The Day The World Turned Dayglo

Of the many musicians who grabbed my attention back in the heady days of punk’s first flowering, Poly Styrene stood out for a number of reasons.

‘Women in Rock’TM were still relatively rare, and uncompromising women like Poly were even more scarce. No ‘rock chick’, she. Born Marianne Elliott-Saïd, of British-Somali heritage, she was a visible woman of colour in an overwhelmingly white genre; writing for and art-directing her band X-Ray Spex, and pioneering her own style, borrowing as much from Pop Art and Dada as from rock; and taking topics such as identity, consumerism and sci-fi as her subjects.

After ending the band she become actively involved with the Hare Krishna movement and remained a devotee for the rest of her life.

She experienced mental health difficulties throughout her adult life but continued with a sporadic musical career and released a particularly well-received album, ‘Generation Indigo’ just a month before her death from breast cancer in 2011, aged just 53.

Today, Poly’s daughter, writer/musician/academic/teacher/film producer, Celeste Bell (left), was in town as part of the Writing on the Wall festival to talk about her mum, and about ‘Dayglo’, the book she’s written about her, in collaboration with the excellent music writer/artist/drummer, Zoë Howe (right) - check out her books about The Slits, Wilko Johnson, Lee Brilleaux, The Jesus and Mary Chain, and Stevie Nicks, amongst others - as well as her novel ‘Shine On, Marquee Moon’.

‘Dayglo’ is a thing of beauty. It’s an aural history comprising of extensive interviews with about 30 of Poly’s friends, family and collaborators; extracts from old press coverage; photographs and amazing treasures from the archives that Poly left to Celeste - diary entries, original art works, lyrics and creative writing.

Celeste and Zoë are also currently working on a film about Poly, ‘I Am a Cliché’, with director Paul Sng. We saw a brief extract from it tonight and I can’t wait to see the completed film.

It was a treat to speak to Celeste and Zoë afterwards, and also to have a brief chat with Zoë’s mum, Jo!

Here’s the classic X-Ray Spex track, ‘The Day The World Turned Dayglo’ https://youtube.com/watch?v=rSrOJ1ig6tI

And here’s a song co-written and performed by Poly and Celeste, and released just a few months before Poly’s death, ‘Black Christmas’ https://youtube.com/watch?v=ML0cD0REC4Y (I know it’s not exactly seasonal but it’s lovely to see Celeste and Poly perform together).