I kept writing text on the subject for platforms that disappear... It's such a metaphor of our time, of journalists' work that is not in the mainstream. I don't have the edited version but this is what I had originally written:
Bristol Ideas - 2023 Book - Essay by Melissa Chemam
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Bristol Culture: From Underground to Avant-Garde
After my book on Bristol’s music and graffiti scene came out, in March 2019, I spoke at the festival ‘Bristol Transformed’, and put the emphasis on how Bristol's colonial past came back round, in the 1980s, to build the culture that put the city on Britain’s map, making of its diversity a strength.
I had spent months interviewing key members of the scene: Robert Del Naja, (or 3D, the first graffiti artist to make a name for himself outside of the city, also a rapper and key member of the Wind Bunch then Massive Attack), Inkie, Tricky, Ray Mighty, Neil Davidge, members of reggae bands Black Roots and Talisman, or the now regretted Pop Group founder Mark Stewart…
What I learned from our discussions and reflections is that without their “Do it Yourself” attitude, none of them would ever have become an artist. Not in the context of the late 1970s-early 1980s crisis and the rise of Thatcherism.
As they said, Bristol at the time felt deprived of cultural infrastructures compared to now. The young creatives could come to Arnolfini for free, to the Thekla for a small fee, and to a few youth centres or pubs, but that was about all the public support they could get. And, apart from Arnolfini and its 1985 ‘Graffiti Art’ exhibition, few institutions showed interest in the graffiti & hip-hop culture, which emerged underground. On the contrary, the local police did everything they could to destroy the graffiti scene and regulate house parties.
Luckily, the ethos of the reggae, post-punk and hip-hop cultures of that underground scene gave the strength to most of these young artists and wannabe musicians to carry on. There was no venue to perform at night? They made one happen: The Dug Out, on Park Row, linking the areas of Clifton, Redland and St Paul’s together. They had no space to hang out daytime? They invested the Special K cafĂ© or the Montpelier Hotel. They also met at record shops, squatted at the Glastonbury or Ashton Court festivals, and expressed themselves at St Paul’s Caribbean Carnival.
But most of the ‘Bristol Sound’ as it is now referred to, and of the graffiti art scene, actually emerged in people’s bedrooms, with 3D, Smith & Mighty, Mark Stewart, Miles Johnson, Tricky and Mushroom, at the time living “on the dole”, drawing stencils, writing lyrics or sampling tunes. Borrowing from reggae, dub, post-punk, hip-hop and soul, this music transcended these genres to create a new one. It also offered a platform to some of the most incredible women’s voices in Britain, from Shara Nelson to Beth Gibbons, Martina Topley-Bird and Liz Fraser.
Bristol culture radiates thanks to its diversity and inclusivity
To me, thus, it’s with its multicultural music that Bristol contributed to the emergence of a new culture, that came from immigrants from the former colonial empire. Along with, outside of Bristol, the likes of Neneh Cherry, Mad Professor, Sade, Keziah Jones, Skunk Anansie, Goldie, Lubaina Himid, Sonia Boyce, Keith Piper, and, in cinema, John Akomfrah, Isaac Julian and Steve McQueen.
A key strength of Bristol’s underground scene was the transmission of immigrants’ cultures: Caribbean fans of music, selector of records for 'blues parties’, pubs like the Bamboo Club, early DJs like Tarzan the High Priest and DJ Derek, who were doing the work from the late 1960s, long before it became a cultural trend, and probably many others whose names didn’t make it in the news.
Bristol’s colonial past, its links with the conquest of North America from as early as 1497, its wealth generated from the slave trade, and its debates on whether or not to abolish slavery, among journalists, in now legendary pubs like the Seven Stars in Redcliffe, all these elements led to a long history of migrations, reinforced with the two great wars and the displacement of the work force known as the ‘Windrush generation’. Their cultural influences touched in priority the sons of immigrants, those coming from the Caribbean, and soon their Irish or Italian working-class neighbours in St Paul’s, Barton Hill, Hotwells, or Knowle West.
This outburst of uncontrolled and self-taught creativity led to cultural highlights today celebrated all over the world, from the multicultural sound of Massive Attack’s third album Mezzanine to the three records of Portishead. From the graffiti scene emerged the meteorite rise of the street artists like Inkie, Nick Walker, and Banksy in the 2000s, all influenced by 3D and his precocious use of stencils.
Their success in the 1990s and 2000s changed the city.
So, when Banksy decided to come back to Bristol in 2009, he found a place to do so: Bristol Museum & Art Gallery, which is celebrating its 200th anniversary this year. When he plotted an even bigger surprise, he opened its own venue however, in nearby Wester-Super-Mare, for the ephemeral but insanely successful Dismaland, the summer of 2015.
The same year, Bristol was the European Union’s Green Capital, its streets were filled with inspiring cultural and nightlife venues, St Paul’s was buzzing, as much as the Harbourside. And when my articles on Tricky’s latest albums or Massive Attack’ 2016 tour came out, everyone agreed with my observation that Bristol was one of the “cultural capitals” of Europe.
Yet, as early as in the summer 2019, I was also writing about the consequences of gentrification on neighbourhoods like St Paul’s or Easton. Venues and pubs started closing. Petitions to ‘Save the Nightlife’ had emerged, led by Annie McGann and Leighton De Burca. Even Arnolfini had to stop exhibiting for a while, keeping their space on Narrow Quay open as a library and working space.
Later in 2019, I became the writer in residence at Arnolfini, as they reopened with the ‘Still I Rise’ feminist exhibition. I wrote about the different cultures that were featured, once again highlighting the diversity of artists, from Africa, the Caribbean, the Arab world and their diaspora.
A culture of resistance
So, I think it’s fair for me to say that ‘DIY’ culture and diversity made Bristol the city I love so much.
Sadly, the lessons of these past three decades today seem a little lost… The current government is cutting funding for youth centres or arts degrees, and young creatives struggle to make a living, working on some zero-hour contract…
As artists struggle to get public funding, a lot of emphasis is put on technology, from virtual reality to artificial intelligence. It sometimes feels like public institutions have forgotten to invest in the arts’ beating heart: people.
I appreciate the efforts made by some of them to connect with more diverse audiences and improve their outreach. I also hear many who still feel unheard and unseen, as performers or as spectators. Each year, Bristol becomes more and more diverse, and many of its new communities feel underrepresented.
These past few years, game-changing events have already shifted the future of Bristol: the Covid-19 pandemic, then Brexit… But also the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests that led to the toppling to the statue of the slaver Edward Colston, who had been turned into a figure of so-called philanthropy from the Victorian era.
According to me, the resilience of Bristol’s cultural strength is also largely due to another specific phenomenon: its long history of activism. Without the 1963 Bus Boycott, the 1980 St Paul’s “riots” and protests that followed, the musicians supporting causes such as anti-racism, the anti-apartheid movement, Palestinian rights, justice for the victims of the ‘Windrush scandal’, in terms of culture, Bristol would not be Bristol.
In this, a few of Bristol’s world-renowned artists can be celebrated, and activists, such as the historian Roger Ball and the Radical History Group, and the former lord mayor Cleo Lake.
When Bristol’s underground scene emerged, there were after a few years so many bands and hip-hop crews, not only the Wild Bunch, but Fresh 4, around DJs Flynn and Krust, Smith & Mighty, FBI, and later Roni Size & Reprazent. Despite the lack of funds or venues. This allowed emulation, and helped the youth to be inspired, to believe it was possible to create a new music.
30 years after the release of Massive Attack’s first album, Blue Lines, which put Bristol on Britain’s cultural map, some artists have luckily shown that it was possible to do it again: the producers from the Young Echo collective, the singer-songwriter Laura Kidd (known first as She Makes War and now Penfriend), the post-post-punk band Idles, the internationally-acclaimed Americana singer Yola. And some moved to Bristol for its underground scene, like members of the collective EP64, the DJ Batu, or the young non-binary singer-producer Tara Lily Klein, aka t l k.
It is important to foster a new generation. And to not let anyone here believe they cannot exist because society shows them that they are bound to be underrepresented.
As the great photographer who documented the pioneers’ journey, Andy Beese aka ‘Beezer’, says: “Make a scene to make a culture”. He also often quotes the aforementioned Mark Stewart, whose lyrics encouraged us to “Kiss the future, protest and survive”.
To me, these words still sound like a mantra for the future of the city.
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Melissa Chemam is a journalist, broadcaster and writer on art, music, culture, social change, African affairs, North/South relations, and activism. She is the author of the book ‘Out of the Comfort Zone’ (Tangent Books, 2019), and currently writes for RFI English, Art UK, the New Arab, Bylines Times, UP Mag, Skin Deep.
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You can still find the book this text was published in here:
