Grace Jones live at Afropunk 2015 Shot by Vickey Ford for Okayplayer/Sneakshot
Afropunk 2015 Shot by Vickey Ford for Okayplayer/Sneakshot
Afropunk 2015 Shot by Vickey Ford for Okayplayer/Sneakshot
Grace Jones has never been one for the meek and has made ritual out of expressing her distaste for contemporary pop stars who have swagger-jacked their way to icon-status. But outside of a few jaw-dropping performances this year (most notably at this year's Afropunk Festival in Brooklyn) the queen of tongue-in-cheek has remained largely mum. However, a new excerpt from her anxiously-anticipated and ironically titled memoir I’ll Never Write My Memoirs, shows us precisely why that may have been the case, as she dives deep into the divide between true artistry and mere trend-setting. Pulling no punches, Jones named some names and made sure no pop star or starlet went untouched, calling out the Mileys, the Gagas and the Rihannas of the world for their inability to to strap up and embrace the unspoken duty of an artist to challenge the industry that gave them life. Below you will find a few heated bits from the excerpt, which should get you ready for the book's release on September 24th. Preorder Grace Jones' memoir on Amazon today.
The names:
“Trends come along and people say, ‘Follow that trend’. There’s a lot of that around at the moment: ‘Be like Sasha Fierce. Be like Miley Cyrus. Be like Rihanna. Be like Lady Gaga. Be like Rita Ora and Sia. Be like Madonna.’ I cannot be like them – except to the extent that they are already being like me.”
The principle:
“They dress up as though they are challenging the status quo, but by now, wearing those clothes, pulling those faces, revealing those tattoos and breasts, singing to those fractured, spastic, melting beats – that is the status quo. You are not off the beaten track, pushing through the thorny undergrowth, finding treasure no one has come across before. You are in the middle of the road.”
