NEWSLETTER

Southend-On-Sea is a portal to another topsy-turvy dimension where all the kids are these hipper-than-hip, ice cool gothic indie babes, with immaculate style, impeccable taste in music, and intimidatingly refined cultural know-how. It’s said that each new born baby is issued with a Nuggets boxset, the second Einsturzende Neubauten album, and a copy of Perfume. If uncoolness is occasionally detected at an early age the infant is exiled to nearby Thorpe Bay, where they live out their years in the shadow of their super-being cousins. Okay, well not really, but kinda.

So far we’ve seen this come to fruition in the form of bands like The Horrors, These New Puritans, and Wretched Replica. Now it’s time for the Essex seaside town (also home to a lovely pier, and frequented by many a Radio 1 roadshow), to let loose the females of the flock; Ipso Facto. After meeting at one of the town’s monthly symposia, the now legendary Junk Club, the girls started off as the backing band for another Southend resident, Theoretical Girl, before branching out with their own “creeping noir pop”.

Vice: We’ve heard that there’s a lot of scene politics and gossip going on round your way. Do you see any parallels with the Southend scene and Hollyoaks?

Samantha Valentine (bass): Of course, small towns are always going to have scandal and gossip, and we wouldn’t change it for the world.

What’s the most salacious thing that’s ever happened there?

Well, I can’t talk too much about this. Our lead singer Rosie is the only member originally from Southend, and has been involved in a fair few scandals, but we cannot discuss them for legal reasons.

What’s the most scared you’ve been?

When I seriously burnt my hand. It was a horrific experience, my skin got stuck to the hob, and the hospital told me I’d need skin grafts, but I proved them wrong because it magically healed itself. I was thinking maybe I should write to Take A Break and get some money out of it.

Definitely. Did you know that Take A Break is the highest selling magazine in the UK?

No, I did not.

Well, there you go. What about the other girls? Anything scary happen to them?

Rosie got arrested for stealing a Seinfeld Seasons 1-3 DVD boxset from Borders once. That shook her up a lot.

I actually have the same boxset, I bought it for a fiver from a smackhead in a pub in New Cross along with a USB memory stick. Not a bad deal.

Not at all.

What are the pros and cons of having an all-girl line-up?

That’s difficult, it just seems to fit, but whether that’s because we’re all girls, I do not know. People will always feel obliged to compare you to other female bands, even though you sound nothing like them. Also, we don’t want to come across like a feminist band. We love men, a lot. We are secret misogynists really.

JAIMIE HODGSON
myspace.com/ipsofactomyspace

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