We Were Here: A History of Black People & Alternative Music

Join us for a live conversation to mark the publication of We Were Here - A History of Black People & Alternative Music.

The talk will start at 7.30pm, there will be an audience Q&A & signed books will be available for purchase on the night.

A reclamation of rock'n'roll for the Black artists who tore up and re-wrote its rules, by musician, arts and culture journalist and die-hard alternative music superfan, Stephanie Phillips.

We Were Here promises to rip up our received history of rock 'n' roll and alternative music and repopulate it with the extraordinary Black artists and influential figures who truly steered its course from the 1930s to the present day, including vital figures Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Little Richard, Jimi Hendrix, Tina Turner, Betty Davis, Poly Styrene, Bad Brains and beyond. As well as reflecting on why Black people have continued to be drawn to alternative music despite their ongoing ostracization from it by the white mainstream industry, Phillips argues that there would be no alternative music without Black artists, and that its future lies in the hands of Gen Z Black musicians experimenting with the boundaries of what punk, metal, hardcore and indie could be.

About Stephanie:

Stephanie Phillips is a London-based music journalist and musician who writes for the Independent, The Quietus, Vice, Bandcamp and The Wire. She started the Black feminist punk band Big Joanie and played backup for Bikini Kill and Sleater-Kinney. She is also part of the collective behind Decolonise Fest, a festival celebrating punks of colour. Faber & Faber published her first book, Why Solange Matters, as part of the Music Matters series in 2021; it was praised by the likes of Thurston Moore and Caleb Azumah Nelson.