‘Skunk Anansie wouldn’t exist without Grassroot venues’

Skin from Skunk Anansie discussed the importance of grassroots venues (Picture: Belinda Jiao) Skunk Anansie’s frontwoman Skin believes grassroots venues are the reason her band was able to exist. Fronted by singer Skin – real name Deborah Anne Dyer – British rock band Skunk Anansie was formed in London in 1994 with bass player Cass, guitarist Ace, and drummer Mark Richardson Over their decades-long career, they have released six studio albums and one compilation album, spawning hit singles including Charity, Hedonism, Selling Jesus and Weak. In 1999, Skunk Anansie also made history as the first black British headliner of Glastonbury Festival. Skin meets Metro at The Splash Club at Water Rats, an iconic, award-winning 90s venue where her band first came to fame, to emphasise the importance of grassroots venues. ‘The very, very first Skunk Anansie gig was here. Used to be a lot scuzzier, no air conditioning, complete, like knackered black box – and it was fantastic. ‘You could, you know, because when things are a bit scruffy and a little bit messed up, people aren’t as precious about it. So you could really be yourselves.’ ‘The thing about grassroots venues is that people are a lot less precious about it, so you can kind of be yourself, but without having those grassroots venues, there’s nowhere to play and there’s nowhere to get good.’ Skin, 57, details that without this venue, and others like it, she doesn’t believe that Skunk Anasie would have been able to get a start, get good, and become the fixture of the ’90s rock scene that they became. ‘If we didn’t have this, then where would we have played? Because, you know, there’s a million pubs in London, but not many of them will let you put on a rock night. ‘So, yeah, it was, I don’t know if Skunk Anansie would have been able to start, because we really had to do a lot of gigs to get gig to get good.’ Skin of Skunk Anansie performing on stage at Splash Club, Kings Cross, London, 11 March 1994. (Picture: Ian Dickson/Redferns) The venue has welcomed many of the greats with Bob Dylan playing his first ever gig at the venue in 1962, The Pogues performing inn 1982 and Oasis having their London debut at the club in 1994. Skin says that the Water Rats was a ‘safe haven’ for the rock bands of the time, and a safe space for those in the LGBTQ+ community – which wasn’t always the case at the time. ‘It was just like a safe haven for us little rock bands. And the wonderful thing about it was that those bands had Asian people in there, those bands had Black people in there, those bands had queer people in there. She adds: ‘There’s a healthy kind of S&M kind of side to some of the bands as well. So it was just where you could kind of be free and be your band, and you weren’t judged because of your sexuality or skin colour or what you were into. It was a very natural scene.’ She reflects on her own place within the community: ‘I would be by myself, because I was the only kind of little, skinny, bald-headed, queer, Black girl into rock music. ‘When I got here, nobody was judging me. Nobody was, you know, saying that my music was un-Christian, and all of that stuff, stuff that I’d hear at home. So I just felt much safer here, and I knew that there were people here going to look after me.’ The Water Rats looks rather different today (Picture: Ian Dickson/Redferns) Reflecting on her fondest memories in the venue, Skin recalls the band;s first ever gig where 250 people would be crammed into the venue (which today holds 200 maximum) and she crowd surfed around the room. ‘I mean, this place only holds 250 people, but I managed to stage dive from there about five times in my little nightie. ‘It was just mad, because the very first Skunk Anansie gig. It was just all fans and all people that were into us, because we were an unsigned supergroup. ‘Cass was the best bass player. Mark was the best guitarist. I was the best singer. We had the worst drummer, because it wasn’t Mark Peterson,’ she says with a laugh. ‘The roof just came off because people were expecting something good, and then we were 10 times better than that. You know, we knew it, but we knew that they were going to go crazy. And it was just something in the air, and it just, it literally just was like somebody just keg of dynamite on the dance floor.’ The star looks much the same today as she did decades ago (Picture: Stefania D’Alessandro/Getty Images) Skin, Martin ‘Ace’ Kent, Richard ‘Cass’ Lewis, and Mark Richardson make up the band (Picture: Gie Knaeps/Getty Images) London is still a thriving epicentre of the music scene and a place where a lot of music acts get their start. But things have changed since the 90s. Venues across the capital are closing down, and technology plays a huge role in supporting and promoting up-and-coming musicians. ‘The positive things about social media is, as you said, you know, you can do off things very quickly, and have people turning up to a venue with 10 minutes’ notice, for instance, which is not something you could do back in the day. ‘But I do think it also the negatives is it has made people a bit more flaky and a bit more lazy.’ Legendary drummer’s 'medical emergency' forces band to cancel all tour and festival dates 90s pop legend's showstopping Eurovision 2025 return 'still up in the air' Metallica cause an actual earthquake after rocking so hard at uni gig She adds that in a time without pagers and mobiles, this was a big no-no: ‘I think the thing about smartphones or whatever is that people can change plans on you, like, two minutes before they’re supposed to turn up. ‘Or you’d be waiting for someone in half an hour. You know, before the whatever you’re supposed to do, they’re not turning up. See, that kind of flakiness was really like a red card back in those days, and it has changed in terms of the fact that now we have social media everybody’s kind of finds people that way, which is fine.’ Although times have changed, she emphasised that social media could most certainly be used to help promote the London scene in a way that wasn’t possible back then. ‘In those days, it was kind of like a pub crawl of ravers or a pub crawl of rock musicians, like, somebody will be at a band and say, “Oh, this band’s really great.” And they’d run outside and tell their mates, and everyone would come in. Now they could just do that on WhatsApp. Suddenly, everybody’s turning up.’ Got a story? If you’ve got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the Metro.co.uk entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@metro.co.uk, calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we’d love to hear from you. Arrow MORE: McDonald’s adds popular 90s toy to Happy Meals — and they sell for thousands Arrow MORE: Legendary drummer’s ‘medical emergency’ forces band to cancel all tour and festival dates Arrow MORE: 90s pop legend’s showstopping Eurovision 2025 return ‘still up in the air’

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