Last Friday (January 27th) at the Notting Hill Arts Club saw the latest instalment of the monthly hip all-female night Rock The Belles, LIVE’s Christian Adofo samples a celebration which goes above and beyond any gender cliché.
Not to be confused with the legendary hip-hop festival, Rock The Belles is a sprightly showcase for creative females who are making their mark in the arts, fashion and music industries respectively. I rocked down to this edition of RTB on my Larry lonesome with this resonating for company from the station to the venue.
Held on the last Friday of every month, I ambled my way downstairs to the low lit confines of club and was greeted by a motley crew of local Sugar Mama’s, Scenesters (from the opposite direction of LDN) and Statues that were restored to reality when a song that was on a Vice Playlist 24 hrs ago dropped. One side of the space had a bar and booths to pop your Prosecco (or Panda Pops) and the other area, separated by a wall, where the dance floor and stage was found. The DJ is situated between the two a la Cilla Black on cult dating show Blind Date but there are no cheesy cacophonies shouted across a polystyrene partition here.
NoLay and Shystie are two artists far removed from the well-off backdrop of West London but together bring a dose of defiance and determination that gets the dancefloor giddy. The former is defiantly up first ,trundling on stage in boots that would send little toes into rehab, she personifies her name (which means no longness) and sets the party off with ‘Drugs’ from her latest EP He Said She Said I Am Bad. The juxtaposition of rolling bass; the soft echoic meander of the title track’s name (sung by O.G Ms Dynamite) and her forthright flow is addictive to get the crowd bubbling.
Seasoned MC Shystie assumed the baton next, clad in a yellow and black jumpsuit (with a barnet that had a hint of Keri Hilson), she immediately had the masses pulling screwfaces in admiration for her bars over Wiley’s grime classic ‘Eskimo’. Yet, it was the bashment tinged ‘Swagoola’ that generated a carnival-like atmosphere, as she passed cups of homemade ‘Swag Juice’ around (which her ardent Twitter followers know about) and vigorous sprays of silly string temporarily transformed the platform into a sticky web. The addition of hefty backing dancers Double Trouble induced a special L.D.N twist on the Dougie skank and by the time UK Funky favourite ‘Pull It’ dropped, the Hackney-born female had the punters pandering for more.
For calm vibes that are on point like a decimal, and resident DJ’s that drop a cross-section of recent riddims and those which make you reminisce, you’d be hard pressed to find a better night than Rock The Belles across the country (let alone the Big Smoke).
7.5/10
For more information, on Rock The Belles, check out www.rockthebelles.com or follow on Twitter @IRockTheBelles
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