On Music, Bristol and Brexit

I worked on this book over the past four years, a book about art and music, coming from England but heavily inspired by external and non-English influences.

The last three years have been marred by the Brexit debate, referendum and terrible talks toward a mostly hated deal, about to be rejected by the British Parliament.

For British music, and for British culture in general, this political context in an absolute killer, a self-inflicted suicide.

Music cannot live with such hard borders. Like American music from the 1920s to the 1990s, British music grew higher thanks to worldwide influences and Bristol music is the best example of it. Hence my choice to write about this scene.

Unfortunately, so many people intervened behind the scene to postpone its UK release that it couldn't have a voice in the current debate...

But I'm still here and if nothing else happens, the English version of the book will be out early March 2019.

In the meantime, we have this:

Foreign musicians could have to earn over £30,000 a year to enter UK post-Brexit
Read more at https://www.nme.com/news/music/foreign-musicians-earn-30000-year-enter-uk-post-brexit-2424827#lfVLAhYPzZTVQuHl.99

A new white paper outlining the country's plans for immigration policy made the claim

Foreign musicians could have to earn over £30,000 a year to be allowed entry into the UK post-Brexit, according to a new white paper. 

In the paper, which outlines the country’s plans for immigration policy after leaving the EU, the Government Migration Advisory Committee state musicians and other workers will need to earn a minimum of £30,000 to be able to apply for a five-year visa. 

The government says the new policy, which wouldn’t come into effect until December 31, 2020, will help prioritise higher-skill workers and a new skills-based immigration system would “favour experience and talent over nationality.”  People from “low risk” countries will be allowed to visit the UK and work for one year without a job offer. 

In regards to touring, the paper suggests visiting bands will still be allowed the same freedom as they are now. “Visitors coming to the UK for short-term business reasons will be able, as now, to carry out a wide range of activities, including permitted paid engagements,” it reads. 

UK Music responded to the paper, saying the minimum salary requirement posed a “major threat” to the music industry. “Requiring musicians, songwriters, and producers from the EU to earn salaries of at least £30,000 to work in the UK poses a major threat to the music industry where music creators earn on average £20,504), way below the average for other jobs,” they said in a statement. 

They added the UK “may suffer retaliation from EU member states”, including “extra costs and red tape for artists who need to cross borders for their work.”

Deborah Annetts, the Chief Executive of the Incorporated Society of Musicians (ISM), also said the policy would be a negative one for British music. “The end of freedom of movement will have a devastating impact on British musicians,” she said. “The introduction of harsher immigration rules after Brexit will cause declining diversity and creativity in the British music industry. It could also potentially lead to the introduction of reciprocal immigration rules by EU countries.”

Last month, UK Music CEO Michael Dugher warned Brexit could pose a risk to the country’s live music industry and touring acts. In a letter to Theresa May, he wrote: “The ending of free movement with no waiver for musicians will put our fast-growing live music sector, that generates around £1 billion a year for the UK economy, at serious risk. The costly bureaucracy will make touring simply unviable for very many artists who need to earn a living and it delivers a hammer blow to development of future, world-leading British talent.”

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Massive Attack: Out Of The Comfort Zone 

Paperback – 4 Mar 2019

by Melissa Chemam 

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

“Suddenly, Massive Attack are happening”, writes Miranda Sawyer in Q Magazine in March 1991. “A silver album! That ‘all-important’ critical acclaim! Even seminal world rockers U2 want to meet them!”… From the caves of Bristol’s underground and forbidden parties, the non-musicians will emerge worldwide in only a few months… 

From 1989, the work that Massive Attack’s three core members have started take a more definite shape, and it becomes clear for Cameron McVey and Jonny Dollar that an album is on its way, and not an ordinary album. Produced without a definite plan in mind, their art, which creates after “cutting and pasting” from an extraordinary playlist of references, seems to work magically, just like 3D’s art of collage at the time…

Tricky and 3D write the raps featured in ‘Daydreaming’, where we see Tricky’s talent for “storytelling” rap: “Attitude is cool degrees below zero / Up against the wall behaving like De Niro / Tricky’s performing taking his phono”. He also mentions the social context a while later: “Yes Tricky kid I check my situation / Maggie this Maggie that Maggie means inflation”. And adds details on daily violence: “Wise guys get protection when they carry a knife / They shouldn’t have been born they’re making me yawn”, while 3D brings a more hopeful note: “We’re natives of the massive territory and we’re proud / Get peaceful in the dance, adapt the glory and the crowd / The problem ain’t a different kind of skin, Tricks / I love my neighbour I don’t wait for the Olympics”. 

Tricky and 3D also work on lyrics for the songs ‘Blue Lines’ and ‘Five Man Army’, on which they’re joined by Daddy G, Willy Wee and Horace Andy. The reggae singer, born Horace Hinds, in Kingston, Jamaica, on the 19th of February 1951, is the third main guest vocalist on the album. Grant considers Horace as a legend and knows by heart his first album, Skylarking, released in 1972, after a first single in 1967, ‘This is a Black Man’s Country’, recorded at the young age of 16.

About the Author

Melissa Chemam is a French journalist and author who has worked for France 24, the BBC World Service and Radio France International, as well as many magazines, and for the filmmaker Raoul Peck. Since 2003, she has been based in Prague, Paris, Miami, then in London, Nairobi and Bangui, travelling into more than 40 countries.