I’ve been back for twenty days. I was so busy in London that I just flopped when I got back here, which is why I am now procrastinating by writing this rather than dealing with the huge pile of filing in front of me. JD is still in London and, as I can be properly lazy about leaving the apartment, I’ve also been busy trying to establish my life here, & meet as many people as possible.

Anyway, the picture above is of my building in the East Village. I have the whole of the second floor, complete with a precarious white painted, iron fire escape which acts as a balcony and has pots of chives gently blowing in the wind, It’s a perfect place to write. I just have to be careful what I wear as passers by can look straight up my skirt from the street.

Camileon adjustable heels: What will they think of next?

I was woken by a call from the BBC in London first thing this morning asking if I would go on air to talk about these shoes. (The Beeb's radio researchers are obsessed by shoes.) Made by a company called CAMiLEON (sic), their USP is a foldable heel which allows the wearer to adjust the heel height from 3 to 1 inches.

At a price point approaching $300 they are putting themselves in the firmly in the designer shoe bracket, albeit at the lower end. That's a lot of money for a hideous shoe. I'm presuming the pricing covers the R & D, rather than a good designer judging by the styles available so far. And, with the heel folded away, they all look staggeringly ugly anyway. They do seem utterly pointless: three inches is barely a heel in my or any other fashion loving woman's book - the kind of woman who would drop $300 on a pair of shoes. It's low enough to walk blocks in or run screaming into the street for a cab. It is not high enough to require a pair of flats in your bag for emergencies, therefore it's not high enough to require a patented folding heel arrangement.

If you do wish to gaze at more of these fashion freaks, they are to be found at Zappos

Lordy, better buy some sunscreen & a very large hat

The weather oracle that is the BBC weather page tells me that temperatures will reach 96F/36C on Saturday in Manhattan. Monday is Memorial Day here, one of the very few public holidays in America and the people I know are disappearing out of town for the long weekend or heading out to the Hamptons for the start of the season there. (I'm still in two minds about the whole Hamptons thing. Mostly it makes me feel tired, the thought of all that partying & social climbing. Although some proper country/beach action wouldn't go astray.)

As for me, I'll be in New York, sweltering. However TC & I have a cunning plan for Saturday. And it involves that delicious looking swimming pool & roof deck above. I don't care one little bit if some arbiter has raised an eyebrow to declare Soho House SO over. It has a pool on the roof for chrissakes. And cocktails. And the English papers. What is there not to like about this? (Hopefully most of the members will be in the Hamptons and the rest (the hipsters) will be far too busy cutting off their noses to spite their contorted-with-worry-as-they-work-out-which-new-edgy-place-they-should-be-seen-in faces to hang out there.) Now I just need to work out how to scrub off the freckly remains of my last disastrous spray tan, and find a miracle swimsuit that holds in my Chinese food baby.

Soho House to open in Los Angeles

The Soho House American invasion continues apace: in addition to the opening in June this year of Soho House Miami, it's been announced that they will be taking over the lease of Morton's in West Hollywood, home of the annual Vanity Fair Oscar party. A $5m (£2.5m) refurbishment will start at the beginning of 2008, with the club expected to open by the end of the year. Soho House have been dipping a toe in the water of the Los Angeles scene by setting up shop for the Oscars for the past couple of years and, with the recent influx of big investment money into the company, LA is the obvious next step for the film industry orientated club. Like all Soho House locations, it will doubtless be a raging success from the get go. Whether a year or so later it maintains its momentum remains to be seen - NYC hipsters moan that the New York one is so over. Although that doesn't explain why the club is packed out in the evenings, and Friday night dinner reservations are almost impossible to come by.

Nothing is quite what it seems...

Hmm. TO those of you who have commented on the butter wouldn't melt in the mouth looks of this miniature wire hired dachshund, may I please direct your attention to this picture of it willfully destroying my £20 ostrich feather duster from Labour & Wait? (She threw herself up a wall to grab it from its hook.)

Things I Miss About London. Part Two: The dog

Lily Allen looks just fine

Given the fact that I work in fashion, I try to stay away from the subject of weight. I learnt my lesson during London Fashion Week when I appeared on BBC network radio to talk about the never-ending media debate about size zero models. The BBC then quoted me on their news website, which is syndicated to thousands of other websites worldwide. Unfortunately, someone took a vital word out, which meant I was seriously misquoted globally. I still get email vilifying me for my supposed belief that overly thin models aren’t a problem.

But when musician Lily Allen posted this cri de coeur on her MySpace blog on Sunday night, it resonated.

"im on my own in america again . I used to pride myself on being strong minded and not being some stupid girl obsessed with the way I look . I felt like it didnt matter if I was a bit chubby cause , im not a model , I'm a singer . Im afraid I am not strong and have fallen victim to the evil machine . I write to you in a sea of tears from my hotel bed in Seattle , I have spent the past hour researching gastric bypass surgery , and laser lipo suction."

We all like to have opinions about people in the public eye (I was going to say celebrity, but that is a much over used word), and Lily Allen has received a lot of stick both in the press and from the public about her gobby, ballsy persona, being British actor Keith Allen’s daughter and being a normal sized woman.

Unfortunately, it would seem that it’s not just sticks and stones that break a person’s bones. I always thought that Lily’s feisty attitude would protect her from the raging sexism in the music industry that dictates that unless you are a folk singer or KD Lang, your success as a female singer will include skinniness, trowelled on make up, short skirts and provocative videos. So far, she seems to have escaped that pressure admirably, creating a strong look (normal figure, prom dresses & trainers) that suits her.

However, it’s naïve to think her image and looks wouldn’t inevitably be the subject of public scrutiny: certainly those that sup with the devil need a long spoon. The NME voted her Worst Dressed last year, an award that seems anachronistic at best, staggeringly irrelevant & sexist at worst.

This makes it even more admirable that she went ahead with the (not bad at all) Lily Loves collection at British fast fashion retailer New Look. Unfortunately, it means that she has left herself wide open to buckets of criticism of her style, rather than of her music, outside of the music press.

What kind of society do we inhabit where a girl who is a perfectly normal & average size 12 (a US8) is considered to be ‘chubby’ Of course, I work in an industry where weight is an issue. It drives me insane that since I started out buried in a fashion cupboard sorting returns ten years ago that samples have shrunk by at least two sizes. But this girl isn’t a model, (which is a whole different can of worms), she is a musician. And neither is she a Beth Ditto, making a statement about women’s weight issues. I cannot imagine what it must be like for a young woman to be the subject of such relentless pressure in the media about her image. It’s not surprising that she broke down. I hope that the thousands of messages of support on her blog help to convince her that she looks just fine the way she is.

Pete Firman - The Worlds Biggest Card Trick

The charming Mr Firman dazzles again...

London Fashion Week dates just confirmed

Finally, London Fashion Week dates for September 2007.

The confirmed dates of the forthcoming London Fashion Week, sponsored by Canon, are 15th – 20th September 2007.

The dates of The Exhibition @ London Fashion Week are 16th – 19th September 2007 which will take place at The Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7.
Opening times will be 10am–6pm on the 16th – 18th and 10am–5pm on the 19th.

The Big Smoke vs The Big Apple. Part two

There’s been a helicopter circling above the East Village for the past hour or so. A guy sitting on my stoop when I got back from The Arctic Monkeys gig told me that a man had been shot three times in the stomach over on Avenue D. That’s just four blocks east of here in Alphabet City.

I’d just been thinking as I walked back from the subway about things I missed from home. The list is surprisingly short. People: my sister & the hound, my parents and my life-enhancing, fabulous friends. Food: decent butter, M&S houmus & raspberry meringues, and authentic Indian cooking. Then a few random things: Green spaces in the city, Hampstead Heath, cycle lanes that people respect, stylish & inexpensive clothes shops and a regular, wide ranging bus system I understand.

I didn’t think to add less gun crime to the list.

Dorothy Perkins: Not nearly as bad as one thinks

I bought these from good old Dorothy Perkins in the sale for the grand sum of £15. Although, as I ordered them on-line, they arrived today at my sister's flat in London, and I won't get them until the end of June. That sucks. Although my wardrobe has its fair share of red soled beauties, Manolos, some lovely Rupert Sandersons and all the rest, it's fun to fill in the gaps with a few cheapies - especially when they are as chic as these. Looking through the blog, I haven't bought any shoes since the beginning of March - very restrained of me.

I've become fan of Dottie P's since last summer when I bought the same sundress in two colour ways, and then bought it again for my two best friends. Fantastic quality, really high end finish, pretty print: it would have been great value at four times the price. You do have to hunt through the rails, but there are some good pieces lurking in there. Although interestingly, the dresses we all bought were remaindered & remaindered again. Goes to show that sometimes stylish quality just doesn't sell in chain stores, however much we like to posit that Britain is in the grip of a universal taste revolution

US Harpers Bizarre

As a long term fash mag slag, I'm perfectly aware that in our populist, multi media society that the net result of running picture of (non-celeb) models on the cover of fashion magazines is a downturn in newstand sales. Apparently the reader wants a cover star they can identify with, someone whose life speaks to them. This is why Jennifer Aniston (ubiquitous, not too pretty girl next door) covers fly off the shelf, Naomi Campbell's (ex-drug taking, bolshie diva) always, always tank.

BUT WHAT THE FUCK IS US HARPERS PLAYING AT? IT'S A FASHION MAGAZINE FOR CRYING OUT LOUD. I understand that magazines exist to provide a kind of social commentary, and that these girls are part of our society, like it or not. But when, when did Paris Hilton ever dress in any style other than hooker on street corner crossed with Barbie crossed with Olivia Newton John? Why should we be aspiring to the look & lifestyle of a girl with the fashion nous of a tween and a do-anything-for-money-even-though-I'm-an-heiress, venal, amoral, laws-don't-apply-to-me mentality?

Let us not forget that this is the magazine which positions itself as the magazine for "the well-dressed woman and the well-dressed mind", whose staff have included legendary fashion editors Carmel Snow, Carrie Donovan, Diana Vreeland, Anna Wintour, Liz Tilberis, art directors Fabien Baron and Alexey Brodovich, and which has commissioned photography from Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Man Ray & Richard Avedon amongst many, many other luminaries.

To it's sister publication in England, Virginia Woolf, Rose Macaulay, and Elizabeth Bowen contributed fiction; Gertrude Stein wrote about Alice B Toklas, Vita Sackville West wrote on gardening, Seigfried Sassoon contributed poetry and Evelyn Waugh extolled the pleasures of ocean cruising. And now we have Paris Hilton & Nicole Ritchie.

I despair, I really do.

Eurovision Heaven: Borat writers' next project

Oh My God. Variety has announced that the team behind Borat are making a...wait for it... EUROVISION SONG CONTEST movie.

The genius of this is so enormous that it's difficult to know where to start. Christ, the costumes alone.... Eurovision has something like 600 million people watching worldwide. This movie will be HUGE. Sod America: this is a film for the Euros. And, lest we forget musical giants including ABBA, Céline Dion and Buck's Fizz, the guiding lights of my childhood have won Eurovision. (I could do their entire dance routine with nifty skirt ripping off movement - not bad for a 9yr old)

Perhaps the script could rotate around England, France & Spain rebelling against the political block voting of the ex Eastern Bloc countries, thus righting a HUGE wrong. Ok, I know Jemini weren't really that good, but this year's entry wasn't THAT bad. (Hey, I may be in New York, but that doesn't mean I am giving up on my cultural heritage).

And, of course, there would have to be a major, major role for Terry Wogan. And his bottle of the hard stuff. ( For the Americans who are so kind as to read this blog, he is the septuagenarian Irish housewife's choice presenter who always gets progressively drunkerer as the live transmission continues.)