Walking into the interview with a hand-sharpied Black Flag t-shirt, Claire Barrow has always been punk(ish). She first gained 2014-Tumblr notoriety for her hand-painted leather jackets, which have been worn by Rihanna, Faris Badwan (of the Horrors), and Lou Reed. Despite, in recent times, being most famously known for her work with Bladee, Claire Barrow herself doesn't listen to too much hyperpop at all... it seems that, just as with her career, the second she gets into something, she's already eons over it. Don't forget, she was a fashion designer under NEWGEN for years before she switched to art, then sculpture ... and now she's talking about starting a band. Don't fret, whatever she does, she's good at it.

This interview took place in person over the course of a few hours at Claire Barrow's Chalk Farm studio. Hence its more conversational style, as compared to this zine's other interviews.. "There's this guy here, in Camden, who's the dictator of this store that's been around since the 70s. All the sizes are mixed up, and its three stories of cobwebs, but its so fun to look around here. There aren't many places like that left, it's become really touristy. But I like that about having my studio here. It's like "punk graveyard"; stuff has happened here, but no longer. There are all these remnants of it. And that interests me because it's so touristy yet based around subculture, which is a rare place. England is so known for punk and indie. An example of that clash is that shitty Amy Winehouse statue in Camden, it looks nothing like her. It's fucked. And it's gonna be there forever too. I'm sure she wouldn't like it."

ON BEING SCENE (D.O.S (DEATH OF SUBCULTURE), MY SPACE)

How do you find social media has affected creatives?

I feel like people stopped taking risks at a certain point. When Myspace existed, it was quite risk taking. But then Facebook started and that was like, so generic and familiar, it wasn't like a space of true expression. It's posting drunk pictures for your family to see. People stopped taking risks. The other day I was researching how the 'scene' subculture happened on MySpace. In an interview I watched about "scene" hairstyles, someone talked about how people were doing it first in the real world, but then they took it online. And that's how quickly it hit, a fashion trend can hit so quick online. It's got impact, you know? The first online subculture was scene. But back then it was linked to the music, and now it's not so much. Subculture now is diluted a lot. Now there's less tribal instincts, group mentality. Everyone's trying to be an individual. Online. But then again most people just don't care about music. They just want a quick fix of a Spotify situation.

I didn't have it until last year! I was doing YouTube to mp3. When I was 19 I used Limewire to download this massive back catalogue of every punk album there ever was. I'm talking it had to have it's own physical hard drive. Took me 2 days to download. I would always carry the hard drive around with me from computer to computer. There was a point where I was obsessed with it, and went through to discover new bands from it. Then it almost put me off punk at some point. I think this is a pattern with my music tastes, I go in and out of genres quite often. It's always been about discovering something new, for me. That's how I've always got off on music, because I grew up in a house music wasn't even playing. Our radio, would only play Chart Hit Music. I only saw rock music when I was watching music channels on TV that had bands on them. My parents were very against alternative culture. It used to make me really angry, but now I know not everyone is into music.

Yeah, I think I was a Myspace-emo-scene person. In that sense, I was mainstream. I used to express myself through weird accessories, very FRUITS inspired. I bought copies of it from a local shop. The scene subculture in itself was very inspired by that, so I guess I was a textbook 'scene' kid. I had hair extensions, blonde ones underneath my brown hair. Scene was my introduction to a broader sense of music. MySpace was really good for discovering music at the time. YouTube wasn't really popping off. It was early internet. That was when I was quite young though, around 13-14. Around then I was also into the Strokes and the

Libertines. But when I reached 16 I had naturally progressed towards bands like Sonic Youth and the Velvet Underground. I'd say  'Heroin' is one of my favourite songs ever. I ended up writing my college essay about post-hardcore, with bands like Indian Summer. I had to know everything about every band from the 80s, 70s, and 60s. I was even into death metal and pop. But I didn't truly like pop. I remember once being drawn to the cover of this CD in my local shop. It was the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, I was obsessed, but I used to play it really quietly to not disrupt my family. The scene music that I was into was heavier and it had like electro-classy elements, but I'd never been interested in like electronic music until six years ago, which I'm now really into. I recently saw Skrillex playing. I think he's really talented. Someone in there was saying Skrillex was so cringy. And I told them "no, he's a musical genius". And he asked "are you kidding?" I said, "just because you don't like him doesn't mean it's not a fact that he's a musical genius". He is! He started a subculture and a genre, basically. Dubstep. He was an emo, and then he switched and all the emos got into that.

Yes! Do you not remember? He was in an emo band. He looked like them pictures on my concept wall. He was like a king of scene. He had this band, From First to Last, and they were really good.

I wasn't out of spite, just because all my friends said "they're really cool". And I didn't wanna be basic. I wanted to know about the weird ones no one else is into.They were played on the TV, you know, they were a popular emo band. Or a late scene band, they came around 2007. Everyone fancied Skrillex too, bisexual friends from school really fancied him and wanted to be him.

ON BEING ELECTRO (and an edgelord)

What got you into the electronic music you currently enjoy?

I became bored with rock. I was in a musical rut. I was still listening to like Black Flag and all that sort of stuff on repeat, and I'd still perpetually find new bands from the 80s and go to punk shows, around the time I was doing fashion. I refused to get into electronic because I had a boyfriend that was into really bad 80s coldwave music (Depeche Mode, etc.), and I didn't like it. By then there was all this other electronic music stuff happening in London, which I wasn't a part of that scene to be honest. I was too self involved with my own fashion stuff going on at the time, so I was living in the past. Living in the 80s and even at one point I was into 60s music a lot. I think what changed when I woke up a bit. I ditched the fashion industry and moved to LA. Then I came back and I got a SoundCloud account.

I got a SoundCloud account fucking way too late. People had been on it for like fucking decades. When I got an account I started discovering new non-rock music and even to this day my main music that I listen to is trance music from SoundCloud. I love tacky music. I listen to like a lot of mixes.

Yeah, I also like DJs. I like when people on SoundCloud remix different genres together. It's like a mash up. I guess I've changed with the times a bit. I kind of like what's cool right now. In terms of what people are making right now, I'm into it, I'm feeling it…

I mean, no. I don't know. Well there's one but it's so edgelord I can't say it.

I really love John Maus at the moment.

That’s funny, my friend just tried getting me into his stuff.

He went to the Trump rally and everyone hates him now. He's canceled you know. But I love a sort of canceled musician. I like to get into someone when they're kind of on the way out. Just dissect it a little bit. I'm like, really into him at the moment. That's kind of all I listen to now.

I've actually gotten less into trance recently, I went to a festival in London like a year ago and it was really bad. Everyone looked terrible, everyone was white, they dressed like they'd literally just gone to like the NEXT sale. It looked like they'd dug through a charity shop from 10 years ago, it was really bad vibes. It made me think differently about trance music. I thought I'd love it but really put me off. I was thinking, "this really isn't a very inclusive space". Its very backwards in it's ways, and very tacky, but

there's just something about the euphoria of it I love.

Do you like pop?

I don't like pop. I don't mind being out dancing to certain songs, there's just something about it I find jarring, when a really bad pop song comes on. That because it's the mainstream you must hear it again and again and again. It's slightly torturous.

Oh my god, it's shit for them isn't it. I do like some 80s pop. I'm always very 80s. But there's just something about it that's gone off for me… There is this one Ariana Grande album I quite liked, Sweetener, I'd put it on repeat a lot. It just hit for me for some reason.

The hyperpop thing was kind of interesting. I have friends that are doing it, but it's not necessarily my taste. I just like experimentation and to see something that's 'punk spirited'. That's what I require to enjoy my music. When either something's a bit off about it or there's like a 'punk spirit' to it. I find that nowadays people are forgetting to be punk. Bring it back! Do something more exciting. I do like Bladee though, I think he's a really interesting artist. Obviously, I'm biased a bit, because he's my friend… but I think he's a really, really talented songwriter. It seems effortless, but it has really been thought out so much. His spirit is punk. He grew up listening to punk and was in a punk band. I think that's where it came from, you know. But then I don't necessarily… when I say I'm into what's current, I guess I'm not. I just like experimentations.

ON MUSIC (General)

Do you feel music has changed your life?

Definitely. Obviously, I like making art and fashion. Well, let's just say I like making art, but music has always been the thing that's led me to be open to the possibilities of contemporary art before I was even aware of it. I know art doesn't just exist in one medium, it can be music, too. Even without album artwork, even without the fashion that's associated with it. It can create a visual world in itself and like hearing The Velvet Underground for sure had an impact. When I heard 'Heroin' for the first time, I was like, fuck, oh my god. This is incredible. It makes me want to do heroin so bad. (Laughter) But also just the noise of it. This is the thing

when you grew up with mainstream music, you don't really hear noise music very often, because noise music is the opposite of what people in the mainstream want to hear, completely. So when I started to hear noise I started to understand that, music doesn't have to have a structure to it, unlike what you're conditioned to believe. And that completely opened my mind to what can be done with fashion and art. I definitely, like got all my early inspiration, from that.

I did, I really really hated that jacket. I'm embarrassed by it. At least I got to do it. He was really ill at the time. AnOther magazine asked me "do you want to do a jacket about him? And we'll write an article about you liking Lou Reed and then we'll give it to him". I think I was drunk when I got interviewed for that article… It wasn't the best thing I've ever made. But it was nice for them to give it to Lou afterwards. Apparently, he got it and he gave it to his friend. And his friend messaged me on Instagram and said, "Hey, I've got your jacket. Lou gave it to me. He said he thought that I would like it. And I love it. So thank you so much". So it's cool that he did pass it on to someone. That was super cute.

Yes, at the time. I think I started making them initially just as a thing to do. But, as I was like doing them and researching it, I got really into Kenneth Anger and that sort of thing. I love that film, and that look. I think in the Lou Reed jacket there was that sort of influence. Previous to that it was honestly just a little bit more loose.

I find there were lots of references to Lou Reed’s bisexuality and general experimentation in that jacket. Did the piece sort of wink at that?

Yeah, definitely. I really loved that era of Lou Reed too, when he was kind of doing drag. Wearing the white makeup and black lipstick. That's my favourite look of his. I was trying to channel that in the jacket.

I don't think so. I had just moved to London and I was doing it for money. I was trying to find a way in. A way to get to a point where I could make what I actually wanted to in fashion. When I first did the jacket, I made 100 pounds. Great. I should do another one. And then I did another one and another one. One I put on Tumblr and it got a lot of reposts, Rihanna wore that one.

I do have one. Black Sabbath's 'Paranoid'. With a guy with that sword just moving in a rainbow.

I miss DIY-ing, I'm like totally open to get back into it. I bleached a Fendi bag the other day that's not that nice with the intention of drawing lots of Misfits stuff on it actually! I want to put this Misfits t-shirt I've got on it and then add more Misfits details to it. I really like the way the Misfits look. They're definitely one of my favourite bands ever. Early Misfits is the best. I really like early albums generally.

I think so. I love a few of their latest songs. I love early punk band albums. They're the best ones.

Just the one with all the heads. The debut. I also remember that one song on Funhouse and it's got that song that's really long in the middle.

ON THE INDUSTRY

What’s the most interesting modelling gig you’ve ever done?

I did something with Sienna Miller one time. It was really random. They dyed my hair purple for the first time. I tried to do it myself once, and I didn't put the dye on for long enough and it had gone a really horrible burgundy… So I told them yah if you're gonna dye my hair I'll fuckin do it. It was nice, back then I felt a lot less self conscious. Because it was not an Instagram world. You know, we just went out and did stuff. I didn't think what I did when I was first beginning would stick on the internet forever. Sometimes I get a bit sad about that, you could Google me and find a terrible thing I did, or a horrible picture or something. It just didn't feel like that much would stick at the time. I was just a student. So I wasn't taking myself super seriously. I wanted to eventually be a designer. I was still at uni, finding my way around things when Rihanna bought that jacket.

I was fuckin buzzin! It wasn't my sort of main taste in music. But it made my mum really happy. And it made everyone at uni get really jealous of me and hate me. That was a good thing. I also got attention from the fashion industry as well, which is what I wanted at the time. My dream when I was younger was always to be a designer, not an artist. I wanted to make fashion collections. So I did that. Then I found out when I was in that system that the thing that I actually wanted to do was make ideas happen, you know, make ART. Make ideas exist physically in 3D form. My clothes always had paintings or prints on them. That was my signature, because I needed to find an outlet to have my drawings on clothes. But when I was in the system I found it was not a nurturing place, creatively. I hated Fashion Week, where the elders control it... honestly, it didn't feel very punk. That drew me back to what I felt was true to myself. So I withdrew. I just quit the system, so I wasn't getting funding from the British Fashion Council and NewGen. I realised I didn't actually want to do this. Or, I needed to find a new way of doing it. I needed to live a little bit as a 20 year old. I just like went straight from uni to like, Fashion Week. So I consciously stopped doing it. Then spent a few years just traveling about and working on random stuff. It's good. I finally feel like I'm at a place now where I'm making things on my own terms. And it's really making me happy. I love making art and it's maybe something I should have always done. Rather than fashion school. maybe I should have gone to art school, and taken myself a tiny bit more seriously, even at the point of the jackets. That can be an art form too, there just wasn't that language surrounding it. I was at fashion school. So it was a fashion thing.

Yeah, I guess that's still happening right now with the "333" Bladee cover. That was a painting everyone really liked. I guess there's a slight bit of "what's she going to do next?" But I don't care, I'll keep doing want I want to do.

I did airbrush things for one of her shots. We were in the same class. We did a project together. We were best friends in our class, it was us against everyone else. They were maybe a bit jealous because we really just knew who we were a little bit more. At that point. We both wanted to be designers. Our classmates weren't saying they wanted to be designers, but they probably did want to be designers. There were some talented people, but they all kind of ended up working for brands…

ON HER ART (Doodle and Hieroglyphics)

Is there any reasoning behind your art almost never having any depth or perspective, being more doodle-y rather than realistic?

I've always drawn like that. Everything often is very flat on… I'm aware it's happening, I'm embracing it, but I'm starting to paint a little bit more realistically sometimes too. I can, but I just choose not to. I think, honestly it's because I was obsessed with ancient Egypt when I was young.

I was obsessed. It was my passion. I had always been dyslexic, so I'm not very good at reading. I'm not very good at holding names and geography and places and things. Nonetheless, I've always been obsessed with learning more and more about Ancient Egypt. Not even holding the knowledge. It's just a passion. Hieroglyphics and tomb paintings was the first art to really inspire me. I was also really into this British painter called Lowry, who did stickman drawings in towns and everything's very flat from the front. I recreated one of his works when I was six, like completely too. Too accurate. The teacher that taught me how to do this really liked it. So he took it into show at a university and said, "oh, a 6 year old girl did this". I liked copying at that point, in a cartoonish style I guess. Cartoons are very inspired from Egyptian paintings.The flat perspective just hit when I was a kid. And it just hasn't really changed since. I see no problem with the unrealistic. It's a bit of a fight against mainstream stuff, too. Because it's like, I was always told to make my work more real-looking.

No, but my friend and her boyfriend saw one, in Australia. They saw it flying above their bedroom window, and then it went. They were disturbed by it for years. They couldn't believe they saw it. It looked like classic UFO, it was a circular spacecraft.

It's a bit of both. It really helps me to lead with a story, which I will never reveal to people. The story can be from a dream, or from something I have written, because I like to write a lot. I'd say my practice is writing a lot, and then drawing a lot. Then it goes on to create a sculpture or a painting. Standard for a lot of artists, I know, but I would say that the writing of comes first.

I just write words and like short things. I'm not a really good writer. As I said, I'm dyslexic. So I'm not really prolific with words, I just need to sometimes get something out quickly.

Yeah, I do. I think maybe it's a hindrance to me by not explaining it. I feel like I'm still in the early stages of my work. This is a lifelong thing for me. So I feel like there's still a lot of learning to do. I feel like a bit of a child sometimes in the way that I'm making art. Though I have been making it for a long time, since I was a teenager, I'm always wanting to reinvent it. I'm trying to master everything at once. That makes me comfortable, and that makes me happy. Just like how I like to learn about new music all the time, where I get obsessed with things and move on, I feel that way about art too. The idea is what drives me. I've always got an idea I'd like to try and achieve, it doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to look great. I just need to get the idea out. Sometimes I get really down. If I can't get my idea out.

ON BEING IN A BAND (?)

Why can’t you get the ideas done? Materialistically? Or skill-wise?

Materials, skills, money. And, a little bit of needing bravery too, I was always a shy person. Sometimes it takes a while to do things. I often think maybe it's my time to join a band and be the singer. To let that out more, that thing that needs to be screamed about, let that confidence out. I can either do that, or I can just start to let it out fully in my work.

Well, there's talks happening… with my friends…

I don't think it should be a genre. I think we should just get in there and start doing it. I've like kind of been doing this singing, which is both whispering and screaming. It's like ASMR. The problem is that it's so quiet. So it picks up the rest of the room, because you'd have to turn my mic really high.

We did our first performance the other week, just for one song. We just got on stage and made it up as we went along. But my microphone didn't work, I was whispering so much. The sound guy didn't turn it up because he didn't know that I was actually singing!

No, I don't remember a point. I just always knew. I must have come to London on a trip. I knew for certain when I was in college. I don't think I would have moved to London if I hadn't have gone to art college. Because it pushed me out of my comfort zone in terms of like having to get the bus. Before that I would just walk to school. My sister is still in our small town. She's really different to me, she likes pop music...

What's really basic for someone born around my time, but I was obsessed with Beanie Babies. I've still got them. Not all of them. But some of the favourites. I feel I've gone off them a bit recently, they've become oversaturated again. I'm sick of them. I want them to just fuck off. They symbolise so much, they're a capitalist object. They were only a trend for a few years yet they mean so much to me. Strange fake animals, these representations of animals, completely detached from the actual animal itself. Beanie babies exist in this world of cuteness. They're moorish. I look at them and feel like "I hate you and I want to punch you".

I kind of hate that dog. The pink one. I just got it off Amazon because I'm gonna rip it apart, to get the insides out of it. Because it's an animatronic, and I'm using it to make art. A sculpture. I've been making these soft sculptures for years, ripping up old Teddys. I'm not precious about ripping everything up.

But once you do it, it's like it's over. it's detaching the capitalist ideas of an object having a soul too. It's just matter. It's just another thing that can be used to make something else with your own hands, like DIY- ing clothes as well. That's a hard step when you're first doing it, too, isn't it? When you're a kid cropping your shirt for the first time, its like AHH!