Poly Styrene (Hare Hare)

It's one year ago today since Marianne Elliott Said, also known as Poly Styrene, won her battle to go to higher places and left us a marvellous legacy of music and images. Poly was and is a great hero of mine and I was terribly sad to hear of her illness and then her death. It all happened so quickly while at the same time her album, 'Generation Indigo' was released to critical acclaim. We had the joys of the album and the sadness of her illness and passing all within a short time of a matter of weeks.

I saw a local TV programme interview with Poly sounding breathless but positive about the album and her own health, positive to the end. She always was positive in lots of ways. Not for her the nihilism of many of the punk bands back in the day. Her rebellion was a bit more thoughtful. She cared about things like consumerism, pressures on women (and herself) to look stereotyped and beautiful, about a higher life, about Krishna, about peer pressure, about cruelty, about war and about love. Not for Poly the trembling-lipped love ballad, she gave us a howling bouncy song to love in it's most basic forms in 'LUV'.

Something I have been pleased to see over the past year is not the mourning of fans but the discovery of Poly and the Spex by new fans, by young people who find the videos on YouTube and go on to explore her music. That gives me hope and tells me that her work will continue to be appreciated. You don't have to have bought the singles in 1978 to be a fan, you might just have discovered her last week, downloaded 'Germfree Adolescents' and then searched for more and find 'Generation Indigo'. I love seeing the tweets from people who discover Poly and X-Ray Spex, who post links to videos and keep spreading the word.

A tribute album has been released in America in which bands I've never heard of cover Spex songs - some are better than others as is always the way but I don't care, I downloaded it straight away. I want to hear how bands today interpret 30 year old songs and pay homage to Poly. It's called 'Rebel On The Underground' and is available here.  Go on, buy it and enjoy the music - it's in a good cause.

I suspect Poly would like the idea of the album, like the idea of playing it loudly and bouncing round the room in day-glo socks and celebrating her music, not mourning it. Poly earned her place in music history with her first single with the Spex and went on to do and be so much more. The world is a better place for Poly being in it even though she wasn't in it for long enough.

Namaste Poly.