Spicy Herbs and Powerviolence

"Monthly updates" she said. She lied!

Good morn or evening friends.

I’m a little disappointed I didn’t keep up with my monthly updates. Just a little. I truly wasn’t feeling it. Also, imposter syndrome. She interrupts my thoughts as frequently as I draw breath. I’d sit down at my desk and be hit with a dose of: Do I really deserve to occupy this space as a self-proclaimed evoker of words when it’s a battle to concentrate long enough to convey my thoughts to people in real life, let alone on the wurld why’d webb? The www.?! 

More on that some other time. Here I am anyway. Tappity tap tap.

The past few months have been, to say the very bloody least, insane. It’s like the world keeps intruding on its own mayhem to announce “no wait, there’s more!”. A lot has happened globally (and personally) since my first post, that has made me feel frustrated, scared, angry as hell, heartbroken, and mentally exhausted. 

Take a deep breath loved ones. In…and out.

On Wednesdays, my boss and I have what we call “our days” at the hi-fi place I work at. Our days are just us listening to good music, making that cash money, and meeting interesting people who like good music too. We chat about almost everything, he and I. So on one of our days, we discussed the things that angered us. I spoke about the church and its deplorable figures. We spoke about anti-abortion laws and how it feels to live in a world that constantly wages war against its mothers and daughters. He spoke a bit on his experience running a small business since the late-80’s as a black man in east London. I mentioned how Africa, to the rest of the globe, is still seen as a money-making machine, and its people a nuisance; our neighbours stare at us with mouths wide open, salivating, thinking “steal, kill, and destroy”. 

Then we each had a coffee. He had one of those Nescafe instant coffees, “choca mocha!” he joyfully calls it, and I had mine black with two sweeteners. We packed away our deliveries, and then went back to business as usual. 

Then, after work, your girl attended her first powerviolence concert :)

The band’s name is ‘Zulu’. My friends and I went to New River Studios in Haringey to watch them perform. They’re an all-black powerviolence band based in L.A. I discovered them some months back when a friend of mine posted their song on his story - shout out to him for inadvertently introducing me into this world. He showed me quite a bit of music when we worked together actually, and his admiration for MF Doom encouraged me to explore the rappers’ lyricism with greater appreciation.

Anyway, I was intrigued by Zulu, so I dove into their song collection. Never did I think I’d respond so well to the intensity of it all, the sudden changes in speed, and of course, the screaming. I was acquainted with the screaming in my past, but never did I hear it like this. And from the blacks? It’s great. 

Their tracks are short and are scooped up by a different soul, reggae, spoken pieces, or some other recording of sorts. One of their tracks ‘On the Corner of Cimarron & 24th’ is twenty-seven seconds of their performance that is then tailed by a rendition of ‘I'm Gonna Lay Down This Heavy Load’. It’s a brief exposure to everything all at once, and an ode to the range and culture we exhibit as a people.

Go forth. Enjoy their music with abandon. It was amazing. They’re amazing (shout out to Dez!!). And it was oh so cathartic to witness my friends getting tossed like salad in a mosh pit. I even felt great the next morning. Joy, she overfloweth.

But then the days went by and I was left alone with these thoughts concerning the things that made me frustrated, scared, angry as a bird, heartbroken, and mentally exhausted. So, I’ve been checked out for a bit - I say a bit, but I’ll keep it real internet comrades, I’ve been checked out since January 1st 2022. Like I’m here, but not all the way. You know? You get? 

Anyway, I’m still unsure how to appropriately express those emotions, so I’m sweeping that shit under the rug and revealing something new and shiny for you to look at. 

This is my mother. 

I shot this with a film camera I bought some months ago. I’ve been having fun with it. It’s the one hobby where my overthinking mind cannot participate. Still not sure what I’m doing though. I just take pictures for weeks, praying the guy at the print shop doesn’t tell me I’ve somehow loaded the film backwards and have taken 36 shots of absolutely nothing. 

So far so good.

I assumed the open bin being in the shot would annoy her. In the matter of appearances, she is usually quite fussy. My mother is mine, after all. I special ordered her from the mother store from outer space in the summer of ‘96; she was a reissue from the 1994 winter line of mothers that were notorious for their nitpicking. Just how I like them. She’d look at me funny if I left the house without a bag of essentials. Or question my sanity if I don’t put on a nice watch to an event. And dare I wear my inside clothes to pop to Tesco’s or something.

“You’re going out like that?” She would ask.

“I’m just going to the shops.” I would reply.

“Hmm. You never know who you can meet on the road.”

“Who am I going to meet on the road, mother?” 

“You can meet your husband, you know.” 

*sigh*

“If my husband doesn’t like me like this, he doesn’t deserve me at my best.” 

“Is it?” 

*eye roll*

Anyway, I sent her the picture via WhatsApp. 

“Is that me in the kitchen minding my business?”

“It is indeed”

“Nice. Are you upstairs?”

“Thanks. I am.”

I think this is my thing now. I go on strolls around the way, snapping photos like some alternative babe, and then politely shove the developed prints into the face of any unfortunate soul who shows the slightest interest in my latest addiction. As if I’m showing them my discovery of a new species or something. 

And I’ll keep doing it. I don’t care. I’m having so much fun. 

The camera I’m using is the Olympus OM10. It has this handy light meter indicator thingy inside the viewfinder. My results so far have taught me that if the indicator is too high or too low, my prints will look like a 6 by 4 piece of shit. Also, trying to balance it with all this aperture and shutter speed wahala is tricky. But fun still. 

So, confused as I was when I knelt to take this shot of her, it surprised me how well it turned out.

I shared it with some friends. As you do when you’re proud of something. At first, they thought it was me in the photo. 

“Lol, no. It’s my mum.” 

“Oh really? That looks like you!” 

“Yeah? Oh. Well, thank you.”

People say I only take after my dad. I’m told this by my siblings, friends, aunts, uncles, and every mirror I look into. If I had a beard and kept my hair low, I could be a much cuter version of my dad in his twenties. At every single family function (I am serious. every. single. one.) our relatives take turns jerking their heads to look between my dad and me, using all types of hand gestures and affirming looks to indicate that I am indeed my father’s daughter. 

My sisters each carry one or two of my mother’s features. Be it the slant of the eyes, the arrow-like nose, or the high cheekbones. Up until this point, I believed, at least if you look at me head-on, that I look nothing like my mum. Not in the eyes, the nose, the lips, the cheekbones. Nada. 

Then I captured this moment of her in the kitchen, drinking what is probably a cup of her ginger, pineapple, and lemon concoction, with a few ginger biscuits on the side. She loves her ginger. If my mum ever decided to branch out into the world of drug dealing, I’m sure she’d find a way to push ginger tea. She would of course be the don dada, and proclaim all its medicinal properties to her lackeys before they hit every street corner with the spicy herb. And, naturally, whilst singing “The Goodness of God” in her loudest possible register, she’d brew them a pot every morning to keep their cholesterol levels low and their throats clear of catarrh.

“Don’t look at the camera. Just keep doing what you’re doing” I told her. She listened. Yes, this was a power move.

“It’s nice you know.” She said laying in her bed.

“Thanks, I like it too”. I said, sitting up next to her, as we studied the larger version on my clunky laptop. 

I got the scans in my email a few days after visiting snappy snaps. I flicked through and was challenged in remembering when and where I took most of them. I think that’s one of the joys I find in shooting on film. Recalling the when, where and how. I’ve got a notebook now so I can jot down settings, lighting and dates and such. Another joy is occasionally catching a glimpse of my camera perched on the small tv stand in my room as it guards the moments I thought were worth capturing and prepares for the ones I haven’t yet.

Some were decent. Others bled into one another, which looked cool. A couple made me realise that taking pictures of black people indoors, with little to no lighting on black and white film was just not the one. 

Then I got to the image of my mother. And I just beheld her. 

The depth to which the bridge of her nose sinks before resurfacing at the tip and back down into that soft little curve. The way her cheeks sit patiently, ready to bear the weight of her most electrifying laugh - the single trait of hers my sisters and I share equally and with as much volume.

So I resemble her in profile alone. Cool! I’m really glad she likes the photo, but boy I hate how the bin is open.

That’s all for now. Till next time!

---

Things and such  -

‘Zulu’ - The band I saw perform in Haringey last month. How much did I spend on their merch? Enough. Enough of my money. And I’d do it again. Listen to their music why don’t you.

‘Go tell it on the mountain’ by James Baldwin - Emotionally, para mi, it’s a lot. I may or may not speak on this at some point. I’d like to.

I was introduced to Altered Soul Experiment with ‘Amila’, by a cool stranger. I now listen to them on walks, as I write, or when I’m doing life stuff. Go listen.