IT SEEMS THERE'S been a miscommunication. Simbiatu Ajikawo and I are not sitting in a booth at one of her favourite restaurants in London, as I'd been told. The 28-year-old actor and rapper, who you may know better as Little Simz, picks up the menu. She squints at it a little. Has she got a regular? "From here?" She looks up to meet my eye, slightly confused. "Err," and after a long pause: "No, not a regular." Once we order - fish with a prawn starter, and a passionfruit mocktail for her - I ask if lines were crossed, to place us in this fairly nondescript, "Caribbean-inspired" establishment co-founded by two white men. Yes, there may have been a mix-up. "It's a cool spot, though," she offers, diplomatically. "But favourites? I don't know," accompanied by a slight frown. To be clear, Ajikawo's preferred place to eat is Enish, in Finchley, north London. Their Nigerian fare is, to Ajikawo, "just really authentic; it feels like home, so I like going there." Now, she smiles. We're meeting right after the photoshoot, so she sits across from me in full, stunning makeup and a relaxed fleece zipped right up to the neck.
The sound of horns on a chirpy, reggae instrumental blare out from speakers above our heads. Besides her publicist, her security and the staff, we're the only people in here. It's late afternoon, in the lull between lunch and dinner services. Before Ajikawo arrived, I'd tried to find us the quietest table, and asked staff to turn the music down. "This is as low as it goes," a young waiter had said, after double-checking. Fair enough.
But Ajikawo notices it, too. She's powering down after the intensity of the shoot. And, as will become a theme when thinking about how she behaves professionally, she's hyperaware of our surroundings. We're just about to start talking about the Mercury Prize awards that nearly didn't happen.
Diese Geschichte stammt aus der December 2022/January 2023-Ausgabe von Rolling Stone UK.
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Diese Geschichte stammt aus der December 2022/January 2023-Ausgabe von Rolling Stone UK.
Starten Sie Ihre 7-tägige kostenlose Testversion von Magzter GOLD, um auf Tausende kuratierte Premium-Storys sowie über 8.000 Zeitschriften und Zeitungen zuzugreifen.
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The Scream Queen Next Door - In just a few short years, Hunter Schafer has gone from small-town North Carolina to global runways, Euphoria stardom, and her first lead role, in the horror flick Cuckoo
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Together in Electronic Dreams - Raphaella Lima of video game publisher Electronic Arts brings music to her childhood love of gaming to spotlight many of the most exciting emerging acts of the past two decades in the hit football game EA SPORTS FC
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To quote one Bob Dylan: "the times they are a-changin." After 14 years of Tory rule, 4 July saw a changing of the guard in British politics as Sir Keir Starmer stood on the steps of Downing Street to mark the start of a new Labour government and - according to the man himself - a decade of national renewal.Not that the result was ever in doubt, however. A cursory look at polls over the preceding year showed that a Labour landslide was very much on the cards, and it seemed like those aforementioned Dylan lyrics were about to ring true.
Staying Power- As they gave their first performance in the UK for five years, Rolling Stone UK caught up with Bang Chan, Lee Know, Changbin, Hyunjin, HAN, Felix, Seungmin and I.N, who together make up the record-breaking K-pop phenomenon Stray Kids
As they gave their first performance in the UK for five years, Rolling Stone UK caught up with Bang Chan, Lee Know, Changbin, Hyunjin, HAN, Felix, Seungmin and I.N, who together make up the record-breaking K-pop phenomenon Stray Kids. Here, they open up about the bonds they share between themselves and their devoted fans, as well as their common goal of super stardom
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